A short story collection tied together by its two protagonists, Jem Calder’s Reward System - just in that first clause alone - does two things that I instinctively enjoy: one, short stories, and two, a conceit. It also does a third thing of deciding that one of the six stories is going to be maybe 40% of the book by itself. I like this. Like vignettes of a life post-breakup depicted off-page, these short stories belong to Julia and Nick; what became of them, where they might meet again. The first, aforementioned long short story, is inevitably the most in-depth, effectively a novella smuggled into the midst, painting a portrait of Julia’s life as a sous chef at an exclusive London restaurant. Another depicts an anonymous - “the male user”, “the female user” - pair’s orbits crossing through a dating app with an alarmingly perceptive recognition of what all that means and the psychic toll of it all. The final story, a recounting of an early pandemic reconnection over FaceTime, hits close to home without being so broadly drawn as to be obvious. Not everything in the collection works, or necessarily advances the thematic message Calder is going for, but on the whole, a rewarding system.