Best American Fantasy

Best American Fantasy #1

by Jeff Vandermeer (Editor), Ann VanderMeer, Ann Kennedy (Editor)

A prestigious new anthology series, Best American Fantasy is guest edited by Ann & Jeff VanderMeer, with Matthew Cheney serving as the series editor. This inaugural volume showcases the best North American fantasy short fiction from the preceding year.

Hard truth about waste management / Sumanth Prabhaker --
Stolen father / Eric Roe --
Saffron gatherer / Elizabeth Hand --
Whipping / Julia Elliott --
Better angel / Chris Adrian --
Draco Campestris / Sarah Monette --
Geese / Daniel Courdriet --
Chinese boy / Ann Stapleton --
Flying woman / Meghan McCarron --
First kisses from beyond the grave / Nik Houser --
Song of the selkie / Gina Ochsner --
Troop [sic] of baboons / Tyler Smith --
Pieces of Scheherazade / Nicole Kornher-Stace --
Origin story / Kelly Link --
Experiment in governance / E.M. Schorb --
Next corpse collector / Ramola D --
Village of Ardakmoktan / Nicole Derr --
Man who married a tree / Tony D'Souza --
Fable with slips of white paper ... / Kevin Brockmeier --
Pregnant / Catherine Zeidler --
Warehouse of saints / Robin Hemley --
Ledge / Austin Bunn --
Lazy taekos / Geoffrey A. Landis --
For the love of Paul Bunyan / Fritz Swanson --
Accounting / Brian Evenson --
Abraham Loncoln has been shot / Daniel Alarcon --
Bit forgive / Maile Chapman --
End of narrative (1-29; or 29-1) / Peter LaSalle --
Kiss / Melora Wolff

Genres: Fantasy, Short Stories, Anthologies, Fiction

396 pages, Paperback

First published August 21, 2007

About the author

NYT bestselling writer Jeff VanderMeer has been called “the weird Thoreau” by the New Yorker for his engagement with ecological issues. His most recent novel, the national bestseller Borne, received wide-spread critical acclaim and his prior novels include the Southern Reach trilogy (Annihilation, Authority, and Acceptance). Annihilation won the Nebula and Shirley Jackson Awards, has been translated into 35 languages, and was made into a film from Paramount Pictures directed by Alex Garland. His nonfiction has appeared in New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Atlantic, Slate, Salon, and the Washington Post. He has coedited several iconic anthologies with his wife, the Hugo Award winning editor. Other titles include Wonderbook, the world’s first fully illustrated creative writing guide. VanderMeer served as the 2016-2017 Trias Writer in Residence at Hobart and William Smith Colleges. He has spoken at the Guggenheim, the Library of Congress, and the Arthur C. Clarke Center for the Human Imagination.

VanderMeer was born in Bellefonte, Pennsylvania, but spent much of his childhood in the Fiji Islands, where his parents worked for the Peace Corps. This experience, and the resulting trip back to the United States through Asia, Africa, and Europe, deeply influenced him.

Jeff is married to Ann VanderMeer, who is currently an acquiring editor at Tor.com and has won the Hugo Award and World Fantasy Award for her editing of magazines and anthologies. They live in Tallahassee, Florida, with two cats and thousands of books.

Reviews

[Raving Redcoat · Rating 1 out of 5]

Honestly, I didn't finish this book. I honestly tried, but the stories really didn't grab me.

[Anna · Rating 2 out of 5]

Couldn't finish it. The selected stories were very dark and depressing.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some very good, some mediocre. Then again, I have really particular tastes. The story about God's overcoat was my favorite, if only because I was touched by the kindness.

[David · Rating 2 out of 5]

Top stories - a better angel and he married a tree

[Rick · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the 1950s and 1960s, the distinctions between literary and fantasy fiction lacked rigid outlines. Nothing typified this trend more than editor Judith Merrill's 12 volumes of The Year's Greatest Science Fiction and Fantasy, published from 1956 to 1968. Within her anthologies, such authors as John Graves, William S. Burroughs, Donald Barthelme, and Gunther Grass routinely appeared alongside more readily identifiable genre writers. Since the mid-Eighties, "best of" fantasy publications have focused on genre writers, all but ignoring stories that are marketed outside the field. Best American Fantasy replicates Merrill's success by combing nontraditional genre haunts and delving into mainstream literary and online magazines.

Editors Ann and Jeff VanderMeer offer a wide range of tales, most of which do not appear in other "best of" collections, from publications as different as Alaska Quarterly Review, Fantasy & Science Fiction, The Georgia Review, Harrington Gay Men's Literary Quarterly, McSweeney's, New England Review, The New Yorker, Oxford American, The Paris Review, and Zoetrope: All-Story. The VanderMeers chose their selections wisely.

Highlights include Sumanth Prabhaker's "A Hard Truth About Waste Management," Chris Adrian's "A Better Angel," Meghan McCarron's "The Flying Woman," Gina Ochsner's "Song of the Selkie," Tyler Smith's "A Troop [sic] of Baboons," E.M. Schorb's "An Experiment in Governance," Brian Evenson's "An Accounting," and Daniel Alarcón's "Abraham Lincoln Has Been Shot." Two pieces stand out: Nik Houser's "First Kisses From Beyond the Grave," a refreshingly original tale of a high school for zombies complete with teen angst and desires, and Kelly Link's clever "Origin Story" about two people with powers, super and not so much, and their lifelong love affair. A majority of the stories rotate around the loss of control, especially by persons with immense inner strength. Given the state of American politics since 9/11, this is not a surprising theme.

In Best American Fantasy, the VanderMeers accomplished their stated goal. They have successfully produced an excellent collection of the fantastical, completely disregarding the arbitrary distinctions of genre and, in the process, potentially reinvigorating American fantasy.

This review originally appeared in The Austin Chronicle, October 19, 2007.

[Steve · Rating 3 out of 5]

By some error, Goodreads seems to have conflated the first and second volumes of this series. My favorite stories from the first book are "The Saffron Gatherer" (Elizabeth Hand), "A Better Angel" (Chris Adrian), "First Kisses from beyond the Grave" (Nik Houser), "A Troop [sic] of Baboons" (Tyler Smith), "Origin Story" (Kelly Link), and "The Man Who Married a Tree" (Terry D'Souza).
---------------------------------

A month after my first posting and I just read the second volume. My favorites here are "Chainsaw on Hand" (Deborah Coates) and "The Last and Only, or, Mr. Moscowitz Becomes French" (Peter S. Beagle). There are also stories, most of them good, by some other well-known writers of fantasy: Bruce Holland Rogers, Kage Baker, M. Rickert, Jeffrey Ford, Kelly Link, and Rachel Swirsky. There are eleven other stories of varying merit by other authors as well.

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

What I love about this collection is that it's not just genre fantasy (The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Clarkesworld, Lightspeed, etc). Much of it - in fact, the majority of this collection - pulls from literary journals like One Story, Zoetrope, The Southern Review, A Public Space The New Yorker, etc. It's such a smart way to do a year's best-type collection, in my opinion, broadening the horizons of fantasy readers, genre and literary.

Not sure why this collection is getting only 3.5 stars on average. It deserves better.

[Lane · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some I really enjoyed, some not so much, as is often the case with more "literary" fantasy. For the most part still better than bad uber-genre short fantasy, but I didn't enjoy as many as I hoped I would. I particularly liked the "A Troop [sic] of Baboons," but I'm especially susceptible to monkeys in my fantasy.

[Eric]

My favorites: "The Flying Woman," "Song of the Selkie," "Pieces of Scheherazade," "The Man Who Married a Tree," "A Fable with Slips of White Paper Slipping from the Pockets," "The Warehouse of the Saints," "The Ledge," "The End of Narrative (1-29; or 29-1)," and "An Accounting," which I read to my wife when she was ill and it cheered her up.

[Jenny · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was really excited to read this collection of stories, I thought that the fantasy would be spilling out of the pages....but I was really disappointed. Although all of the stories were well written there were only a few that I really enjoyed. Bottom line is that this book is not fantasy more twisted reality and the the only reason I finished it was in the hope that it would get better.

[S · Rating 2 out of 5]

Why are there so many depressing stories in the world?

Future self, you should know that you probably only stopped reading this book because you had so many others you would rather be reading checked out from the library which has a measly three week lending period.

[Marisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

Blech. Pretentious, and seemingly dedicated to "rescuing" fantasy from genre. Many of the stories were quite bland.

[catherine · Rating 4 out of 5]

i'm in this book.

[Zach Zeidler · Rating 5 out of 5]

my sister has a story published in this one, everyone should buy this