From Booklist
Stalwart sf fans will most likely find Dozois' twentieth stout annual anthology as satisfying as any of its predecessors. The authors represented in it range from multiple-award winners Gregory Benford, Nancy Kress, and John Kessel to skilled newcomers Molly Gloss and Chris Beckett. In-betweeners in terms of prize winning and output include Ian MacLeod, Ian McDonald, Bruce Sterling, and Eleanor Arnason, who should write much more. Dozois has again cast his net widely, drawing Geoff Ryman's entry from a chapbook and Walter Jon Williams' from the electronic media. As usual, sf magazines are leading resources, with Asimov's and Fantasy and Science Fiction leading the pack in total contributions and Inter zone coming in third. Selections from original anthologies are fewer this year, though. As long as the short story remains an important form for sf, Dozois' anthologies will be required reading for the genre's fans. Roland Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Book Description
Widely regarded as the one essential book for every science fiction fan, The Year's Best Science Fiction (Winner of the 2002 Locus Award for Best Anthology) continues to uphold its standard of excellence with more than two dozen stories representing the previous year's best SF writing. This year's volume includes Ian R. MacLeod, Nancy Kress, Greg Egan, Maureen F. McHugh, Robert Reed, Paul McAuley, Michael Swanwick, Robert Silverberg, Charles Stross, John Kessel, Gregory Benford and many other talented authors of SF, as well as thorough summations of the year and a recommended reading list.
About the Author
Gardner Dozois has won the Hugo Award for Best Editor twelve times. The editor of Asimov's SF magazine since 1986, he lives in Philadelphia, Peensylvania.
The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twentieth Annual Collection FROM THE PUBLISHER
Widely regarded as the one essential book for every science fiction fan, The Year's Best Science Fiction (Winner of the 2002 Locus Award for Best Anthology) continues to uphold its standard of excellence with more than two dozen stories representing the previous year's best SF writing. This year's volume includes Ian R. MacLeod, Nancy Kress, Greg Egan, Maureen F. McHugh, Robert Reed, Paul McAuley, Michael Swanwick, Robert Silverberg, Charles Stross, John Kessel, Gregory Benford and many other talented authors of SF, as well as thorough summations of the year and a recommended reading list.
FROM THE CRITICS
Publishers Weekly
Drawing from his own magazine, Asimov's, as well as a wide range of other publications from the U.S., U.K. and Australia, Hugo-winner Dozois presents SF that is both provocative and literate in this respected annual anthology. In Michael Swanwick's powerful "Slow Life," alien life turns up where it's least expected. "The Political Officer" by Charles Coleman Finlay is a taut cloak-and-dagger tale of the search for a double agent aboard a military spaceship on a crucial mission. Richard Wadholm's "At the Money" extrapolates the wheeling and dealing of a distant future where ultradense elements manufactured in the heart of stars form the basis of an unpredictable interstellar economy. "The Old Cosmonaut and the Construction Worker Dream of Mars" by Ian McDonald is simultaneously an elegy for both manned space flight and the pristine worlds those astronauts dreamed of exploring. Back on Earth, "The Most Famous Little Girl in the World" by Nancy Kress shows how a single event can warp the fates of millions, while Maureen F. McHugh reminds us that the most advanced medical science may not be enough to restore true "Presence." Geoff Ryman's "V.A.O.," in which an elderly hacker takes on a criminally deficient health care system, offers a bit of black comedy. Exotic settings, memorable characters and challenging themes are par for the course here. Once again Dozois has gathered together a stunning array of the best in shorter SF. (July 16) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.
Library Journal
From Ian MacLeod's powerful far-future story of a young girl's path to adulthood ("Breathmoss") to Alastair Reynolds's eerie tale of a dark secret in the depths of a seemingly idyllic planet ("Turquoise"), the 25 tales in this collection highlight the best short sf published in 2002. Featuring stories by numerous sf veterans, including Gregory Benford, Nancy Kress, and Ian McDonald, as well as newcomers Charles Coleman Finlay and Richard Wadholm, this volume continues the high standards of its predecessors and belongs in most sf collections. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
Without question, the Dozois SF annuals deserve rosettes. Editor Dozois's usual exhaustive retrospection on the year's events in SF was missing from our galley, but as in last year's thought-provoking, at times lighthearted collection, Dozois kicks off here with a long story by Ian R. MacLeod (The Great Wheel, 1997), among the most literary of SF stylists. The present tale, "Breathmoss," is an elegant masterpiece of moist landscape and world-building that turns on the coming-of-age of Jalila on Habara in the Season of Soft Rains. Jalila must now leave her dreamtent on the high plains of Tabuthal, where the breathmoss first grew in her lungs and allowed her to breathe, and, with her three mothers, enter Habara's busy coastal city to prepare for her part in populating the Ten Thousand and One worlds beyond the Gateway, entering the Pain of Distance as she crawls "across this particular page of her universe." Appearing again also is Hugo and Nebula winner Nancy Kress, this time with the moving "The Most Famous Little Girl in All the World," which tells of Kyra, who at ten walked up into a spaceship that landed in the pasture and after an hour came out again. Then the spaceship left. Throughout Kyra's long and varied life, her cousin Amy and the rest of the world want to know what the aliens looked like and what they told her or did to her. Although she doesn't remember too clearly, the reader comes to wonder whether it might not be that she was engineered to have no fear of aliens. Not to be missed: Alastair Reynolds's "Turquoise Days" and what lies beneath the utter serenity of a quiet, peaceful little planet. Other outstanding contributions come from Gregory Benford, Charles Stross, PaulMcAuley, and Robert Reed. For all libraries, absolutely.
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