Amnesty

The story is set against the backdrop of an alien invasion that's more or less benign. Still, the appearance of the aliens caused a giant economic crisis, and humanity is still reeling from that. As I read somewhere on Goodreads, the bulk of the story is one big info dump: a character explaining stuff about the aliens to a few new recruits. "Info dump" shouldn't be taken as a negative: also formally this is an interesting addition to the overall collection.

There's a bit of easy handwavium though - I guess the basic premises would have suffered if it had been made into a full novel. But again: it seems Butler isn't interested in the hard science part of her stories.

Amnesty focuses on the ethical difference between intention and result, and its effect on forgiveness. The questions the story raises are not that interesting - the answers are fairly obvious - but the story works nevertheless: there was enough sense of wonder & discovery.

For a write-up of each story in Butler's Bloodchild and Other Stories collection, please visit Weighing A Pig...