THE BIG BOOK OF SCIENCE FICTION

Reviewed by Steven H Silver

Over the past several years, Ann and Jeff VanderMeer have quietly built a reputation for their anthologies, both original, such as The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities, and retrospective, like their massive The Time Traveler's Almanac. Their latest endeavour, the aptly named The Big Book of Science Fiction, eclipses all of their previous successful anthologies. This massive book includes 105 short stories, ranging from H.G. Wells's 1897 "The Star" to Johanna Sinisalo's 2002 story "Baby Doll."

The VanderMeers include several expected authors and short stories. The book contains the requisite Bradbury, Clarke, and Asimov, as well as Hugo and Nebula Award winners and nominees. In truth, these selections are relatively familiar friends, available in numerous other readily available anthologies and collections. The real strength of the anthology is when the editors have strayed from the established path, whether with lesser known American and English authors or with authors whose first language is not English.

In The Big Book of Science Fiction, they define and argue for an inclusive view of science fiction as a genre which can include not only the space opera of Edmond Hamilton's "The Star Stealers," but also the existential isolationist "Darkness," by Brazilian André Carneiro and the satirical "Let Us Save the Universe," by Stanislaw Lem, here presented in a new translation by Joel Stern and Maria Switcicja-Ziemianek, rather than Lem's traditional translator, Michael Kandel. In fact, most of the numerous translated stories in The Big Book of Science Fiction are presented in new translati10:07 PM 7/7/2016on.

Theme isn't the only sign of inclusivity. Clare Winger Harris, represented by "The Fate of the Poseidonia," is the first modern female science fiction author to publish under her own name. The story is typical of her work, in that it is more descriptive than narrative. and the VanderMeers have also included numerous authors in translation from countries including China, represented by Cixin Liu's "The Poetry Cloud," Germany with Paul Scheerbart's "The New Overworld," and the Soviet Union with Valentina Zhuravlyova's story "The Astronaut." All of these stories, and more, stand on their own. For all that science fiction has been called an "American artform," the VanderMeers successfully demonstate that from its earliest days, authors around the world have used the tropes of science fiction to explore the world around them.

While the stories speak for themselves, The Big Book of Science Fiction sets out to do more than just give the reader numerous stories to enjoy and think about. Each story includes a brief introduction, which not only places the story within the context of the author's career, but also discusses the author's place in the world. These introductions don't shy away from controversy, discussing Karl Hans Strobl's descent into Nazism, even as it presents his "The Triumph of Mechanics." It does lead to the question of how easy it is to separate an artist from his work. Can a modern reader enjoy Strobl's pre-World War I writings knowing that in World War II he was a member of the Nazi party who wrote propaganda?

Readers who have prescribed views of what science fiction is...whether it needs to include spaceships or aliens or laser guns, will have their eyes opened by the breadth of stories included within The Big Book of Science Fiction, and may even feel the need to debate whether a specific story is science fiction, but in their introduction, the VanderMeers provide clear guidance as to their definition of what science fiction encompasses, which the rest of the book supports.

The book is only available in electronic and paperback formats, which is a shame. Given its size, the electronic format is certainly easier (and lighter) to read, allowing the reader to flip between the stories without worrying about breaking the book's spine of their own wrists. However, a book like this offers a certain amount of heft and permanence, which is more assured with an hardcover edition, but this is a minor quibble for a book with such fantastic and broad contents.

There are also a handful of familiar authors whose stories don't grace the pages of this massive book. If no Heinlein story appears (VanderMeer has stated there was a rights issue), it isn't really necessary, his works are available elsewhere. and the lack of another Heinlein reprint means that the VanderMeers were able to include lesser known authors such as Will Worthington or Juan José Arreola, whose work is not well known to the majority of The Big Book of Science Fiction's audience.

Over the years, science fiction has seen numerous general surveys, from Ursula K.Le Guin's The Norton Book of Science Fiction to James Gunn's six-volume The Road to Science Fiction to David Hartwell's Science Fiction Century. The VanderMeers have added a useful and welcome addition to that category, offering a depth and breadth vision of the field which has rarely been seen.

H. G. Wells	The Star
Rokheya Shekhawat Hossain	Sultana's Dream
Karl Hans Strobl	The Triumph of Mechanics
Paul Scheerbart	The New Overworld
Alfred Jarry	Elements of Pataphysics
Miguel de Unamuno	Mechanopolis
Yefim Zozulya	The Doom of Principal City
W.E.B. DuBois	The Comet
Clare Winger Harris	The Fate of the Poseidonia
Edmond Hamilton	The Star Stealers
Leslie F. Stone	The Conquest of Gola
Stanley G. Weinbaum	A Martian Odyssey
A. Merritt	The Last Poet and the Robots
Paul Ernst	The Microscopic Giants
Jorge Luis Borges	Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius
Clifford D. Simak	Desertion
Ray Bradbury	September 2005: The Martian
Juan José Arreola	Baby HP
James Blish	Surface Tension
Philip K. Dick	Beyond Lies the Wub
Katherine MacLean	The Snowball Effect
Margaret St. Clair	Prott
William Tenn	The Liberation of Earth
Chad Oliver	Let Me Live in a House
Arthur C. Clarke	The Star
James H. Schmitz	Grandpa
Cordwainer Smith	The Game of Rat and Dragon
Isaac Asimov	The Last Question
Damon Knight	Stranger Station
James White	Sector General
Arkady & Boris Strugatsky	The Visitors
Carol Emshwiller	Pelt
Gérard Klein	The Monster
Theodore Sturgeon	The Man Who Lost the Sea
Silvina Ocampo	The Waves
Will Worthington	Plenitude
J.G. Ballard	The Voices of Time
Valentina Zhuravlyova	The Astronaut
Adolfo Bioy Casares	The Squid Chooses Its Own Ink
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.	2 B R O 2 B
Vadim Shefner	A Modest Game
Sever Gansovsky	Day of Wrath
John Baxter	The Hands
André Carneiro	Darkness
Harlan Ellison	"Repent, Harlequin!" Said the Tocktockman
R. A. Lafferty	Nine Hundred Grandmothers
Frederik Pohl	Day Million
F. L. Wallace	Student Body
Samuel R. Delany	Aye, and Gomorrah
Langdon Jones	The Hall of Machines
Yoshio Aramaki	Soft Clocks
David R. Bunch	Three from Moderan
Stanislaw Lem	Let Us Save the Universe
Ursula K. Le Guin	Vaster Than Empires and More Slow
Robert Silverberg	Good News from the Vatican
Joanna Russ	When It Changed
James Tiptree, Jr.	And I Awoke and Found Me Here on the Cold Hill's Side
Dmitri Bilenkin	Where Two Paths Cross
Yasutaka Tsutsui	Standing Woman
Alicia Yánez Cossio	The IWM 1000
Michael Bishop	The House of Compassionate Sharers
Barrington J. Bayley	Sporting with the Child
George R. R. Martin	Sandkings
Lisa Tuttle	Wives
Josephine Sexton	The Snake Who Had Read Chomsky
Kajio Shinji	Reiko's Universe Box
Bruce Sterling	Swarm
Jacques Barbéri	Mondocane
Greg Bear	Blood Music
Octavia E. Butler	Bloodchild
Pat Cadigan	Variation on a Man
S. N. Dyer	Passing as a Flower in the City of the Dead
William Gibson	New Rose Hotel
C. J. Cherryh	Pots
John Crowley	Snow
Karen Joy Fowler	The Lake Was Full of Artificial Things
Angélica Gorodischer	The Unmistakable Smell of Wood Violets
Jon Bing	The Owl of Bear Island
Élisabeth Vonarburg	Readers of the Lost Art
Iain M. Banks	A Gift from the Culture
Jean-Claude Dunyach	Paranamanco
Tanith Lee	Crying in the Rain
Michael Moorcock	The Frozen Cardinal
Pat Murphy	Rachel in Love
Manjula Padmanabhan	Sharing Air
Connie Willis	Schwarzschild Radius
Gene Wolfe	All the Hues of Hell
Geoffrey A. Landis	Vacuum States
Han Song	Two Small Brids
Rachel Pollack	Burning Sky
Kim Stanley Robinson	Before I Wake
Misha Nogha	Death is Static Death is Movement
Michael Blumlein	The Brains of Rats
Leona Krohn	Gorgonoids
Kojo Laing	Vacancy for the Post of Jesus Christ
Gwyneth Jones	The Universe of Things
Robert Reed	The Remoras
William Tenn	The Ghost Standard
Geoffrey Maloney	Remnants of the Virago Crypto-System
Stepan Chapman	How Alex Became a Machine
Cixin Liu	The Poetry Cloud
Ted Chiang	Story of Your Life
Cory Doctorow	Craphound
Tatyana Tolstaya	The Slynx
Johanna Sinisalo	Baby Doll

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