This short-story collection is ideas-driven, not character-driven, and very good. In a way, it feels like a throwback to the 1950s anthologies I read in my teens, minus any trite cliches or stereotyped characters. And the ideas presented in Chaing's stories are exciting. What if in ancient Babylonia, you could buil a tower to heaven? What would the logistics be? What if the letters used to activate a golem was like its DNA? What would the world be like if biblical angels came to earth fairly regularly? And that other one, about beauty - excellent food for thought.