New Skies: An Anthology of Today's Science Fiction [Hardcover]

Patrick Nielsen Hayden (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 13, 2003

A new generation of science fiction fans is at hand. A new generation that is curious, smart, audacious, and experimental. It is for them that Patrick Nielsen Hayden-winner of the World Fantasy Award for Best Anthology - has selected these stories from the thousands published by contemporary SF writers over the past two decades.

Here are writers such as Philip K. Dick, Orson Scott Card, Jane Yolen, Greg Bear, Kim Stanley Robinson, Steven Gould, Connie Willis, Spider Robinson, and many more. Here is a careening adventure along the outside of a tower looming miles above the ground, and a tale of desperate survival on the deadly surface of the Moon. Here is a world in which children divorce their parents, and the story of a four-dimensional boy in a three-dimensional world. Here are future young people rebuilding after terrible disasters, and here is a story of the future development of baseball-on Mars.

Nightmarish or whimsical, irreverent or swashbuckling, each of these stories is an adventure in imagination. Journey from the here and now into New Skies.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Gr. 7-12. A fine lineup of authors, including Orson Scott Card, Philip K. Dick, Steven Gould, Connie Willis, and Jane Yolen, distinguishes this collection of short stories that first appeared in science fiction magazines. The most recent story, Greg van Eekhout's "Will You Be an Astronaut?" features a Mexican astronaut named Antonio in a future when all astronauts come from Central and South America and a place called the "North American Diaspora." Other stories conjure up a world in which children can divorce their parents, a four-dimensional boy who exists in a three-dimensional world, and an explanation for baseball's development on Mars. There is something for everyone--adventure, comedy, horror, satire, suspense, and whimsy. Especially noteworthy is Terry Bisson's "They're Made Out of Meat," about aliens who visit Earth and are astonished by how much "sentient meat" have managed to accomplish. Science fiction fans will enjoy this solid collection of some of the best the genre has to offer. Ed Sullivan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

"A first-rate selection of some of the best short SF of recent years."--LOCUS

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 13 and up
  
• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Tor Teen; First Edition edition (September 13, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0765300168
• ISBN-13: 978-0765300164
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.7 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,713,652 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fresh modern stories, July 10, 2006

By 

Gary Sprandel (Frankfort, Kentucky) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: New Skies: An Anthology of Today's Science Fiction (Hardcover)

It's hard to define the "modern era" of science fiction, but this anthology provides a good measure. The stories (originally published from 1981 to 2002) have a freshness, perhaps by asking questions about how we humans would react to future realities. These 17 stores are not hard on scientific details, but rather focus on human reaction. There are no rigid forms and Maureen McHughs "Lincoln Train" could be thought of as alternate history. Greg Bear's "Tangents" tells a story of a young boy interacting with an older experimental couple, and the boys reaching new worlds that the couple could only glimpse. Philip K. Dick (creator of Blade Runner) short tale of cat-kibble and boredom is easy to relate to. Orson Scott Card's "Salvage", perhaps updates the James Dean story of restlessness and homesickness. Less we think that the future belongs to the humans Terry Bisson's "They're made out of meat" puts us in our place. A great anthology!

4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars well written strong collection, October 26, 2003

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
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This review is from: New Skies: An Anthology of Today's Science Fiction (Hardcover)

This seventeen story anthology provides readers with some of the better shorts that focused on new scientific discoveries and theories. The tales include eight from the 1980s, six from the 1990s and three from the current decade. Each of the contributions is well written and applies recent scientific thought and theory to enhance a particular sub-genre. The authors, many of whom are major award winners, are some of the top guns of the past twenty plus years, but each entry shows why that writer is very highly regarded. Fans of short story collections that use modern science as a base for future predictions of what is to come or just want to understand some of the more current theories will take great delight in reading NEW SKIES, a well written strong collection with no weak stories.

Harriet Klausner

3.0 out of 5 stars Review for Kindle Edition, May 7, 2011

By 

Reader (MA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: New Skies: An Anthology of Today's Science Fiction (Kindle Edition)

I enjoyed the stories in this book, but the editing was horrible. There were spaces in the middle of words all over the place. The title of Connie Willis' story was misspelled. There were line breaks in the middle of words. The list goes on.... I can get past a few editing errors, but there were so many that it made the book hard to read.