The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Tenth Annual Collection

by Gardner Dozois

  At the beginning of 1992, Analog and Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine (along with two mystery magazines, all formerly belonging to Davis Publications) were sold to Dell Magazines, part of the Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, which is a part of the international consortium Bertelsmann. In November, they were redesigned slightly and “relaunched” with new logos (which, for IAsfm, included a name change—or alteration, anyway—to Asimov’s Science Fiction), and in early 1993 they changed editorial offices and editorial addresses, as Dell Magazines moved into a huge new office tower in Manhattan, along with Bantam, Dell, Doubleday, and all the other (formerly) far-flung pieces of the Bertelsmann American empire. The editorial staffs of both magazines remain intact, however, and so far other changes have been minor. Circulation was down somewhat for both Analog and Asimov’s Science Fiction in 1992, but Dell Magazines is putting into action a massive push for new subscriptions and greatly increased newsstand display, and next year we’ll begin to see what effect this has.

  Circulation was also down slightly at The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, 18.6 percent, according to Locus, but not enough to offset completely last year’s gain in circulation of 30.9 percent, leaving it still in better shape than it had been in 1990. The tragic death of Isaac Asimov in 1992 compelled some changes in columnists for F&SF, with Bruce Sterling and Gregory Benford taking over the science column on a rotating basis; later, longtime Book Review columnist Algis Budrys left to start his own magazine (see below), and will be replaced on a rotating basis by John Kessel and Orson Scott Card. New editor Kristine Kathryn Rusch, who took over the reins last year from longtime editor Ed Ferman, seems to be settling in nicely, and seems to be doing a first-rate job (to answer the cries of “Can she do it?” from last year—apparently, Yes).

  The British magazine Interzone completed its second full year as a monthly publication. Circulation was down somewhat, by approximately 15 percent, although the magazine had another solid year in terms of literary quality—in fact, Interzone is one of the best science fiction magazines available today, and certainly one of the most reliable places to find quality work.

  Two new SF magazines started in 1992, and one of them, a large-size full-color magazine called Science Fiction Age, edited by Scott Edelman, had one of the most successful launches of any new SF magazine in recent memory, achieving, according to one estimate, a circulation of more than 100,000 with its first issue. There is obviously money behind Science Fiction Age—it has high production values, is very slick-looking, is attracting the kind of upscale advertisers that rarely bother with SF magazines, and has been getting lots of prominent rack display, displayed right up near the cash register in many national bookstore chains; on the other hand, it must be a very expensive magazine to produce, which means they need a higher level of profitability than a digest magazine just to break even, and it takes very deep pockets indeed to keep a magazine out on display in those choice racks near the cash register, often as much as ten dollars per register per store, which can run into real money when you’re talking about the big bookstore chains with thousands of franchises nationwide. So far, the gamble seems to be paying off for Science Fiction Age, and if they can manage to establish themselves solidly before their money runs out, they may become one of the most prominent and widely read SF magazines of the nineties—it is still too early to tell, though, with only three issues out to date; we may well have to wait until next year, or even longer, to determine the real outcome. Still, this could be the start of an important new market, in a field that can use all the short-fiction markets it can possibly get. It’s way too early to get any definite feel for the editorial personality of Science Fiction Age, especially since this is something which often evolves and mutates over time anyway; so far, the issues have been split equally between fiction and nonfiction, which is a little too much nonfiction for my tastes—but hey, for all anyone knows, it could be the nonfiction that’s selling the magazine! It’s just too early to tell.

  The other new magazine is Tomorrow, a considerably less upscale operation (not attracting many advertisers, so far, or getting any kind of national distribution), edited by Algis Budrys. Tomorrow published one issue late in 1992, but it was dated 1993—which for us pushes any consideration of material from it into next year. It’s had a rocky launch so far; it started out being published by Pulphouse Publishing, but Budrys bought it from them late in 1992, and intends to publish it himself, although there will be a delay of several months between the first issue and the second. Unlike Science Fiction Age, there’s clearly not a lot of money behind Tomorrow—but don’t discount it; Budrys is a canny and experienced editor, and may well end up doing some very interesting things with this magazine, if it survives. At any rate, I wish it well, too—as I said above, the field can use all the short-fiction markets it can get.

  As most of you probably know, I, Gardner Dozois, am also the editor of a prominent SF magazine, Asimov’s Science Fiction. And that, as I’ve mentioned before, does pose a problem for me in compiling this summation, particularly the magazine-by-magazine review that follows. As the editor of Asimov’s, I could be said to have a vested interest in the magazine’s success, so that anything negative I said about another SF magazine (particularly another digest-sized magazine, my direct competition), could be perceived as an attempt to make my own magazine look good by tearing down the competition. Aware of this constraint, I’ve decided that nobody can complain if I only say positive things about the competition … and so, once again, I’ve limited myself to a listing of some of the worthwhile authors published by each.

  Omni published good fiction this year by Terry Bisson, Tom Maddox, Harlan Ellison, Poul Anderson, Howard Waldrop, Jonathan Carroll and others. Omni’s fiction editor is Ellen Datlow.

  The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction featured good work by Bradley Denton, Joe Haldeman, Robert Reed, Steven Utley, Marc Laidlaw, Pat Cadigan, Paul J. McAuley, Lisa Mason, Terry Bisson, and others. F&SF’s editor is Kristine Kathryn Rusch.

  Asimov’s Science Fiction published good work by Michael Swanwick, Connie Willis, Maureen F. McHugh, Nancy Kress, Mike Resnick, Pat Cadigan, Frederik Pohl, Mary Rosenblum, Pamela Sargent, Lucius Shepard, Greg Egan, Tony Daniel, Ian R. MacLeod, and others. Asimov’s SF’s editor is Gardner Dozois.

  Analog featured good work by Geoffrey A. Landis, Vonda N. McIntyre, G. David Nordley, William E. Cochrane, Dean McLaughlin, Brian C. Coad, Ben Bova, and others. Analog’s longtime editor is Stanley Schmidt.

  Amazing featured good work by L. Sprague de Camp, Pamela Sargent, Phillip C. Jennings, Ursula K. Le Guin, Brian Stableford, Avram Davidson, and others. Amazing’s editor is Kim Mohan.

  Interzone published good work by Greg Egan, Ian McDonald, Gwenyth Jones, Eugene Byrne, Ian MacLeod, Diane Mapes, Lawrence Watt-Evans, Kim Stanley Robinson, David Langford, and others. Interzone’s editor is David Pringle.

  Aboriginal Science Fiction featured good work by Patricia Anthony, Gregory Benford, Richard K. Lyon, Wendy Wheeler, Jamil Nasir, and others. The editor of Aboriginal Science Fiction is Charles C. Ryan.

  Weird Tales published good work by S.P. Somtow, Tanith Lee, Avram Davidson, F. Paul Wilson, and others. Weird Tales’s editors are George H. Scithers and Darrell Schweitzer.

  Pulphouse: A Fiction Magazine published good work by Kathe Koja, Parke Godwin, S.A. Stolnack, Suzy McKee Charnas, Tim Sullivan, Janet Kagan, Amy Bechtel, and others. Pulphouse: A Fiction Magazine’s editor was Dean Wesley Smith, but he is now acting as publisher and the editor is Jonathan E. Bond.

  Science Fiction Age published only one issue this year, but it contained good work by Paul Di Filippo, Don Webb, and others. Science Fiction Age’s editor is Scott Edelman.

  As usual, short SF continued to appear in many magazines outside genre boundaries. Playboy in particular continues to run a good deal of SF, under fiction editor Alice K. Turner; this year they featured good work by Robert Silverberg, Lucius Shepard, and John Varley, among others.
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  An interesting associational magazine started early in 1993, a hip (perhaps too self-consciously so) large-format national magazine called Wired, which seems to be devoted to exploring cutting-edge new technologies, especially computer networks, electronic media, and Virtual Reality. Although there’s no science fiction as such published here, the magazine has a definite “Cyberpunk” feel to it, and the debut issue not only features an article by Bruce Sterling about the future of military technology, it also uses a blown-up photo of Bruce’s face as its cover image! In spite of being so “creatively” laid out and typeset as to be nearly unreadable in spots, Wired is supposedly doing quite well in initial sales, and may be a success.

  (Subscription addresses follow for those magazines hardest to find on the newsstands: The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Mercury Press, Inc., Box 56, Cornwall, CT 06753, annual subscription—12 issues—$26 in U.S.; Asimov’s Science Fiction, Dell Magazines Fiction Group, P.O. Box 5133, Harlan, IA, 51593-5133, $34.95 for 13 issues; Interzone, 217 Preston Drove, Brighton BN1 6FL, United Kingdom, $52 for an airmail one year—12 issues—subscription; Analog, Dell Magazines Fiction Group, P.O. Box 5133, Harlan, IA, 51593-5133, $34.95 for 13 issues; Pulphouse: A Fiction Magazine, P.O. Box 1227, Eugene, OR 97440, $39 per year (13 issues) in US; Aboriginal Science Fiction, P.O. Box 2449, Woburn, MA 01888-0849, $18 for 4 issues in US; Weird Tales, Terminus Publishing Company, P.O. Box 13418, Philadelphia, PA 19101-3418, $16 for 4 issues in US; Tomorrow, The Unifont Company, Inc., Box 6038, Evanston, IL 60204, $18 for 6 issues in US.)

  It was a bad year in the semiprozine market, which continues to contract, with more magazines lost this year in addition to the magazines lost last year. Michael G. Adkisson’s New Pathways seems to have finally died, or at least I’ve seen no new issue from them since the one I reviewed here last year. The eclectic Forbidden Lines went from bimonthly to quarterly sometime during 1992, and Steve Pasechnick’s promising Strange Plasma only published one issue this year, and there are rumors that it is about to go under as well. The entertaining Nova Express—edited by Lawrence Person, Glen Cox, and Dwight Brown—published no issues during 1992, although they did produce an issue just before press time in early 1993. Science Fiction Review evidently has died, as has Iniquities. An issue of Whispers was again promised for this year, and once again failed to appear. Grue, 2 AM, Deathrealm, Weirdbook, Midnight Graffiti and Tales of the Unanticipated all produced only single issues this year. Doug Fratz’s Quantum (formerly the long-running Thrust) announced that it would cease as an independent publication in 1992 and merge with Science Fiction Eye, which itself only published one issue this year (although another issue did come out soon after the beginning of 1993); allegedly, there is still one giant final issue of Quantum yet to come. And Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Fantasy Magazine remained unimpressive in quality.

  On the (somewhat) more positive side, there continues to be a lively British semiprozine scene, with several eclectic magazines such as BBR, Nexus, Strange Attractor, Scheherazade, Exuberance, and a number of others struggling either to be born or to stay alive long enough to produce another issue—we’ll see how the dust has settled by next year; some of these magazines are quite likely to be already defunct. There’s an interesting Canadian magazine called On Spec which seems fairly reliably established and which has produced some interesting work this year, and two worthwhile Australian magazines, Aurealis and Eidolon. Cemetery Dance seems to have established itself as the most prominent of the horror semiprozines, and is now readily available on many large newsstands.

  Charles N. Brown’s Locus and Andy Porter’s Science Fiction Chronicle remain your best bet among the semiprozines if you are looking for news and/or an overview of what’s happening in the genre. Stephen P. Brown’s Science Fiction Eye and The New York Review of Science Fiction (whose editorial staff includes David G. Hartwell, Donald G. Keller, Robert Killheffer, and Gordon Van Gelder) are the most fun to read of the criticalzines, the most highly opinionated, the most ambitious, and also publish the most eclectic and furthest-ranging types of material—The New York Review of Science Fiction has in addition established itself as the most reliably published of these magazines, keeping to its twelve-issue schedule once again this year. Another interesting criticalzine is the Damon Knight-edited Monad, whch put out its second edition this year.

  (Locus, Locus Publications, Inc., P.O. Box 13305, Oakland, CA 94661, $38 for a one-year second-class subscription, 12 issues; Science Fiction Chronicle, Algol Press, P.O. Box 2730, Brooklyn, NY 11202-0056, $27 for one year, 12 issues, $33 first class; Quantum (formerly Thrust), Thrust Publications, 8217 Langport Terrace, Gaithersburg, MD 20877, $7 for 3 issues; Science Fiction Eye, P.O. Box 18539, Asheville, NC 28814, $10 for one year; New Pathways, MGA Services, P.O. Box 863994, Plano, TX 75086-3994, $25 for 6-issue subscription; Nova Express, White Car Publications, P.O. Box 27231, Austin, TX 78755-2231, $10 for a one-year (4-issue) subscription; Strange Plasma, Edgewood Press, P.O. Box 264, Cambridge, MA 02238, $8 for 3 issues; Aurealis: The Australian Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Chimaera Publications, P.O. Box 538, Mt. Waverley, Victoria 3149, Australia, $24 for a 4-issue (quarterly) subscription, “all money orders for overseas subscriptions should be in Australian dollars”; BBR, P.O. Box 625, Sheffield SI 3GY, United Kingdom, $18 for 4 issues; The New York Review of Science Fiction, Dragon Press, P.O. Box 78, Pleasantville, NY 10570, $25 per year; Cemetery Dance, CD Publications, P.O. Box 858, Edgewood, MD 21040, $15 for 4 issues (one year), $25 for 8 issues (two years); Grue Magazine, Hells Kitchen Productions, Box 370, Times Square Station, New York, NY 10108, $13 for 3 issues; Midnight Graffiti, P.O. Box 2546, Yucca Valley, CA 92286-2546, one year for $19.95; Tales of the Unanticipated, P.O. Box 8036, Lake Street Station, Minneapolis, MN 55408, $10 for three issues; Eidolon, Eidolon Publications, P.O. Box 225, North Perth, Western Australia 6006, $34 (Australian) for 4 issues overseas, payable to Richard Scriven; Forbidden Lines, P.O. Box 23, Chapel Hill, NC 27514, $12 for 4 issues (one year); Monad, Pulphouse Publishing, Box 1227, Eugene, OR 97440, $5 for single issues or $18 for four issues.)

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  This was a generally weak year for original anthologies—there were few outright stinkers, but even most of the best original anthologies of 1992 were a bit lackluster, with few really first-rate stories.

  Universe 2 (Bantam Spectra), for instance, the second volume in the new series edited by Karen Haber and Robert Silverberg (a continuation of Terry Carr’s old Universe series) is somewhat disappointing compared to 1990’s Universe 1—this is still a solid anthology, and a good buy for the money, but (with the exception of the Kathe Koja story reprinted here) none of the stories in it are exceptional … entertaining, yes, good solid second-rank stuff, with few bad or even mediocre stories among them, but with nothing that’s really of first-class quality, either; good work here by Joe Haldeman, Tony Daniel, Carolyn Gilman, Jamil Nasir, Deborah Wessell, Paula May, and others. New Worlds 2 (Gollancz), the second volume in the new British anthology series edited by David Garnett, is considerably weaker than last year’s debut anthology, and all the more disappointing because 1991’s New Worlds was such an outstanding anthology. As with Universe 2, there’s nothing really first-rate here, although New Worlds 2 does feature good work by Ian McDonald, Jack Deighton, Stephen Baxter, and others. Unlike Universe 2, though, which at least maintains an even tone and a solid average level, there is a good deal of weak work in New Worlds 2, and some stuff that is just plain bad—I certainly could have done without the two pieces by Warwick Colvin Jnr. (which I gather is an in-joke pseudonym for one of the old New Worlds insiders), for instance, several of the other stories are annoyingly self-conscious and pretentious, and, with space at such a premium in an anthology which is only issued once a year (and which at the moment is Britain’s only continuing SF anthology series), I can’t help but wonder if it wasn’t a mistake to devote so much of that space to two long outlines for never-to-be-written novels by the late Philip K. Dick; they’re
interesting, but I would rather have seen the space utilized for new stories, especially as there are so few professional British markets for short fiction these days.

  Let’s hope these two very important anthology series get back on track and produce stronger volumes next time around—especially New Worlds.

  What Might Have Been Volume 4: Alternate Americas (Bantam Spectra), edited by Gregory Benford and Martin H. Greenberg, was somewhat weaker than previous volumes have been, perhaps because the theme for this one is too specialized (for the most part, it’s a de facto Alternate Columbus anthology), and, as a result, too many of the stories are too similar to each other; still, a worthwhile anthology for the money, containing strong work, both original and reprint, from L. Sprague de Camp, Pamela Sargent, Robert Silverberg, A.A. Attanasio, Sheila Finch, and others. There were two issues of a promising new series of mixed original and reprint anthologies out this year, Omni Best Science Fiction One and Omni Best Science Fiction Two, both from Omni Books, and both edited by Ellen Datlow—Volume One contains good original work by Robert Silverberg, J.R. Dunn, Bruce McAllister, Elizabeth A. Lynn, and others; Volume Two contains good original work from Lucius Shepard, Pat Cadigan, Maggie Flinn, Elizabeth Hand, and others, and there is good reprint work from Omni in each volume. L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future Volume VIII (Bridge), edited by Algis Budrys and Dave Wolverton, was, as usual, apprentice work by people who may—or may not—one day be writing at a really professional level, but who mostly are not as yet. Responding to my statement here last year that his Synergy series seemed to be dead, George Zebrowski tells me that the series is not dead, but will be published on an irregular basis, whenever he’s assembled enough worthwhile material; there was no issue of Synergy out this year, for the second year in a row. The long-promised last edition of the Pulphouse hardback anthology series, Pulphouse Twelve, didn’t appear this year either, and is now being promised for sometime in 1993.