The last short story, 'Anxiety is the Dizziness of Freedom', was a definite five-star read for me and I highly recommend it. This story was about technology, quantum divergences, and parallel selves, and it extrapolated beautifully.

The others varied between 2.5 and 4, but all provided some sort of interesting food for thought. The title story about a robot/alien individual who dissects their own brain was probably my second favorite.

I was a bit disappointed with the longest story in the collection, which was about the cognitive, emotional, (and sexual?!) development of A.I. pets. This one did FEEL quite long and I was hoping it would all lead somewhere more interesting in the end. Instead, it was more quiet and speculative and a smidge boring.

Still, this collection ultimately did remind me of the joys of reading Sci-Fi, and the writing was always impressive in some facet.