Title: Dolly
Author: Elizabeth Bear
First Publication: Asimov's Science Fiction, Jan. 2011
Cover: Tomislav Tikulin
Elizabeth Bear must be a fan of Isaac Asimov’s robot stories. “Dolly” seems like a modern version of the classic Asimov robot mystery. Bear’s robots are not as advanced as Asimov’s. The positronic brain has not been developed. The main characters, two detectives, are called in to investigate a closed room murder. Only the victim and his robot companion are in the room. The robot obviously had to commit the murder. The question becomes who hacked into the programming to orchestrate the deed. Or is something else going on… Bear has captured the spirit of classic science fiction short story telling and combined it with a modern writing style. After reading this story, I will be looking for more of Bear’s work in the future.
