Sooner or Later Everything Falls into the Sea

Sooner or Later Everything Falls into the Sea is a 2019 short story collection by Sarah Pinsker. It includes thirteen stories, each incorporating elements of speculative fiction, most notably science fiction and fantasy.

Contents

 * "A Stretch of Highway Two Lanes Wide"
 * "And We Were Left Darkling" (originally published in Lightspeed, 2015 )
 * "Remembery Day"
 * "Sooner or Later Everything Falls into the Sea" (originally published in Lightspeed, 2016 )
 * "The Low Hum of Her"
 * "Talking with Dead People"
 * "The Sewell Home for the Temporally Displaced"
 * "In Joy, Knowing the Abyss Behind" (originally published in Strange Horizons, 2013 )
 * "No Lonely Seafarer" (originally published in Lightspeed, 2014 )
 * "Wind Will Rove"
 * "Our Lady of the Open Road"
 * "The Narwhal"
 * "And Then There Were (N-One)" (originally published in Uncanny Magazine, 2017 )

Themes
Several critics noted the atmosphere of loss, nostalgia, music and reinvention throughout the collection. Gary K. Wolfe, in a review for Locus, wrote that memory "may be [Pinsker's] characteristic theme". Publishers Weekly wrote that "In all of Pinsker’s tales, humans grapple with their relationships to technology, the supernatural, and one another." Michelle Anne Schingler of Foreword Reviews observed that yearning was integral to many of the stories in the collection.

Many of the protagonists of the stories in some way rebel against or break the norms of their society. Many stories feature characters whose communities have been displaced in some way, and the impact of social and technological change on culture is a recurring theme. Kirkus Reviews wrote that "Pinsker’s characters are often loners dedicated to idiosyncratic artistic pursuits".

The collection also prominently features LGBT characters, and many of its themes tie into gender and sexuality. Alexander Carrigan of Lambda Literary noted that "Pinsker presents characters who are all over the LGBT+ spectrum, and in many cases, it allows for further reading and exploration of each story’s themes and characters."

Reception
The collection received critical acclaim, and was given starred reviews in Publishers Weekly, Foreword Reviews, and Booklist. It won the 2020 Philip K. Dick Award, and was nominated for the World Fantasy Award—Collection, losing to Brian Evenson's Song for the Unraveling of the World.

The collection was included in B&N Reads list of "The Best Science Fiction & Fantasy Books of March 2019". It also appeared on lists of the best books of 2019 by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Fantasy & Science Fiction, and BuzzFeed.