I obviously read, or at least look at, a lot of short science fiction and fantasy stories. Increasingly these stories are coming out in original anthologies from both small presses and trade presses, and they contain some terrific fiction. What I’m finding more and more difficult is keeping track of all of these anthologies, and being sure that I see them when they come out. With that in mind, I’m at the very least going to blog about books that I know are coming out, and might even start up some kind of registry. With that a quick initial mention of a few anthologies that have come to my attention recently.

First up is Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling’s Salon Fantastique: Thirty Original Tales of Fantasy. This one’s due out in September/October of this year and can be preordered from Amazon. Ellen and Terri are one of the best and most important collaborative editorial teams to work in the fantasy field, and all of their anthologies are terrific. This one looks especially good. On that, be sure to keep an eye out for The Coyote Road, due out in 2007.

Second is Peter Crowther’s Forbidden Planets. This is the fourth paperback original anthology that Pete’s edited for DAW, following on from Moon Shots, Mars Probes, and last year’s Constellations. I’m actually reading this one at the moment, and it has some terrific stories by Alastair Reynolds, Ian McDonald, Jay Lake and others. It’s due in November 2006, and if you’ve read Pete’s other anthologies, you’ll know what to expect here.

Third is Lou Anders Fast Forward 1. The first in a new original anthology series due out in early 2007, and featuring a cool John Picacio cover, it has some great people in it and looks like it should be fascinating. Lou has edited a couple anthologies in recent years, Live Without a Net and Futureshocks, both of which featured some extraordinarly good short fiction. What I like about his anthologies is that they’re very focussed. They are based around a strong, clear idea, and Lou really makes his books work.

And last for the moment is Marvin Kaye’s Forbidden Planets. It’s due from the SF Book Club in June, and includes original novellas by Robert Reed, Nancy Kress and others. I though Kaye’s The Fair Folk was one of the best fantasy anthologies of last year, and I’m looking forward to this one. I’d also take my hat off to the Club, who have published some great novella books of late. I think Gardner’s One Million A.D., for example, is terrific and Charles Stross’s “Missile Gap” (from that book) deserves to make the Hugo ballot next year.

Richard Bowes remarkable story “There’s A Hole in the City” has won the 2006 Million Writers Award for Fiction. The story, which is also nominated for the 2005 Nebula Award for Best Short Story, is terrific. I’m delighted it’s won the Million Writers Award, and very pleased that it’ll be in Fantasy: The Very Best of 2005.

Via: Matt Cheney

The Science Fiction Book Club have listed Best Short Novels: 2006, so you can now order it, and should see copies sometime in early June. I’m really happy with the book, and have had a great time working with Andrew Wheeler, Kathy Kiernan and the team at the Club this time out.

Of course, now that the listing is public I can confirm that the mystery ninth story is…ta da!… Jeffrey Ford’s wonderful short novel, The Cosmology of the Wider World. It’s a stunning story and one that I’m thrilled to be able to include in the anthology. I’d really like to thank Jeff, Pete Crowther at PS Publishing, and Nick Gevers for helping make sure it could happen. The story was originally published in a lovely edition from PS with a great Kim Veitch Kim Deitch cover, and this will be its first US publication. Be sure to check it out. And if you love it as much as I do, you’ll be interested to know that there should be a second Cosmology story coming out from PS sometime next year.

Note: Edited to correct my error. I credited the fine cover art for Jeff’s book from memory. It clearly is by Kim Deitch, who had was covered in Time Magazine several years back, and not some fictional person that I entirely invented. Apologies to Kim, who did a great job.

Having said that, I entirely understand the reviewer’s point of “Yes, we know you can do Heinlein — but can you do you?” One of the ironies here is that the book I wrote immediately after Old Man’s War — The Android’s Dream — is rather different tonally than Old Man’s War or Ghost Brigades; and at the very least it can’t be said to be Heinleinesque because Dear Ol’ Bob never opened a book with a chapter-long fart joke.

As I mentioned earlier, I spent some time catching up on John Scalzi. Read both Old Man’s War and The Ghost Brigades, and enjoyed them both. They’re good fun SF, and definitely show the influence of Heinlein that most reviewers have noted, and that John Scalzi acknowledges in the above quote from his blog. Well, a few days ago John emailed me the opening chapter of his next novel, The Android’s Dream, which as promised opens with a chapter long fart joke. It starts with “Dirk Moeller didn’t know if he could fart his way into a major diplomatic incident”, and then it gets really funny. I’m not going to say much more about the chapter because readers should get the chance to enjoy it themselves. I can’t really say much about the novel either, though based on one chapter I’ve seen it does move away from the whole Heinlein scenario. I do believe John’s comment that The Android’s Dream may well be “almost entirely message-free; if a science fiction novel could be described as a “popcorn book” … this would be that book.” It sounds like fun and I’m looking forward to seeing the entire book when it’s ready.

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