Cities and suburbs, real and imaginary.

Thursday, April 2, 2009

After Reading Table of Contents for a couple Year's Best Anthos....

It's not that I don't think the editors of the "Best of..." and "Year's Best..." are off the mark. Actually, most of my favorite fantasy stories end up in these anthologies. And, it's not that they're ignoring micro- and semi-pro 'zines. That's wholly and unequivocally false to even a glance across the ToC.

It's that I think the semi-pro 'zines are where it's at in fantasy short fiction, these days. I don't get excited by the latest issue of F&SF quite in the same way I do for Electric Velocipede. I'm more engaged by one issue of Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet's sci-fi than in multiple years of Analog. Asimov's is lovely, true, but in a cage match with Talebones, that venerable standard-bearer of the field would face true competition when it comes to innovative fictions.

I would love to see a Year's Best Anthology Dedicated to Micro- and Semi-pro publications, dedicated to the edges of the field. Even if it were an on-line only, thing, it would be a cool list to have handy.

And, I mention it here because I don't think I'm qualified to do it, even if I had the time for it.

I nominate Cat Rambo and Eric Marin.

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