Science Fiction: The Best of 2002 (Science Fiction: The Best of ... (Quality)) [Mass Market Paperback]

Robert Silverberg (Author), Karen Haber (Author)

Book Description

Series: Science Fiction: The Best of ... (Quality) | Publication Date: February 25, 2003

A collection of the best science fiction prose written in 2002, by some the genre's greatest writers, and selected by two of SF's most respected editors. Here in one affordable volume is the best short science fiction of the year as selected from magazines, anthologies and journals. It is the second in a prestigious new series from ibooks. Robert Silverberg, a multiple winner of the Hugo and Nebula awards as a writer, has complied a distinguished record as an anthologist over the past 35 years. Among the famous books he has edited are THE SCIENCE FICTION HALL OF FAME, THE NEW DIMENSIONS, UNIVERSE and THE ALPHA SERIES. His long list of science fiction and fantasy novels include such titles as DYING INSIDE and THE ALIENS YEARS.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

In his illustrious forty-five-year career as a novelist and author of short fiction, Robert Silverberg has belonged in the company of the best writers of the 20th century. His writing has been compared to Conrad, Huxley and Orwell.

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 432 pages
• Publisher: I Books (February 25, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743458168
• ISBN-13: 978-0743458160
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.1 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #982,763 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I live near Basel, Switzerland, with where I work as a computer programmer half the week and am pounded on by my children, Aviva and Noah, the other half. We bake a lot of pies while dancing to Laurie Berkner and They Might Be Giants. Often my wife Esther comes home and eats the pies with us.

Then sometimes I sneak away and write things.

My stories have been published in F&SF, Harper's, Asimov's, McSweeney's, Strange Horizons, and Nature; translated into Bulgarian, Chinese, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Farsi, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Romanian, Russian, Spanish, and Swedish; turned into conceptual art (http://www.anthroptic.org) and short films ("The Orange", which won Best Animated Short at SXSW); and nominated for the Nebula, Hugo, BSFA, Locus, and Sturgeon Awards.

You can find out more (including a lot of free stories) at http://www.benjaminrosenbaum.com/biblio.html

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Not Free SF Reader, August 3, 2007

By 

Blue Tyson "- Research Finished" (Legion clubhouse) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Science Fiction: The Best of 2002 (Science Fiction: The Best of ... (Quality)) (Mass Market Paperback)

This has the stories and only a really brief intro. The stories average 3.65, so I guess this book you could call a 3.75, and only a pretty standard amount of stories for a year's best.

SF Best of 2002 : Tourist - Charles Stross
SF Best of 2002 : The Long Chase - Geoffrey A. Landis
SF Best of 2002 : Coelacanths - Robert Reed
SF Best of 2002 : Liking What You See: A Documentary
SF Best of 2002 : The Black Abacus - Yoon Ha Lee
SF Best of 2002 : The Discharge [Dream Archipelago] - Christopher Priest
SF Best of 2002 : Aboard the Beatitude - Brian W. Aldiss
SF Best of 2002 : Droplet - Benjamin Rosenbaum
SF Best of 2002 : The War of the Worldviews - James Morrow
SF Best of 2002 : Breathmoss [Ten Thousand and One Worlds] - Ian R. MacLeod
SF Best of 2002 : Angles - Orson Scott Card


Two women and a cat? On top of trying to keep up with everything? That's tough.

5 out of 5


Soldier's marathon space race conversion.

4 out of 5


Life history lesson appearance.

3 out of 5


Beauty software adjustments.4 out of 5


Quantum war captain's legend.

4 out of 5


Archipelago escort-aided AWOL ends in ultrasonic MP inferno.

3 out of 5


Interstellar genocidal military maniac mental case.

3 out of 5


Quantum Girl vs Warboy. Reddish brainball remains.

3 out of 5


Mini-Martian military mayhem managed by middle-aged madmen.

4 out of 5


Aliens, interstellar travel Gateways, all pretty run of the mill, according to girl, but boys are freaks.

3 out of 5


Muon memory slant multiversal emigration confrontation.

4 out of 5


Beauty software adjustments.

4 out of 5

6 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Eccentric Choices from Editors Who Should Know Better, April 4, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Science Fiction: The Best of 2002 (Science Fiction: The Best of ... (Quality)) (Mass Market Paperback)

Naturally the judgments of the casual reader are often attended with sneers of contempt by those in the know. Those in the know, know that Silverberg and Haber are very able editors, writers, and extremely nice people. But about half of these stories are not only among the year's worst, some actually don't make any sense at all. The odd choices are Robert Reed's "Coelacanths" and Orson Scott Card's "Angles." The Reed story is one of those intentionally confusing stories that compels the reader to "figure out" what's going on--as if readers really enjoy doing that, particularly when the reader is never, ever told, even in the end. Were the human beings in the story actually "bacteria" living on the surface of one character's bicuspid? Were they microminiaturized and living in multi-dimensions? I read the story twice and I still never understood where this was taking place or why. The Card story, published on his website (which means it was probably rejected by all other magazines), is part lecture about parallel universes and part story with obscurely elitist overtones. Only the last three pages make any kind of sense whatsoever. (I thought, in structure, "Angles" was trying to do what Harlan Ellison did so expertly in his story "Deathbird" of a decade ago.) Then there's the opening story by Charles Stross called "Tourist," an over-written, hyper-cyberpunk story that must have been included because of Mr. Stross' clear control of the English language. It's also a story that attempts to out-cyber William Gibson. But sparkly, techno-hip lanugage does not necessarily a techno-hip story make.

The truly great stories here are those by Brian Aldiss, Christopher Priest, and Geoffrey A. Landis. Indeed, the Landis might even be a classic of a kind. It's an old-fashioned John W. Campbell Jr. romp about conflicting ideologies regarding individualism and a great chase through relativistic space across the centuries. It's also very economically written and drew me right in.

But overall the anthology is very uneven and inexplicably eccentric. Like all other anthologists, Silverberg and Haber are mostly spotlighting their friends and not looking to publish the ACTUAL best stories of the year. (What a concept!) Card may be the success story of the year (perhaps the decade, and some would say of the century), but his contribution is easily his weakest story here and probably should have remained on his website. It was, however, the reason I bought this anthology in the first place.

I recommend buying any other collection but this, especially if the Landis is in it. Oh, one other thing: Be advised: there are only three SHORT stories in this collection. All others are Novella or Novelette length, a lot less bang for your buck.