Imagine a story that’s based on Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. That’s exactly what Charles L. Harness’s “The New Reality” does in its exploration of what Reality really is. Wonderful story! And then there’s a very different story from A. E. van Vogt titled “Process.” Told from the perspective of an intelligent forest on an alien planet, van Vogt manages to capture a “Sense of Wonder.” The most famous story in this volume is Damon Knight’s classic “To Serve Man.” I remember watching The Twilight Zone in 1962 and being shocked by the episode!

The quality of the stories in THE YEAR’S BEST SCIENCE FICTION STORIES: 1951 is better than the 1949 and 1950 volumes. Fritz Leiber’s “Coming Attraction” set new trends in SF. Alfred Bester’s “Oddy and Id” and “Born of Man and Woman” by Richard Matheson are first-rate stories of “unusual” children. If you find a copy of The Year’s Best Science Fiction Stories: 1951 grab it! GRADE: A
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
• Introduction, by Everett F. Bleiler & T. E. Dikty
• “The Santa Claus Planet”, by Frank M. Robinson (Bleiler & Dikty, 1951)
• “The Gnurrs Come from the Voodvork Out”, by Reginald Bretnor ( The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Winter/Spring 1950),
• “The Mindworm”, by Cyril Kornbluth (Worlds Beyond December 1950)
• “The Star Ducks”, by Bill Brown ( The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, 1950)
• “Not to Be Opened—”, by Roger Flint Young (Astounding Science Fiction, May 1949)
• “Process”, by A. E. van Vogt (The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, December 1950)
• “Forget-Me-Not”, by William F. Temple (Other Worlds Science Fiction Stories, September 1950)
• “Contagion”, by Katherine MacLean (Galaxy Science Fiction, October 1950)
• “Trespass!”, by Poul Anderson & Gordon Dickson (Fantastic Story Quarterly, Spring 1950)
• “Oddy and Id”, by Alfred Bester (Astounding Science Fiction, August 1950)
• “To Serve Man”, by Damon Knight (Galaxy Science Fiction, November 1950)
• “Summer Wear”, by L. Sprague de Camp (Startling Stories, May 1950)
• “Born of Man and Woman”, by Richard Matheson (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, July 1950)
• “The Fox in the Forest”, by Ray Bradbury (Collier’s, May 1950)
• “The Last Martian”, by Fredric Brown (Galaxy Science Fiction, October 1950)
• “The New Reality”, by Charles L. Harness (Thrilling Wonder Stories, December 1950)
• “Two Face”, by Frank Belknap Long (Weird Tales, March 1950)
• “Coming Attraction”, by Fritz Leiber (Galaxy Science Fiction, November 1950)

I’ve enjoyed Charles Stross’s “Laundry” series so I thought I would like this projected trilogy: Halting State (2007) and Rule 34 (2011) and a cancelled third volume. Halting State is a police procedural about the hacking of a video game company. Rule 34 revolves around a series of mysterious–but connected–murders. Edinburgh Decretive Inspector Liz Kavanaugh investigates these crimes set in the “near Future.” My biggest complaint about both books is they are told in the Second Person. “You” this and “You” that grates on me. I was able to figure out the culprit in Halting State fairly early in the novel. Rule 34 held more surprises. All in all, I’d advise you to stick with the “Laundry” novels and skip these SF crime novels. HALTING STATE: GRADE: C
RULE 34: GRADE: B

Over the years, I’ve enjoyed many of Otto Penzler’s crime and mystery anthologies. This theme anthology from 2017 features stories that involve books and bookstores. I really liked Loren D. Estleman’s “Book Club” where a book seller is murdered and a rare book is missing. William Link writes a pretty clever Columbo story in “Death Leaves a Bookmark.” Jeff Smith once took Jeff Meyerson, Andy Jayanovich, and me to THE BOOK THING in Baltimore (we were attending a BOUCHERCON). THE BOOK THING is a book store that gives books away. For FREE. Laura Lippman makes THE BOOK THING the star of her story of the same name. Mickey Spillane and Max Allan Collins send Mike Hammer on a search for a dead gangster’s “ledger” in “It’s In the Book.” Bibliomysteries ends on a high note with Nelson De Mille’s “The Book Case” where two vicious beneficiaries are involved in a murder that could make them millionaires. If you’re in the mood for stories about books and crime, Bibliomysteries will fit the bill. You can read my other reviews of Otto Penzler anthologies here, here, here, here, and here. GRADE: B

TABLE OF CONTENTS:
INTRODUCTION By Ian Rankin i
An Acceptable Sacrifice – Jeffery Deaver p. 1
Pronghorns of the Third Reich – C. J. Box p. 43
The Book of Virtue – Ken Bruen p. 69
The Book of Ghosts – Reed Farrel Coleman p. 93
The Final Testament – Peter Blauner p. 121
What’s in a Name? – Thomas H. Cook p. 151
Book Club – Loren D. Estleman p. 179
Death Leaves a Bookmark – William Link p. 203
The Book Thing – Laura Lippman p. 231
The Scroll – Anne Perry p. 257
It’s in the Book – Mickey Spillane & Max Allan Collins p. 293
The Long Sonata of the Dead – Andrew Taylor p. 333
Rides a Stranger -David Bell p. 361
The Caxton Lending Library & Book Depository – John Connolly p. 413
The Book Case- Nelson De Mille p. 471

I’ve been watching James Cameron’s Story of Science Fiction on AMC. The first episode deals with “Aliens.” Cameron interviews actors, directors, science fiction writers, and experts of all sorts to share their stories. Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Ridley Scott, Christopher Nolan, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Will Smith, Amy Adams, Jeff Goldblum, and Sigourney Weaver relate their experiences in their key science fiction movies. We’re getting James Cameron’s Story of Science Fiction on Monday nights at 10:05 P.M. There’s also a book version of the series. GRADE: A
EPISODES:
1. ALIENS
2. SPACE
3. MONSTERS
4. DARK FUTURES
5. INTELLIGENT MACHINES
6. TIME TRAVEL

I’ve been a fan of Sloane Crosley’s humorous essays. I enjoyed I Was Told There’d Be Cake (2008) and you can read my review of How Did You Get This Number (2011) here. In Look Alive Out There (2018) Sloane Crosley writes about dealing with vertigo in “Cinema of the Confined.” Very scary, but Crosley injects humor into a very grim situation. “Relative Stranger” tells the story of Sloane Crosley reaching out to a distant relative who once “performed” in 116 porno movies decades ago. Crosley deals with Bad Neighbors in “Outside Voices.” Slaane Crosley doesn’t hide her snarky and bitchy moments in these essays. But you’ll find something to smile at or laugh at in each of these essays. GRADE: B+
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Wheels Up p. 3
Outside Voices p. 7
A Dog Named Humphrey p. 31
You Someday Lucky p. 49
If You Take the Canoe Out p. 53
The Chupacabra p. 77
Up the Down Volcano p. 81
The Grape Man p. 117
Right Aid p. 129
Relative Stranger p. 131
Brace Yourself p. 151
Immediate Family p. 155
Cinema of the Confined p. 159
Wolf p. 179
Our Hour Is Up p. 203
The Doctor Is a Woman p. 211
Acknowledgments p. 241

A few weeks ago, a wind storm knocked a tree in our front yard down. We contacted Chris, the Landscape Guy at DOWN TO EARTH LANDSCAPING. Diane’s friend, Cindy, recommended Chris and his team because they did a wonderful job landscaping their flowerbeds. Diane usually puts down about 80 bags of mulch, but her doctor told her not to do that anymore. The crew of four showed up at 9:00 A.M. with a dump truck full of mulch. The chain saws fired up and within 15 minutes the downed tree was gone. A few hours later, our flower beds looked great, our lawn was cleared of the limbs from the wind storm, and Diane was happy she didn’t have be Queen of the Mulch this year. What do you think?

Back in the 1960s, Gordon R. Dickson was one of my favorite Science Fiction writers. He knew how to tell compelling stories. Dickson would throw some humor into some of his tales (a rarity back then). Hank Davis selected a representative group of Dickson’s stories for a 2003 BAEN Books collection. Hank Davis knew Dickson’s work because there’s a little bit of everything in these 400 pages of wonderful story-telling! And Hank’s insightful “Introduction” shows he’s just not an editor, he’s a fan of Gordon R. Dickson’s work. Dickson won the HUGO AWARD for “Soldier, Ask Not” for Best Short Story, 1965; “Lost Dorsai” for Best Novella, 1981; “The Cloak and the Staff” for Best Novelette, 1981. Dickson also won a Nebula Award for “Call Him Lord” for Best Novelette, 1966. And Dickson won a August Derleth Award (Best Novel, British Fantasy Society) for The Dragon and the George, 1977. Gordon R. Dickson’s strengths as a writer ore on display in Hank Davis’s fine collection. Inexpensive copies can be found on the Internet. GRADE: A
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Introduction: The Dickson Edge, by Hank Davis 1
“Danger—Human” (Astounding Science Fiction, December 1957) 5
“Sleight of Wit” (Analog, December 1961) 31
“In the Bone” (IF, October 1966) 53
“3-Part Puzzle” (Analog June 1962) 83
“An Ounce of Emotion” (IF, October 1965) 103
“Brother Charlie” (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, July 1958) 133
“The Game of Five” (The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, April, 1960) 175
“Tiger Green” (IF, November 1965) 217
“The Hard Way” (Analog, January 1963) 247
“Jackal’s Meal” (Analog, June, 1969) 297
“On Messenger Mountain” (Worlds of Tomorrow, June 1964) 325
“The Catch” (Astounding Science Fiction April, 1959) 391

In a recent comment on Mike Ashley’s classic Science Fiction anthology, Lost Mars (you can read my review here), Steve Lewis wrote: “I try, but I find that I’m out of step with 95% of the SF that’s being printed in any of the last few best of the year anthologies. What’s not in the anthologies I can’t imagine. I know, I know. It’s me who’s out of sync here.” Well, I’m out of sync, too. While reading The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2017 Steve’s voice was ringing in my head as I slogged through story after story. I kept thinking: are these stories really “the Best”? I can only recommend two of these stories: I liked “The Witch of Orion Waste and the Boy Knight” by E. Lily Yu and “The Story of Kao Yu” by Peter S. Beagle. I can also give a nod to the most kitschy story I’ve read in a long time: “I Was a Teenage Werewolf” by Dale Bailey.

Most of the rest of these stories didn’t hold my interest. Some didn’t even seem like SF stories or fantasy stories. They were mood stories or “slice-of-Life” stories. I realize styles change and tastes change. But I know what I like to read and only E. Lily Yu and Peter S. Beagle delivered the goods. GRADE: C
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Foreword by John Joseph Adams ix
Introduction by Charles Yu xvii

“Head, Scales, Tongue, Tail” by Leigh Bardugo (Summer Days and Summer Nights) 1
“Teenagers from Outer Space” by Dale Bailey (Clarkesworld) 27
“I’ve Come to Marry the Princess” by Helena Bell (Lightspeed) 56
“Everyone From Themis Sends Letters Home” by Genevieve Valentine (Clarkesworld) 71
“The Witch of Orion Waste and the Boy Knight” by E. Lily Yu (Uncanny) 96
“When They Came to Us” by Debbie Urbanski (The Sun) 111
“Vulcanization” by Nisi Shawl (Nightmare) 128
“Openness” by Alexander Weinstein (Beloit Fiction Journal) 141
“Not by Wardrobe, Tornado, or Looking Glass” by Jeremiah Tolbert (Lightspeed) 152
“The Future is Blue” by Catherynne M. Valente (Drowned Worlds) 167
“This is Not a Wardrobe Door” by A. Merc Rustad (Fireside) 188
“On the Fringes of the Fractal” by Greg van Eekhout (2113: Stories Inspired by the Music of Rush) 194
“The Story of Kao Yu” by Peter S. Beagle (Tor.com) 206
“Smear” by Brian Evenson (Conjunctions: Other Aliens) 223
“The City Born Great” by N.K. Jemisin (Tor.com) 230
“Welcome to the Medical Clinic at the Interplanetary Relay Station | Hours Since the Last Patient Death: 0” by Caroline M. Yoachim (Lightspeed) 245
“Successor, Usurper, Replacement” by Alice Sola Kim (BuzzFeed READER) 251
“Caspar D. Luckinbill, What Are You Going to Do?” by Nick Wolven (F&SF) 267
“I Was a Teenage Werewolf” by Dale Bailey (Nightmare) 286
“The Venus Effect” by Joseph Allen Hill (Lightspeed) 304
Contributors’ Notes 331
Notable Science Fiction and Fantasy Stories of 2016 343

Caitlin Kiernan’s Black Helicopters is an expansion of her 2014 World Fantasy Award Best Novella of the same title. The story of an “event” that kills thousands of people (and might be the harbinger of something much Worse) appears in a series of chapters from different time-lines. The story shifts from the near Present to the Past to a couple of hundred years into the Future to back to the near Present. Much of what is going on is mysterious (at least to me). Agents from secret agencies duel in the back alleys of Dublin. Strange characters with telekinetic powers send the story careening toward the growing Darkness. Caitlin Kiernan has always been an atmospheric writer. Black Helicopters might be her moodiest book yet by far. GRADE: B