Customer Reviews

The Best From Fantasy and Science Fiction: The Fiftieth Anniversary Anthology

5 star:		(3)
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1 star:		(1)

 

 

Terry Bisson, Ray Bradbury, Paul di Filippo, Harlan Ellison, Esther Friesner, Elizabeth Hand, Tanith Lee, Ursula K. Le Guin, Robert Reed, Bruce Holland Rogers, Bruce Sterling, Kate Wilhelm, and Gene Wolf are all writers whose name alone would qualify at least serious consideration for buying an anthology. This has them all. F&SF has long been a testiment to the greatness of speculative fiction and these stories are the essence of what the editors strive for: unrealistic stories of the highest literary caliber. Give this book to any one who loves SF, for that matter give this to anyone who hates SF and see if they don't love these stories.

This is one of the strongest in the long-running "Best from F&SF" series. This one collects the editors' picks from 1994-1998, which was mostly the Kristine Kathryn Rusch era. The Table of Contents is above, just before the "Search inside this book" box. 21 stories, and hardly a weak one in the bunch. Six won major awards (Hugo, Nebula, and/or World Fantasy awards. My favorites include Bruce Sterling's wonderful Hugo winner "Maneki Neko"; Ursula Le Guin's great "Solitude", one of her very best Hainish stories; Bradley Denton's droll "We Love Lydia Love", about a unique Austin rocker; SN Dyer's pointed (and very funny) "Sins of the Mothers".... I could go on and on, but trust me, if you like good SF and fantasy shorts, this is an anthology to savor, and keep to reread your personal favorites. Highly recommended.

Happy reading--
Peter D. Tillman

I really enjoy sci-fi the likes of I Robot from Isaac Asimov and many many Joe Haldeman stories, but this particular collection is terrible. I'm about 8 stories in and there's not even one gem so far. I believe this book should be re-titled to - " The Ultra-Contemplative Super-Pseudo-Intellectual's Guide to Boring Science Fiction Stories. Sorry, it's just not a very good book.

The best SF magazine in the business still continues to thrive, as evidenced by this stellar collection.