[.ca] The New Hugo Winners IV (ISBN 0671878522)

Is short fiction dying?:
I've noticed that even impressive collections like this have no reviewers. I want to think it is because the fact they won Hugos means no further recommendation is required, but that excuse doesn't really wash. Fortunately collectins of big name authors do slightly better, but anthologies like this that contain stories by big name authors aren't being read anymore it seems. Worse Hugo winning stories tend to come from magazines like asimov's, analog, f & sf, & SF Age which all are in decline. On the plus side the Hugo anthologies are generally good reading & I almost wish they did what the Nebulas do i.e. put out yearly collections of their nominees. Since I tend to prefer Hugo nominated stories to Nebula nominated stories I'd jump at it. Oh, well. Interstingly many of the great stories in this collection were first in magazines. Beggars in Spain is especially wonderful, but I bet the others are too. A good thing about anthologies like this is that we live in an age of bloated trilogies so this is a nice step in a different direction. I hope you enjoy this collection and I hope short fiction is in better shape than I think. P.S. If you like short fiction of any stripe give science fiction anthologies a chance, after all s.f. is perhaps the best place for short fiction nowadays.

Great collection of science fiction:
Unless you read the science fiction magazines, you've probably missed these sf stories. This is a great compilation of excellent SF; don't miss it!

A mixed bunch but worth it on the whole:
This book contains the winners of three of the categories of Hugo awards (novella, novelette and short story) from the years 1992, 1993 and 1994. Most of the stories here were first published in Asimov's science fiction magazine. Thus, regular subscribers to that will find little new in this collection. I felt that the three short stories were not particularly good. The first, "A Walk in the Sun" by Geoffrey Landis is traditional SF involving an astronaut stranded on the Moon. I felt that this could have been written thirty or forty years earlier and, after the first four pages, it was simple to see how the rest of the story would progress. Only one writer, Connie Willis, featured twice and her two short stories were, for me at least, the weakest in the collection. While none of them stands out as being exceptionally good, the longer works do manage to redeem the collection. The first novelette, "Gold" by Asimov is not particularly memorable but the other two, "The Nutcracker Coup" and "Georgia on my Mind" together with the three novellas, "Beggars in Spain", "Barnacle Bill the Spacer" and "Down in the Bottomlands" tip the balance. All five of these were interesting stories in settings ranging from contemporary Earth through space adventure to alien worlds and races. TNC and BiS also had something interesting to say beyond their narrative. In summary then, a readable book which is worth the price of admission but there are better collections around.