It’s that time of year again, when all the annual best of anthologies start showing up. This year I’ve come across four so far, one of which I’m reading (Hartwell & Cramer), two of which are winging their way from Amazon (Dozois & Strahan), and a fourth is waiting to be shipped (Horton). There are probably more of these out there, so let me know. Here are the titles I know about so far:
- The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Fifth Annual Collection, edited by Gardner Dozois (GD)
- The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year Volume Two, edited by Jonathan Strahan (JS)
- Science Fiction: The Best of the Year, 2008 edition, edited by Richard Horton (RH)
- Year’s Best SF 13 edited by David G. Hartwell and Kathryn Cramer (HC)
What’s truly strange is how little overlap there is, with only 12 stories out of 87 getting in more than one book. This made me feel good about wanting to buy all four volumes, but on the other hand, I wished there were more obvious stand-out stories. We know that the Ted Chiang and Karen Joy Fowler stories won Nebula awards this year, and these stories are nominated for the 2008 Hugo Awards:
- “Memorare” by Gene Wolfe (novella) (HC)
- “The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairytale of Economics” by Daniel Abraham (novelette) (JS)
- “The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate” by Ted Chiang (novelette) (GD, JS) (Nebula winner)
- “Dark Integers” by Greg Egan (novelette) (RH)
- “Glory” by Greg Egan (novelette) (GD, JS)
- “Finisterra” by David Moles (novelette) (GD)
- “Lost Contact” by Stephen Baxter (short story) (GD, JS)
- “Tideline” by Elizabeth Bear (short story) (GD)
- Who’s Afraid of Wolf 359″ by Ken MacLeod (short story) (HC)
Greg Egan and Nancy Kress got in all four best-of-books with multiple stories, and 12 other writers got into more than one volume with one or more stories.
| Abraham, Daniel | The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairy Tale of Economics | JS |
| Asher, Neal | Alien Archeology | GD |
| Baker, Kage | Plotters and Shooters | HC |
| Baker, Kage | Hellfire in Twilight | GD |
| Ballantyne, Tony | Aristotle OS | HC |
| Ballantyne, Tony | Third Person | HC |
| Barnes, John | An Ocean is a Snowflake, Four Billion Miles Away | GD, RH |
| Baxter, Stephen | Last Contact | GD, JS |
| Baxter, Stephen | No More Stories | HC |
| Beagle, Peter S. | The Last and Only, or Mr. Moskowitz Becomes French | JS |
| Bear, Elizabeth | Orm the Beautiful | JS |
| Bear, Elizabeth | Tideline | GD |
| Benford, Gregory | Reasons Not to Publish | HC |
| Benford, Gregory | Dark Heaven | GD |
| Bisson, Terry | Pirates of the Somali Coast | HC |
| Black, Holly | The Coat of Stars | JS |
| Brooke, Keith | The Accord | GD |
| Cadigan, Pat | Nothing Personal | GD |
| Chiang, Ted | The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate | GD, JS |
| Daniel, Tony | The Valley of the Garden | JS |
| Di Filippo, Paul | Wikiworld | RH |
| Egan, Greg | Glory | GD, JS |
| Egan, Greg | Induction | HC |
| Egan, Greg | Dark Integers | RH |
| Egan, Greg | Steve Fever | GD |
| Finlay, Charles Coleman | An Eye for an Eye | RH |
| Ford, Jeffrey | The Dreaming Wind | JS |
| Fowler, Karen Joy | Always | HC, RH |
| Gaiman, Neil | The Witch’s Headstone | JS |
| Goonan, Kathleen Ann | The Bridge | HC |
| Goss, Theodore | Singing of Mount Abora | JS |
| Gregory, Daryl | Dead Horse Point | JS |
| Hand, Elizabeth | Winter’s Wife | JS |
| Hemry, John | As You Know, Bob | HC |
| Hitchcock, Robin | They Came From the Future | HC |
| Holm, Palle Juul | A Blue and Cloudless Sky | HC |
| Irvine, Alex | Wizard’s Six | JS |
| Jablokov, Alexander | Brain Raid | RH |
| Jones, Gwyneth | The Tomb Wife | HC |
| Jones, Gwyneth | Saving Tiamaat | GD |
| Kessel, John | The Last American | HC |
| Kosmatka, Ted | The Prophet of Flores | GD, JS |
| Kowal, Mary Robinette | For Solo Cello | RH |
| Kress, Nancy | By Fools Like Me | JS |
| Kress, Nancy | End Game | HC |
| Kress, Nancy | Art of War | RH |
| Kress, Nancy | Laws of Survival | GD |
| Laidlaw, Marc | An Evening’s Honest Peril | HC |
| Landis, Geoffrey | Vectoring | RH |
| Link, Kelly | The Constable of Albal | JS |
| MacLeod, Ken | Jesus Christ, Reanimator | JS, RH |
| MacLeod, Ken | Who’s Afraid of Wolf 359? | HC |
| MacLeod, Ken | Lighting Out | GD |
| McCormack, Una | Sea Change | GD |
| McDonald, Ian | Sanjeev and Robotwallah | GD, HC |
| McDonald, Ian | Verthandi’s Ring | GD |
| McIntosh, Will | Perfect Violet | RH |
| Moles, David | Finisterra | GD |
| Palwick, Susan | Sorrel’s Heart | JS |
| Phillips, Holly | Three Days of Rain | RH |
| Pratt, Tim | Artifice and Intelligence | HC, RH |
| Purdom, Tom | The Mists of Time | GD |
| Reed, Robert | Night Calls | RH |
| Reed, Robert | Roxie | GD |
| Reynolds, Alastair | The Sledge-Maker’s Daughter | GD |
| Rickert, M. | Holiday | JS |
| Roberson, Chris | The Sky is Large and the Earth is Small | GD, JS |
| Rosenbaum, Benjamin & Ackert David | Stray | GD |
| Rusch, Kristine Kathryn | Craters | GD |
| Sedia, Ekaterina | Virus Changes Skin | RH |
| Shunn, William | Objective Impermeability in a Closed System | HC |
| Silverberg, Robert | Against the Current | GD |
| Singh, Vandana | Of Love and Other Monsters | GD |
| Sinisalo, Johanna | Baby Doll | HC |
| Skillingstead, Jack | Everyone Bleeds Through | RH |
| Stableford, Brian | The Immortals of Atlantis | GD |
| Stanchfield, Justin | Beyond the Wall | GD |
| Sterling, Bruce | Kiosk | GD, JS |
| Sterling, Bruce | The Lustration | HC |
| Sterling, Bruce | A Plain Tale From Our Hills | RH |
| Stross, Charles | Trunk and Disorderly | JS |
| Swanwick, Michael | Urdumheim | JS |
| Swanwick, Michael | The Skysailor’s Tale | GD, RH |
| Van Pelt, James | How Music Begins | HC |
| Van Pelt, James | Of Late I Dreamt of Venus | GD |
| Watts, Peter | Repeating the Past | HC |
| Wolfe, Gene | Memorare | HC |
Auxiliary Memory 
That’s a good list. In past years I have bought two or three best-of-the-year collections trying to keep up with the field, but this year I have only bought Dozois so far. Your list is interesting, and makes me consider buying Hartwell/Cramer’s volume for a wider variety of fiction.
Keep your lists coming! You know I enjoy lists, both making them and reading them, and consider them good guides to selecting one’s reading without wading through a lot of crap.
Year before last the Horton anthology came out on audio and I really loved that. Audible, if you’re lurking, please, please publish these anthologies in your new science fiction line.
I kid you not, but great SF short stories read by a good reader, really stand out. I’m not sure the casual quick reading people give to these stories every year do them justice. These anthologies are a collection of amazing feats of imagination. Listening to a dramatic reading of these stories, told in slow real time, puts me in the best possible framework to see all the author was intending.
Bob, I know you like studying the subject of science fiction, and I believe the annual short stories are the best way to take the pulse of the genre.
Sadly, the Horton audio edition is out of print!
Jim
Thanks for the kind words!
I just wanted to add a quick note — I also publish FANTASY: THE BEST OF THE YEAR 2008, which may not be as much to your interest if you’re mainly an SF reader, but which would increase the overlap just a bit and add one more Hugo nominee to my list — Daniel Abraham’s “The Cambist and Lord Iron”.
And I had planned to publish a collection of the Best Space Opera of 2007, but alas those plans fell through. That book would have included both David Moles and Ken MacLeod’s Hugo nominees.
—
Rich Horton
I really enjoyed Horton’s book last year, had some great stories in it. I’m so torn now that these are all coming out as I have such an enormous pile of books to read already and adding more to the mix doesn’t seem wise. And yet these SF anthologies are just so darn tempting to me!