Rating: 
Summary: ...concluded
Review: "Slow Life" starts off well, with a small group of explorers collecting data on Titan. However, when one of the characters is contacted by an alien collective intelligence in her sleep, the story turns sour, and despite a decent sense of humor, it comes to a silly overly excited conclusion. "A Flock Of Birds" has a great atmosphere, with a handful of individuals wandering the barren landscape of an America after a devastating war. The careful attention to his tasks as a birder parallel his devotion to keeping a fellow survivor alive. The returning flocks of birds become an obvious yet still affecting metaphor against the images of a New York City marathon from a video that is played multiple times over the course of the story. That in ten years, a birder could forget what a pigeon looks like seems ridiculous, but one could argue that this shows the true depth of his psychological damage, which was carefully masked until this point. "The Potter Of Bones" has an interesting story set in an alternate matriarchal past; however, the narration is very intrusive (e.g. "This story is about...," "At this point, the story needs to describe...," disjointed transitions, indications that this is a work of non-fiction cobbled together from artifacts by some of the characters, followed by lengthy fictive exchanges and descriptions, etc), and (with the exception of some clever debates between the potter and the Goddess in her dreams) the dialogue is reminiscent of the stilted exchanges of characters in a video game. For instance, the most common response people think or say to the red-furred potter is "Hah!" "The Whisper of Disks" is another strong offering taken from Interzone, taking place through multiple generations of an eccentric family's existence. Though the protagonist becomes one of the most powerful women alive, she is unable to discover much about her past, but through a series of vignettes across time, we see that she intuits what she cannot know about her genetic history. "The Hotel At Harlan's Landing" is a somewhat entertaining but easily forgettable tale of the supernatural which seems closer to the genre of horror than that of sci-fi. "The Millennium Party" could probably be called flash fiction, being as it is so short. It is more a skeletal idea put to paper rather than an actual story. "Turquoise Days" completes the collection, following the shortest story with what appears to be the longest. Published as a chapbook, it seems unnecessarily long, though it has a few memorable passages.
Rating:
Summary: ...concluded
Review: "Slow Life" starts off well, with a small group of explorers collecting data on Titan. However, when one of the characters is contacted by an alien collective intelligence in her sleep, the story turns sour, and despite a decent sense of humor, it comes to a silly overly excited conclusion. "A Flock Of Birds" has a great atmosphere, with a handful of individuals wandering the barren landscape of an America after a devastating war. The careful attention to his tasks as a birder parallel his devotion to keeping a fellow survivor alive. The returning flocks of birds become an obvious yet still affecting metaphor against the images of a New York City marathon from a video that is played multiple times over the course of the story. That in ten years, a birder could forget what a pigeon looks like seems ridiculous, but one could argue that this shows the true depth of his psychological damage, which was carefully masked until this point. "The Potter Of Bones" has an interesting story set in an alternate matriarchal past; however, the narration is very intrusive (e.g. "This story is about...," "At this point, the story needs to describe...," disjointed transitions, indications that this is a work of non-fiction cobbled together from artifacts by some of the characters, followed by lengthy fictive exchanges and descriptions, etc), and (with the exception of some clever debates between the potter and the Goddess in her dreams) the dialogue is reminiscent of the stilted exchanges of characters in a video game. For instance, the most common response people think or say to the red-furred potter is "Hah!" "The Whisper of Disks" is another strong offering taken from Interzone, taking place through multiple generations of an eccentric family's existence. Though the protagonist becomes one of the most powerful women alive, she is unable to discover much about her past, but through a series of vignettes across time, we see that she intuits what she cannot know about her genetic history. "The Hotel At Harlan's Landing" is a somewhat entertaining but easily forgettable tale of the supernatural which seems closer to the genre of horror than that of sci-fi. "The Millennium Party" could probably be called flash fiction, being as it is so short. It is more a skeletal idea put to paper rather than an actual story. "Turquoise Days" completes the collection, following the shortest story with what appears to be the longest. Published as a chapbook, it seems unnecessarily long, though it has a few memorable passages.
Rating:
Summary: ...continued
Review: "Stories For Men" is a lengthy novella set (like many of the stories in this collection) on a lunar colony. This colony was derived to eliminate patriarchy and its trappings (e.g. violence), though they are replaced primarily with hedonism and a general disenfranchising of men. When the archetype of "Man" creeps back into the colony as the result of its most disgruntled stand up comic, one young man explores the costs and benefits of becoming a "real man" in this context. The depiction of this "reverse discrimination" both highlights gender inequity in today's world and vaguely reinforces it (by promoting the vision of women `run amok' without the proper moral constraints). A pretty brisk and entertaining read regardless of what you think its "message" is. "To Become A Warrior" is a nice stylistic change of pace, with great dialogue written in the dialect of the British soccer hooligan. Reading the story is like hearing it barked into your ear at the pub. Great writing with humor and pathos, suggesting a clash between class and personal values without even trying, make this a quick and worthwhile read. "The Clear Blue Seas Of Luna" has moments that border on literary experimentation with the confluence of multiple and shifting points of view. There are sections where the different characters are actually part of the same character (though not multiple personalities, nothing to gimmicky) thereby presenting the first, second, and third person simultaneously. During one of the climactic chase sections, even the planet itself seems to become both a setting and a character. The only problem with this is that none of the individual portions of Benjan or his computer interface/ship thing, or the planet emerge as solid individuals. The "bad guys" are depicted simply as foils to the culmination of the rest of the aforementioned characters, having simplistic generalizations as their sole character traits. Though it has its faults, the story does take some interesting creative risks at presenting the multifaceted yet in some ways static world of its protagonist. "V.A.O" takes place in a technology driven security state, where a group of senior citizens (who retain much of their devotion to the pop culture of their 00s youth) struggle against a strange combination of fear of death, a lack of cultural memory, surveillance, and neglect which takes forms as varied as corrupt doctors to nagging talking toilets. Despite numerous typos, and a mildly "cranky" tone, this chapbook was absorbing. "Winters Are Hard" is about a man who, after winning the state lottery, becomes a man/wolf, and the effects that the media has on his life and his relationship with his pack. Told from the point of view of the reporter who breaks his story, with some gripping scenes (e.g. when the pack goes on a hunt). "At The Money" takes us to a world where the market economy drives every decision, and where the stock market never closes; except, instead of stocks, people trade in futures of rare or possibly non-existent decaying isotopes, vacuum states, anti-money, and perhaps each others lives. Despite the intrigue, the characters seem rather flat, and the complicated descriptions of the wheeling and dealing are likely to set many a reader to skimming. "Agent Provocateur" is about Heisenberg and Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, as explained through a boy's decision to effect the outcome of World War II and his father's death depending on whether or not he catches a homerun ball by his favorite bookish baseball player, who could go on to be a spy, perhaps killing Heisenberg. Brief, fairly well written, but the idea is hokey. "Singleton" by Greg Egan is one of the most thought provoking stories in the collection. Much like the existential fear of death familiar to many of us, Egan's protagonist is paralyzed by a fear of infinite versions of self, failing, succeeding, and essentially competing in a deterministic fashion in the multiverse. Being a scientist he tries to deal with his fears rationally, creating a device capable of shielding an individual from multiple versions of reality and of self. When his brilliant wife becomes barren, they decide to adopt an artificial child, their emotions driving them to use the device to protect her. Later this decision leads to the child rebelling and going missing for several years. Fantastic attention to detail, well developed characters, plausible and inventive future innovations in science with the action taking placing with a thorny political atmosphere in the background, this is a story of great depth, though its ideology is not at all invasive as it is so intertwined with the motives of the characters. ...
Rating:
Summary: ...continued
Review: "Stories For Men" is a lengthy novella set (like many of the stories in this collection) on a lunar colony. This colony was derived to eliminate patriarchy and its trappings (e.g. violence), though they are replaced primarily with hedonism and a general disenfranchising of men. When the archetype of "Man" creeps back into the colony as the result of its most disgruntled stand up comic, one young man explores the costs and benefits of becoming a "real man" in this context. The depiction of this "reverse discrimination" both highlights gender inequity in today's world and vaguely reinforces it (by promoting the vision of women 'run amok' without the proper moral constraints). A pretty brisk and entertaining read regardless of what you think its "message" is. "To Become A Warrior" is a nice stylistic change of pace, with great dialogue written in the dialect of the British soccer hooligan. Reading the story is like hearing it barked into your ear at the pub. Great writing with humor and pathos, suggesting a clash between class and personal values without even trying, make this a quick and worthwhile read. "The Clear Blue Seas Of Luna" has moments that border on literary experimentation with the confluence of multiple and shifting points of view. There are sections where the different characters are actually part of the same character (though not multiple personalities, nothing to gimmicky) thereby presenting the first, second, and third person simultaneously. During one of the climactic chase sections, even the planet itself seems to become both a setting and a character. The only problem with this is that none of the individual portions of Benjan or his computer interface/ship thing, or the planet emerge as solid individuals. The "bad guys" are depicted simply as foils to the culmination of the rest of the aforementioned characters, having simplistic generalizations as their sole character traits. Though it has its faults, the story does take some interesting creative risks at presenting the multifaceted yet in some ways static world of its protagonist. "V.A.O" takes place in a technology driven security state, where a group of senior citizens (who retain much of their devotion to the pop culture of their 00s youth) struggle against a strange combination of fear of death, a lack of cultural memory, surveillance, and neglect which takes forms as varied as corrupt doctors to nagging talking toilets. Despite numerous typos, and a mildly "cranky" tone, this chapbook was absorbing. "Winters Are Hard" is about a man who, after winning the state lottery, becomes a man/wolf, and the effects that the media has on his life and his relationship with his pack. Told from the point of view of the reporter who breaks his story, with some gripping scenes (e.g. when the pack goes on a hunt). "At The Money" takes us to a world where the market economy drives every decision, and where the stock market never closes; except, instead of stocks, people trade in futures of rare or possibly non-existent decaying isotopes, vacuum states, anti-money, and perhaps each others lives. Despite the intrigue, the characters seem rather flat, and the complicated descriptions of the wheeling and dealing are likely to set many a reader to skimming. "Agent Provocateur" is about Heisenberg and Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, as explained through a boy's decision to effect the outcome of World War II and his father's death depending on whether or not he catches a homerun ball by his favorite bookish baseball player, who could go on to be a spy, perhaps killing Heisenberg. Brief, fairly well written, but the idea is hokey. "Singleton" by Greg Egan is one of the most thought provoking stories in the collection. Much like the existential fear of death familiar to many of us, Egan's protagonist is paralyzed by a fear of infinite versions of self, failing, succeeding, and essentially competing in a deterministic fashion in the multiverse. Being a scientist he tries to deal with his fears rationally, creating a device capable of shielding an individual from multiple versions of reality and of self. When his brilliant wife becomes barren, they decide to adopt an artificial child, their emotions driving them to use the device to protect her. Later this decision leads to the child rebelling and going missing for several years. Fantastic attention to detail, well developed characters, plausible and inventive future innovations in science with the action taking placing with a thorny political atmosphere in the background, this is a story of great depth, though its ideology is not at all invasive as it is so intertwined with the motives of the characters. ...
Rating: 
Summary: A Few Good Hits
Review: Breathmoss,Ian MacLeod. Overlong coming of age story set in a far future world inhabited almost completely by women. Heavy atmosphere, light plot. C- The Most Famous Little Girl in the World, Nancy Kress. The grim backdrop of war and terrorism over the next seventy years is much more interesting than the story about two cousins who take a lifetime to patch up their differences. C The Passenger, Paul McAuley. Engaging but essentially routine yarn about a space ship salvage crew whose strange new passenger is either malevolent or cute as a button. C+ The Political Officer, Charles Finlay. Political intrigue aboard a Soviet-flavored military spaceship where each officer seems to have his own insidious agenda. B- Lambing Season, Molly Gloss. Kindhearted shepherdess encounters alien. Another promising premise wasted in an inconclusive, overly subtle plot. C- Coelacanths,Robert Reed. Variously constructed humans subsist in a hostile, multi-dimensional far future world. Weighty speculation on the fine line between evolution and devolution, natural and supernatural. B Presence, Maureen McHugh. Realistic, heartrending character study of a couple dealing with Alzheimer�s, a new cure, and its unsettling side effect. B+ Halo, Charles Stross. Cacophonous, dense, hard science narrative concerns a cybernetic teenager who flees to Jupiter to escape Mom, who just doesn�t understand her! C- In Paradise, Bruce Sterling. USA circa 2022�Romance in the land of the not so free and the home of Homeland Security. Sorry, but not even close to Sterling offerings from previous volumes. C The Old Cosmonaut� by Ian McDonald. An old cosmonaut�s pipe dream of pioneering Mars is strangely fulfilled. C Stories for Men, John Kessel. Men on a vast matriarchal lunar colony must chose between easy, killer sex and socio-political equality. Quite the conundrum! Great characters, plot, social commentary and psychological exploration. A To Become a Warrior, Chris Beckett. In a socially stratified future England, a gang of world-shifting thugs offers an alienated lowlife some ancient means of payback. Fast-paced narrative with fascinating characters and street jargon. A The Clear Blue Seas of Luna, Gregory Binford. A (mumbo) jumbo ode to terraforming. Zzzz V.A.O., Geoff Ryman. Life stinks for Gen-Y geriatrics, so they hack their way out. Vivid characters, snappy dialog, diabolical schemes, and something sorely lacking in this volume�humor. A Winters Are Hard, Steven Popkes. Man has self physically altered so he can sleep with she-wolves and slaughter wild elk. Can happiness ensue? C At the Money,Richard Wadholm. Monotonous tale of cosmic radioactive waste arbitrage in an ultra-free market far future. Zzzz Agent Provacateur, Alexander Irvine. A boy alters and unalters history around WW2. C Singleton, Greg Egan. All you need to enjoy this AI saga of making babies the new-fashioned way is a couple doctorates in quantum theory and philosophy. C- Slow Life, Michael Swanick. A plucky explorer discovers life on Titan. Well drawn setting but well worn plot. C A Flock of Birds, James Van Pelt. Gripping, realistic, poetic, and touching look at the aftermath of an all-out biological war, set in a desolate 2011 Denver. A The Potter of Bones, Eleanor Arnason. This fantasy story about evolution unfolds about as rapidly. In (yet another) female dominated society, a potter literally pieces together a theory of how her rodent-like race of homosexual furballs came into being. Super. D The Whisper of Disks, John Meaney. The Bryonic Woman: genius makes jillions thanks to her jazzed up genes. C The Hotel at Harlan�s Landing, Kage Baker. Ultracreepy goings-on in a remote logging town in the 1930�s. Well crafted horror, and at long last, a crisp, clear ending. B+ The Millennium Party, Walter Jon Williams. A wry and refreshingly brief look at the digitalization of man, far, far in the future. B Turquoise Days, Alistair Reynolds. Better late than never. A majestic tale of an inscrutably sentient ocean and its interplay with humans both kind and evil. A page-turner with unforgettable imagery. A+
Rating:
Summary: A Few Good Hits
Review: Breathmoss,Ian MacLeod. Overlong coming of age story set in a far future world inhabited almost completely by women. Heavy atmosphere, light plot. C- The Most Famous Little Girl in the World, Nancy Kress. The grim backdrop of war and terrorism over the next seventy years is much more interesting than the story about two cousins who take a lifetime to patch up their differences. C The Passenger, Paul McAuley. Engaging but essentially routine yarn about a space ship salvage crew whose strange new passenger is either malevolent or cute as a button. C+ The Political Officer, Charles Finlay. Political intrigue aboard a Soviet-flavored military spaceship where each officer seems to have his own insidious agenda. B- Lambing Season, Molly Gloss. Kindhearted shepherdess encounters alien. Another promising premise wasted in an inconclusive, overly subtle plot. C- Coelacanths,Robert Reed. Variously constructed humans subsist in a hostile, multi-dimensional far future world. Weighty speculation on the fine line between evolution and devolution, natural and supernatural. B Presence, Maureen McHugh. Realistic, heartrending character study of a couple dealing with Alzheimer's, a new cure, and its unsettling side effect. B+ Halo, Charles Stross. Cacophonous, dense, hard science narrative concerns a cybernetic teenager who flees to Jupiter to escape Mom, who just doesn't understand her! C- In Paradise, Bruce Sterling. USA circa 2022'Romance in the land of the not so free and the home of Homeland Security. Sorry, but not even close to Sterling offerings from previous volumes. C The Old Cosmonaut' by Ian McDonald. An old cosmonaut's pipe dream of pioneering Mars is strangely fulfilled. C Stories for Men, John Kessel. Men on a vast matriarchal lunar colony must chose between easy, killer sex and socio-political equality. Quite the conundrum! Great characters, plot, social commentary and psychological exploration. A To Become a Warrior, Chris Beckett. In a socially stratified future England, a gang of world-shifting thugs offers an alienated lowlife some ancient means of payback. Fast-paced narrative with fascinating characters and street jargon. A The Clear Blue Seas of Luna, Gregory Binford. A (mumbo) jumbo ode to terraforming. Zzzz V.A.O., Geoff Ryman. Life stinks for Gen-Y geriatrics, so they hack their way out. Vivid characters, snappy dialog, diabolical schemes, and something sorely lacking in this volume'humor. A Winters Are Hard, Steven Popkes. Man has self physically altered so he can sleep with she-wolves and slaughter wild elk. Can happiness ensue? C At the Money,Richard Wadholm. Monotonous tale of cosmic radioactive waste arbitrage in an ultra-free market far future. Zzzz Agent Provacateur, Alexander Irvine. A boy alters and unalters history around WW2. C Singleton, Greg Egan. All you need to enjoy this AI saga of making babies the new-fashioned way is a couple doctorates in quantum theory and philosophy. C- Slow Life, Michael Swanick. A plucky explorer discovers life on Titan. Well drawn setting but well worn plot. C A Flock of Birds, James Van Pelt. Gripping, realistic, poetic, and touching look at the aftermath of an all-out biological war, set in a desolate 2011 Denver. A The Potter of Bones, Eleanor Arnason. This fantasy story about evolution unfolds about as rapidly. In (yet another) female dominated society, a potter literally pieces together a theory of how her rodent-like race of homosexual furballs came into being. Super. D The Whisper of Disks, John Meaney. The Bryonic Woman: genius makes jillions thanks to her jazzed up genes. C The Hotel at Harlan's Landing, Kage Baker. Ultracreepy goings-on in a remote logging town in the 1930's. Well crafted horror, and at long last, a crisp, clear ending. B+ The Millennium Party, Walter Jon Williams. A wry and refreshingly brief look at the digitalization of man, far, far in the future. B Turquoise Days, Alistair Reynolds. Better late than never. A majestic tale of an inscrutably sentient ocean and its interplay with humans both kind and evil. A page-turner with unforgettable imagery. A+
Rating: 
Summary: For sophisticated, refined reading
Review: I can't tell you what a letdown this anthology is. Almost every story is either too self-consciously literary, plotless, or more concerned with creating atmosphere than providing a compelling reason to continue reading. I read every story - some more than once - but few were particularly memorable. Of course that's only my opinion; more sophisticated readers and graduates of writing seminars and workshops will love the "crafted imagery" and "inspired strangeness" of Dozois' choices. "BREATHMOSS." On a virtually all-female world, a young girl comes-of-age and recognizes her destiny. A long, slow story, dense with made-up words with almost no clue or context, and descriptive paragraphs that go on and on, Breathmoss is more of a fantasy novella than a science fiction story. Atmospheric? Yes. Interesting? No. "STORIES FOR MEN." Seventeen-year-old Erno lives in in a female-dominated moon colony where males are prized mainly for the ability to pleasure women - and yet he's not happy. This is one of better stories. It's a novella, with a plot, memorable characters, things happening, lives and societies hang in the balance - in a way. The ending was timid, to put it mildly. And maybe I'm too sensitive - but is there some law out there requiring all science fiction stories have strong, intelligent females putting up with weak, spoiled boys? "TURQUOISE DAYS." Naqi and her sister are scientists on the isolated water-world of Turquoise where the ocean is more aware of outsiders than they realize. It's a very low-key story of love and loss and so placid that I could hardly stay awake the two times I read it. An evil man comes to this peaceful world with evil intentions. Good ending, though, if you can reach it. Those three stories account for over 25% of the book. There are 26 stories in total and they're not all so dreary as the novellas, although they do try. "THE PASSENGER." Maris Delgado and her space-salvage crew find a passenger in a long-abandoned vessel who is more than she appears to be. Good short story, in comparison to all those "I'm a writer creating atmosphere" stories, but let's face it: the mysterious stranger picked up by a ship isn't a new idea and there's no one moment here that adds much. "COELACANTHS." Evolution of humanity into several species of brave, self-reliant women burdened with bumbling boys, and cartoonish males. Four parallel stories with humanity living in some hazy far distant and distinctly unrecognizable universe where they may be no more than a sort of virus or vermin. There's this naked over-the-top male narrator ranting about humanity's advances and I don't know what it all adds up to and I don't care. Stories like this, I think, are more likely than not, jokes on the readers. I'd just finished reading "The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, vol. 1 1929-1964" and what a contrast! The old-fashioned writers were amazingly entertaining. There are dozens of outstanding memorable stories there. When I compare "Coelacanths" with James Blish's "Surface Tensions" I see the great gulf between writers trying to show off for other writers and a writer like Blish telling a riveting story. This anthology is writing seminar and writing workshop stuff. I wince when I think of a casual reader who wants to find out if science fiction is for him or her, and unfortunately finds this book. It's poison.
Rating: 
Summary: Always a good read
Review: I consider this THE definitive anthology for science fiction short stories, and I make it a point to get it every year. There are always some stories that don't necessarily blow my socks off, but I can appreciate why they were selected, and value the variety the editor always includes in these volumes. There are some quiet stories, some far-ranging space adventures, a novella or two, and always something for everyone. Before each story, the editor gives a little synopsis of the writer's career, and never fails to mention some other works that you can pursue if you like the author's style. That's how I've found some of my favorite sci-fi authors. Definitely worth getting.
Rating:
Summary: Always a good read
Review: I consider this THE definitive anthology for science fiction short stories, and I make it a point to get it every year. There are always some stories that don't necessarily blow my socks off, but I can appreciate why they were selected, and value the variety the editor always includes in these volumes. There are some quiet stories, some far-ranging space adventures, a novella or two, and always something for everyone. Before each story, the editor gives a little synopsis of the writer's career, and never fails to mention some other works that you can pursue if you like the author's style. That's how I've found some of my favorite sci-fi authors. Definitely worth getting.
Rating:
Summary: A Weak Year for Sci-Fi
Review: I look forward to Mr. Dozois' collections more than I do to Thanksgiving or Christmas, but this year's selections are made up mostly of stories that are technically very well-written, but seem to lack essential elements of any work of fiction, such as theme or climax. Stories by Kress, Finlay, Gloss, McHugh, Sterling and others simply lack the creative spark that excites or provokes the reader. I finished many of these stories and said to myself, "So what?" Just because one is a good writer does not automatically mean one produces good stories. Even John Kessel's gender-dystopia "Stories for Men" ends too abruptly to do this wonderful tale justice. Some gems are to be found here, however. Ian R. MacLeod's "Breathmoss" is intricate and surprising, an entire universe in fifty pages. Robert Reed's "Coelacanths" is daring and provocative. Ian McDonald's "The Old Cosmonaut..." is elegant and lyrical. James Van Pelt's "A Flock of Birds" shows the appearance of hope in a very unusual way when the world is literally falling apart, and Eleanor Arnason's "The Potter of Bones" is bold and stimulating. I enjoyed less than half of these stories, my lowest score yet for this excellent annual collection. Hope things improve by next July.
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