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Rating: 
Summary: Dozois never fails he's the best
Review: Anthologist emeritus does it again with a suberb anthology of short stories and novelletes about spaces and exploring
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Summary: Great science fiction adventure stories
Review: Gardner Dozois collected a bunch of science fiction adventure stories about exploration, ranging from classic stories from the golden age of science fiction to modern stories from the most recent pages of Asimov's science fiction. I loved it.
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Summary: In Memoriam
Review: In the opening story of Explorers, astronauts exploring the surface of the Moon discover a strange monolith planted there by an ancient space-faring civilization. The story is "The Sentinel" by Arthur C. Clarke, a much-anthologized classic that inspired Stanley Kubrick's film 2001: A Space Odyssey. The monolith is, unwittingly, an apt metaphor for this book, which is not so much a collection of science-fiction stories as it is a monument to a genre that is rapidly losing oxygen to the cold, dark vacuum of space. SF magazines, virtually the only print source for new short fiction and reviews, are losing readers if not going out of business altogether (Science Fiction Age, for example, ceased publication with its May issue). SF book publishing, meanwhile, is awash in so-called "media novels" based on movies, television, comic books, and computer and role-playing games. The genre has become so littered with space junk that many of its first-rank authors are taking an escape pod: writing novels with SF themes but marketing them as mainstream fiction. So at a time when science fiction needs to be looking to its future and a new aesthetic, books like this one are dwelling on its past and embracing outdated forms. Gardner Dozois has assembled a so-so collection of stories and packaged them with his usual erudite introductions, but he isn't blazing any new trails here. His selections are almost equally balanced between old masters from the Golden Age of SF, many of them near-forgotten (H.B. Fyfe, James H. Schmitz, Cordwainer Smith), and later writers who published the bulk of their work after SF's New Wave (stardate 1967): Ursula K. Le Guin, John Varley, Stephen Baxter. Longtime fans, of course, will encounter much familiar material here. For a new generation of SF readers, Explorers will serve as a reminder of the glory that once was--and, with change, could be again.
Rating:
Summary: In Memoriam
Review: In the opening story of Explorers, astronauts exploring the surface of the Moon discover a strange monolith planted there by an ancient space-faring civilization. The story is "The Sentinel" by Arthur C. Clarke, a much-anthologized classic that inspired Stanley Kubrick's film 2001: A Space Odyssey. The monolith is, unwittingly, an apt metaphor for this book, which is not so much a collection of science-fiction stories as it is a monument to a genre that is rapidly losing oxygen to the cold, dark vacuum of space. SF magazines, virtually the only print source for new short fiction and reviews, are losing readers if not going out of business altogether (Science Fiction Age, for example, ceased publication with its May issue). SF book publishing, meanwhile, is awash in so-called "media novels" based on movies, television, comic books, and computer and role-playing games. The genre has become so littered with space junk that many of its first-rank authors are taking an escape pod: writing novels with SF themes but marketing them as mainstream fiction. So at a time when science fiction needs to be looking to its future and a new aesthetic, books like this one are dwelling on its past and embracing outdated forms. Gardner Dozois has assembled a so-so collection of stories and packaged them with his usual erudite introductions, but he isn't blazing any new trails here. His selections are almost equally balanced between old masters from the Golden Age of SF, many of them near-forgotten (H.B. Fyfe, James H. Schmitz, Cordwainer Smith), and later writers who published the bulk of their work after SF's New Wave (stardate 1967): Ursula K. Le Guin, John Varley, Stephen Baxter. Longtime fans, of course, will encounter much familiar material here. For a new generation of SF readers, Explorers will serve as a reminder of the glory that once was--and, with change, could be again.
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Summary: Have space suit will travel!
Review: This anthology gives the reader a chance to see how "space travel" science fiction has evolved through five decades. The 23 stories are in chronological order based on their respective publishing dates. They are samplings from the 1950's-1990's. Each selection is prefaced with a short introduction to why it was included. If you like old-fashioned science fiction, the kind I remember from the 65 cent paperbacks I saved up my allowance for, then this is for you. Open it and settle down for a few trips to places you only dreamed about when you were young and innocent.
Rating:
Summary: The Best
Review: This is a collection that will never fail you. I've only had it for one day, and already I've missed a night's sleep reading some of the greatest writers to ever put pen to paper. I particularly liked that the editor didn't just stop with the early seventies, but re-printed some of the good old stuff from writers like Clarke. A real edition to your library, and something I cannot recommend too highly.
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