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The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year Kindle Edition

by Jonathan Strahan (Author, Editor) Format: Kindle Edition
3.9 3.9 out of 5 stars 247 ratings
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In print and on-line, science fiction and fantasy is thriving as never before. A multitude of astonishingly creative and gifted writers are boldly exploring the mythic past, the paranormal present, and the promises and perils of myriad alternate worlds and futures. There are almost too many new and intriguing stories published every year for any reader to be able to experience them all. So how to make sure you haven’t missed any future classics?

Award-winning editor and anthologist Jonathan Strahan has surveyed the expanding universes of modern sf and fantasy to find the brightest stars in today’s dazzling literary firmament. From the latest masterworks by the acknowledged titans of the field to fresh visions from exciting new talents, this outstanding collection is a comprehensive showcase for the current state of the art in both science fiction and fantasy. Anyone who wants to know where the future of imaginative short fiction is going, and treat themselves to dozens of unforgettable stories, will find this year’s edition of Best Science Fiction and Fantasy to be just what they’re looking for!
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  1. Book 7 of 13
    The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year
  2. Print length
    640 pages
  3. Language
    English
  4. Sticky notes
    On Kindle Scribe
  5. Publisher
    Night Shade Books
  6. Publication date
    April 18, 2013
  7. File size
    1197 KB
  8. Page Flip
    Enabled
  9. Word Wise
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  10. Enhanced typesetting
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Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

In his seventh-edition introduction, Strahan remarks that 2012 has been a period of self-examination for speculative fiction, as writers experimented with redefining the genre while remaining true to its principles, and publishers sought innovative ways to distribute content. Certainly this collection of 32 stories represents a stunning range of styles and themes from authors established and new, evidence of a vital field with engaged advocates. “Fade to White,” Valente’s ironic advertisement-fueled world of domestic bliss, is a multiple-award nominee. “Mono No Aware,” another award nominee by Liu, is a poignant tale about a man’s heroic sacrifice, informed by a significant game of Go. Many stories edge into horror, such as Hopkinson’s original take on werewolves in “The Easthound” or Link’s haunted space voyage in “Two Houses,” and some are wryly humorous, like Klages’ tale of sibling rivalry in “The Education of a Witch.” Some defy easy description, such as Johnson’s disquieting “Mantis Wives” or Gloss’ naturalist-inspired “The Grinnell Method.” Like previous anthologies, this is a must-read for fans of science fiction, fantasy, and short stories in general. --Krista Hutley

About the Author

Jonathan Strahan has edited numerous acclaimed anthologies, including The Locus Awards (with Charles N. Brown), The New Space Opera (with Gardner Dozois), and Swords and Dark Magic: The New Sword and Sorcery (with Lou Anders

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B07H466HF6
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Night Shade Books (April 18, 2013)
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ April 18, 2013
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 1197 KB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 640 pages
  • Customer Reviews:
    3.9 3.9 out of 5 stars 247 ratings

Customer reviews

3.9 out of 5 stars
3.9 out of 5
247 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Holly D
5.0 out of 5 stars Interesting collection!
Reviewed in the United States on March 15, 2017
Verified Purchase
A nice set of short stories, 4 or 5 really stood out, making me want to read more of the author's other works. A little bit of everything from fantasy to hard science fiction and one that seemed like a fairytale. These stories will stay with you and make you think about them long after you've put the book down. I will be re reading these again one day.
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Neodoering
4.0 out of 5 stars Well Above Average
Reviewed in the United States on August 12, 2013
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Every year I buy several "Year's Best" anthologies, and overall I'm pleased with how sophisticated these collections tend to be. The stories in this anthology are sharp and smart and engaging, and they cover a gamut of styles and subject matters. This is how I keep up with what the market is doing for short stories, and I think it's a good strategy, because in 3 or 4 such collections you'll read over 100 stories. I found some of these stories to be incredibly depressing, end of the world type tales that really peed on my parade, while others were more uplifting. I like the variety of tales in this anthology, a good mix of fantasy and science fiction that stimulate your imagination.

The only thing I don't like about these stories is that every year the editors round up the usual suspects when it comes to writers. Neil Gaiman is nearly always in these anthologies, as are many of the other writers. It's not really a "Year's Best" anthology so much as it is, "These are my friends, read their work." You'll recognize many of the names connected with these stories and realize it's a chummy little in crowd that gets published in these books, with a few first-timers thrown in to make it look kosher. I don't mind this, but it's false advertising, and that rankles.

Other than that, there is a hearty variety of stories here for your reading enjoyment, crossing genres and sub-genres and offering up many points of view and story types. This collection is well worth its money, and I can recommend it wholeheartedly.
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Vivek Hurry
3.0 out of 5 stars 5 stories try to rescue an otherwise mediocre bunch. They almost succeed.
Reviewed in the United States on August 29, 2015
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I know I'm getting on in years and what passes for SF and/or Fantasy today is nothing like what it used to be. But even so, this anthology was overall a disappointment. The only reason I gave it 3 stars is for the 4 stories that rated 5 stars: good ol' SF as it used to be and should be. There are quite a few that are nowhere near being SF or Fantasy. And it is depressing to note that in the list below there are 9 each that I could only rank as 1 or 2 stars and 8 that are a mere 3 stars. For an anthology that boasts of compiling the best of the year, it was either a very bad year, or the compilation criteria were seriously flawed.

For a change, I made notes while reading so, here are some details. Not spoilers, because some of these stories are already quite spoiled beyond repair.

The Contrary Gardener - Christopher Rowe - 3 star
Dystopian. But a unique blend of back to the agrarian future, machines in rebellion and farmers against Big Brother (who are also farmers)
The Woman Who Fooled Death Five Times - Eleanor Arnason - 3 star
More like a myth or fable than SF or even fantasy. Good writing, though.
Close Encounters - Andy Duncan - 1 star
Sorta reporter-meets-Spielberg-movie-character. Homage to the movie? Didn't quite work for me.
Great-Grandmother In The Cellar - Peter S. Beagle - 3 star
Excellent, though more horror-fantasy than anything else, which lopped a star off. Very evocative writing.
The Easthound - Nalo Hopkinson - 3 star
Also very good. Walking Dead told by a child whose fate it is to become one, and she knows it. Everybody becomes one. Horror. Fantasy?
GOGGLES - Caitlin R. Kiernan - 2 star
Post-apocalyptic, again child's POV. Dark. Dismal.
Bricks, Sticks, Straw - Gwyneth Jones - 2 star
Unusual take on how an AI would try to retain its sanity if cut off from its controllers (us). Good, if a bit confusingly abstract.
A Bead of Jasper, Four Small Stones - Genevieve Valentine - 2 star
Closer to 'real' SF than most, so far. Colonists on Europa who've evolved beyond humanity but are still human. And a lot of India in here in a positive way for a change, via a long-distance friendship/romance between the Europan and a doomed Indian mission controller back in Bangalore. Certainly something different.
The Grinnell Method - Molly Gloss - 1 star
Again apocalyptic- an ornithologist is witness to an unspecified, unexplained catastrophe that rips a hole in the sky. Too elliptical for me. I like answers to my mysteries.
Beautiful Boys - Theodora Goss - 3 star
Amusing look at the aliens-are-among-us genre, a mashup of the bodice-ripping romance and the scientific study. Light.
The Education of A Witch - Ellen Klages - 2 star
More fantasy, more child's POV. Not much more than that.
Macy Minnot's Last Christmas - Paul McAuley - 2 star
Nice writing and imaginative about mankind's colonisation of the solar system, but ultimately more a 'reminiscence' than a true a-ha.
What Did Tessimond Tell You? - Adam Roberts - 5 star!!
Finally, a true SF story with a great a-ha! a la Asimov or Clarke. Loved it! Best one so far.
Adventure Story - Neil Gaiman - 2 star
Short and sweet and Gaiman-esque. But again, leaves the reader hanging - no resolution. Best of Gaiman in 2012? Surely not.
Katabasis - Robert Reed - 1 star
Enormously long-winded and boring. Gave up on it. Imagine giving up on a short story.
Troll Blood - Peter Dickinson - 4 star
Started off dry and pedantic, but then picked up nicely and satisfyingly. I liked it ultimately.
The Color Least Used By Nature - Ted Kosmatka - 3 star
Nice writing but how does this qualify as fantasy let alone SF? More a tale of love and pain and revenge. Barely a scratch of fantasy courtesy the walking trees.
Jack Shade in the Forest of Souls - Rachel Pollack - 3 star
Nice. Horror-fantasy about a ‘Traveler’ tasked to save a soul, confronting his own demons and so on and so forth. But, nice.
Two Houses - Kelly Link - 1 star
Didn’t work for me. Too confusing and un-straightforward. I like elliptical writing as much as the next guy, but it still needs to have a point.
Blood Drive - Jeffrey Ford - 4 stars
Superb satirical piece around the US mania for guns and its (il)logical conclusion. Wonderful. But SF? Not so much.
Mantis Wives - Kij Johnson - 1 star
What is this? Wyndham meets Vanity Fair? Avoid.
Immersion - Aliette de Bodard - 2 star
Interesting concept around ‘immerser’ tech that cloaks you and transforms you. But way too long-winded and ultimately unsatisfying.
About Fairies - Pat Murphy - 1 star
An alt-fairy story (no, not that kind of fairy). Meh.
Let Maps To Others - KJ Parker - 5 star!!
Classic. Great. The sort of story that shows you how to write a long short story and still keep the reader’s interest. Quite a GoT / Tolkien world created in an entertaining short story.
Joke In Four Panels - Robert Shearman - 1 star
An alt-Snoopy-Charlie Brown story. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it. Charlie Brown ain’t broke. This story is pointless.
Reindeer Mountain - Karin Tidbeck - 1 star
I suppose you could classify this one as fantasy-horror but it would be a stretch. Nah.
Domestic Magic - Steve Rasnic Tem & Melanie Tem - 2 star
Yet another child POV one about a brother with a mother who is ‘gifted’ magic-wise but loony and a sister who gets them into trouble. And, of course, the narrator is the one who inherits the whatever. Not a really spoiler there: you can see it coming in para two or three.
Swift, Brutal Retaliation - Meghan McCarron - 2 star
Disturbing story about a pair of sisters haunted by the poltergeist spirit of their dead brother. This may be the modern realistic face of brutal horror writing but it sure as hell ain’t SF or Fantasy, as I once knew them. I miss them.
Nahiku West - Linda Nagata - 5 star!!
Finally, a crisp murder-mystery-political-thriller set in a genuine, believable SF world! It’s been too long coming in this book. But worth ploughing through the last 3 or 4 to get to this one. Savour it.
Fade To White - Catherynne M. Valente - 3 star
Mad Men meets Orwellian SF. Good writing about a dystopian, post-apocalyptic future where the men with good genes are selected to procreate for the sake of re-populating a shattered USA. Not bad.
Significant Dust - Margo Lanagan - 1 star
Again, how does this constitute SF? Angsty story about guilt and pain and all that, but if I wanted that I wouldn’t be reading this book. Nah.
Mono no aware - Ken Liu - 5 star!!
This almost Clarke-ian story doesn’t deserve to be at the end of the book. It should be right up front to pull the reader in. Because, it sure does. On the other hand, reading this to complete the book, leaves one with a sweet taste, one which most of the rest of this anthology does nothing to promote. This is a great story.
83 people found this helpful
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M. Thornburg
5.0 out of 5 stars What science fiction and fantasy strive toward
Reviewed in the United States on March 6, 2015
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I've read only half the book so far, but even if the rest of the stories are bad it's already proven its worth many times over.

I understand why some readers were disappointed or even disgusted by the contents. A lot of sf fans, even fantasy fans, like their reading to be escape into a kind of excitement (they might call it "wonder") that fascinates them and calls for little exertion of thought. If you're that sort of reader, you might not like many of these stories.

Yes, probably the majority of the stories I've read in the first half would be classified as fantasy rather than science fiction. And yes, sf and fantasy are arguably two different things, although what the difference consists in is debatable. To me, both sf and fantasy have, as their reason for existing, a particular similarity: they are attempts to explore what sentient life is about, what our world is about, by means of inventing other worlds and other possibilities. To me, the better their stories succeed at that, the better the stories are. Those I've read so far in this collection approach this success very, very nearly. My favorite (I think...) of these stories is "The Color Least Used by Nature" by Ted Kosmatka, first published in the January 2012 issue of Fantasy & Science Fiction. This story is almost not even a "fantasy," yet its fantastic element is at the heart of the story and indispensable.

I bought the book in the Kindle edition, and have one bone to pick about that edition only: there's no table of contents, so there's no way of going back to a story you've already read unless you remember a title, author, or unique phrase perfectly -- something I unfortunately can't do! Unless you're good at that, I'd suggest you get the print edition.
2 people found this helpful
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Scott Vannatter
4.0 out of 5 stars Well worth the time and the money
Reviewed in the United States on August 25, 2014
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I have not finished this book yet. I tend to spread short story science fiction over time. I just enjoy it that way.
However, I could see someone reading this one cover to cover over a short period of time.
It is diverse, enjoyable, and very very readable.
I have the Kindle format, but in print would work well, too.
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