Year's Best SF 6 (Year's Best SF (Science Fiction)) [Mass Market Paperback]

David G. Hartwell (Author)

Book Description

Series: Year's Best SF (Science Fiction) | Publication Date: May 29, 2001

Get Ready To Expand Your Mind...

Acclaimed editor and anthologist David G. Hartwell is back with the sixth annual collection of the year's most impressive, thought-provoking, and just plain great science fiction.

Year's Best SF 6 includes contributions from the greatest stars of the field as well as remarkable newcomers -- galaxies and into unexplored territory deep within your own soul.

Here are stories from:

Brian W. Aldiss

Stephen Baxter

David Brin

Nancy Kress

Ursula K. Le Guin

Robert Silverberg

and many more...

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

David Hartwell's guiding principle for his annual science fiction anthologies is that the stories be clearly science fiction--not fantasy, horror, or postmodern. As always, for the 2001 edition he has chosen stories representing the best of the SF field, along with several short pieces published in Nature magazine as part of a millennium celebration.

Don't miss Tananarive Due's "Patient Zero," which assumes Greg Egan's frequent spotlight on medical SF (this year Egan covers philosophy vs. science in his alternate history "Oracle"); Stephen Dedman's detective story about amputation, "The Devotee"; Stephen Baxter's hard SF "Sheena 5," which is about an enhanced squid and her mission; Ursula K. LeGuin's anthropological tale "The Birthday of the World"; or Nancy Kress's succinct, pithy "To Cuddle Amy."

2001 Hugo Award nominees include "Seventy-Two Letters" by Ted Chiang, "Oracle" by Greg Egan, and short story winner "Different Kinds of Darkness" by David Langford. --Bonnie Bouman

Review

"Impressive." -- -- Locus

"The finest modern science fiction writing." -- -- Pittsburgh Tribune

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 512 pages
• Publisher: Harper Voyager (May 29, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061020559
• ISBN-13: 978-0061020551
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.1 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #240,605 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #21 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Literature & Fiction > World Literature > United States > Collections & Readers
  • #22 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Anthologies
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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An extraordinary anthology, November 7, 2001

By 

Fosky Bob "human" (Vacaville, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Year's Best SF 6 (Year's Best SF (Science Fiction)) (Mass Market Paperback)

This strong anthology proves that there is room in the science fiction market for two Year's Best anthologies. I was slightly surprised by this anthology because I have been underwhelmed by previous editions.

This year was a different story. I enjoyed nearly every offering in the book. I was particularly impressed with the stories that Mr. Hartwell culled from unusual sources. Robert Silverberg's 'The Millennial Express' from Playboy magazine was particularly impressive. Robert Reed's story 'Grandma's Jumpman' from Century magazine was above average. I enjoyed the 5 or 6 1-2 page stories from Nature magazine. The stories from David Brin and Dan Simmons stood out from the rest.

The anthology also included excellent stories from Howard Waldrop (an amusement-park attraction attains sentience and rebels against its masters) and Ted Chiang (an alternate reality story where Jewish kabbalistic tradition is real and powerful). Brian Stableford's fascinating 'The Last Supper' continues the author's recent exploration of the future of genetics.

Not to be overlooked are two award-winning stories, Ursula Le Guin's excellent 'The Birthday of the World' and David Langford's 'Different Kinds of Darkness'. I thoroughly enjoyed this anthology. Highly recommended.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars 2001 edition not up to par, August 10, 2001

By 

Chris Dodson (Boaz, AL) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Year's Best SF 6 (Year's Best SF (Science Fiction)) (Mass Market Paperback)

This book didn't quite do it for me, I'm afraid. The main problem with the book was the overabundance of two-page short shorts (most culled from Nature). These things are worth reading, I suppose, and they're not as bad as Analog's Probability Zero pieces, but do they really belong in a Year's Best anthology? Ford's "In the Days of the Comet" and Kress's "To Cuddle Amy" could have been worthy of an inclusion here, had they been fleshed out a little more. With the advent of Internet -only fiction, short-shorts have become more and more popular as e-zines attempt to appeal to the average short-attention-span Web surfer. Call me old-fashioned, but I'll take a big fat novella any day.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A good start to a "Best of" series, July 10, 2002

By 

John Peter O'connor - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Year's Best SF (Mass Market Paperback)

When David Hartwell started his own annual series of the year's best SF with this volume in the mid nineties, the doorstopper series edited by Gardner Dozois had been running for over a decade. Hartwell made some passing references to other anthologies being unfocused but otherwise he avoided the issue and that begged the question of why this series started and should you buy it instead of or as well as the Dozois book?

On the strength of this, the first volume, I am happy to recommend Hartwell's choice to anyone who is into SF in the traditional sense. That does not mean that the contents are old fashioned just that the contents are certainly Science Fiction and not some related genre.

The fourteen stories here, all of which were written in 1995, include works by a selection of the best of contemporary SF authors. Writers like Silverberg, Baxter, Benford, Kress, Haldeman, Woolfe, Zelazny and Sheckley rarely disappoint though the last of those is represented here by one of his weaker recent works.

The highlights for me were Joe Haldeman's "For White Hill" and Robert Silverberg's "Hot Times in Magma City". The first is a tale of war, art, love and sacrifice set on a ruined Earth in the far future and the second is set in a near future LA beset by volcanic eruptions. The producers of "Volcano" and "Dante's Peak", a pair of similarly themed disaster movies should have studied Silverberg's tale to see how to inject some real humanity into the subject.

Like the Silverberg story, William Spencer's "Downloading Midnight", Gene Wolfe's "The Ziggurat" and "Evolution" by Nancy Kress are all set on a contemporary or near future Earth and all three are compelling and rewarding stories.

Stephen Baxter's "Gossamer" and Gregory Benford's "A Worm in the Well" demonstrate that the traditional setting of space travel in the Solar System can still give rise to highly enjoyable and original ideas that bring "golden age" styles right up to date.

This is not a perfect book, there are still a couple of stories here that left me wondering what the editor was thinking (or smoking) when he included them but on the whole, the book stands as justification for the fact that there is certainly room for another "years's best" series. If you buy Gardner Dozois' books, you should give this volume a go as well.