Reviews

The Big Book of Science Fiction by Jeff VanderMeer, Ann VanderMeer

themidnightbagel's review against another edition

I can't give this book a rating as I didn't read every single story in it (it was over 1000 pages and frankly some of them just didn't interest me), or I had already read some of them before previously. However, in my mind this is a 5 star collection as a whole. The introduction gave some great history into the sci-fi genre, where it came from, where it is now, and where it's going, and a good short synopsis over the many eras of sci-fi. There was a very conscious effort to fill the collection with many diverse authors, from many different time periods. It felt incredibly comprehensive, and you could tell that the editors have sci-fi in their hearts, and really care about this genre of fiction. Highly highly recommend this to anyone, long or short term fans of science fiction can find something to get out of this collection.

I enjoyed almost every story I read in here, but in no particular order my favorites that I read -keeping in mind I did skip some along the way- were :
2 B R 0 2 B - Kurt Vonnegut
Aye and Gemmorah - Samuel Delaney
Standing Woman - Yasutaka Tsutsui
September 2005 : The Martian - Ray Bradbury
Beyond Lies The Wub - Phillip K. Dick
Day Million - Frederick Pohl
And I Awoke and Found Me Here On the Cold Hill's Side - James Tiptree Jr.
Variation On a Man - Pat Cadigan
Remnants of the Virago Crypto-System - Geoffrey Maloney
Baby Doll - Johanna Sinisalo
Story of Your Life - Ted Chiang