The Mammoth Book of Nebula Awards SF - aka Nebula Awards Showcase 2011

The very best short SF fiction of any given year as recommended and nominated by the members of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America: the best novella, novelette and short story. Here you will find the cream of the crop of science fiction and fantasy - startling ideas, the intricate construction of new worlds and mind-bending experimental writing. This anthology includes not only the Nebula Award-winning works in each short-form category, but also all the nominees in the novelette and short story categories. Here you will find colourful fantasy, outstanding speculative fiction, steampunk, edgy writing on the fringes of the mainstream and uncompromisingly hard SF in stories set in the distant past, an off-kilter present day, the far future or some times in between. There have been full of stories of one or other possible Armageddon, whether by nuclear war, plague, cosmic catastrophe or, more recently, global warming, terrorism, genetic engineering, AIDS and other pandemics. These stories describe the fall of civilization, the destruction of the entire Earth, or the end of the Universe itself. Contents: When we went to see the end of the world - Robert Silverberg The End of the World - Sushma Joshi The Clockwork Atom Bomb - Dominic Green Bloodletting - Kate Wilhelm When Sysadmins ruled the World - Cory Doctorow The Rain at the End of the World - Dale Bailey The Flood - Linda Nagata The End of the World Show - David Barnett Fermi and Frost - Frederik Pohl Sleepover - Alastair Reynolds The Last Sunset - Geoffrey Landis Moments of Inertia - William Barton The Books - Kage Baker Pallbearer - Robert Reed And the Deep Blue Sea - Elizabeth Bear The Meek - Damien Broderick The Man who Walked Home - James Tiptree JR A Pail of Air - Fritz Leiber Guardians of the Phoenix - Eric Brown Life in the Anthropocene - Paul di Filippo Terraforming Terra - Jack Williamson World Without End - F Gwynplaine MacIntyre The Children of Time - Stephen Baxter The Star called Wormwood - Elizabeth Counihan This collection of 21 innovative and mind-blowing stories includes contributions from Sci-Fi pioneers such as Stephen Baxter, Robert Reed, J. G. Ballard, Arthur C. Clarke, Alastair Reynolds, and Geoffrey Landis. Contents: Out of the sun / Arthur C. Clarke -- The Pevatron rats / Stephen Baxter -- The edge of the map / Ian Creasey -- Cascade Point / Timothy Zahn -- A dance to strange musics / Gregory Benford -- Palindromic / Peter Crowther -- Castle in the sky / Robert Reed -- The hole in the hole / Terry Bisson -- Hotrider / Keith Brooke -- Mother grasshopper / Michael Swanwick -- Waves and smart magma / Paul Di Filippo -- The black hole passes / John Varley -- The peacock king / Ted White, Larry McCombs -- Bridge / James Blish -- Anhedonia / Adam Roberts -- Tiger burning / Alastair Reynolds -- The width of the world / Ian Watson -- Our lady of the sauropods / Robert Silverberg -- Into the Miranda Rift / G. David Nordley -- The rest is speculation / Eric Brown -- Vacuum states / Geoffrey A. Landis Many readers are attracted to science fiction for that singular moment when a story expands your imagination, enabling you to see something in a new light. Not all SF works this way! This volume collects the very best of it that does, with 25 of the finest examples of mind-expanding and awe-inspiring science fiction.The storylines range from a discovery on the Moon that opens up vistas across all time to a moment in which distances across the Earth suddenly increase and people vanish. These are tales to take you from the other side of now to the very end of time - from today's top-name contributors including Stephen Baxter, Alastair Reynolds, Robert Silverberg, Gregory Benford and Robert Reed. In this the twenty-fourth edition of his celebrated annual Mammoth Book of Best New SF (its 28th as The Year's Best SF in the United States), award-winning editor Gardner Dozois presents 33 of 2010's most outstanding pieces of short science fiction, along with his typically informative notes on each author. Many are the work of award-winning writers, but there are also some surprising newcomers. The collection is prefaced, as ever, by Dozois's Summation of 2010 in SF, a review of the year's highlights in publishing and film - including non-fiction, media and awards - obituaries and an insightful look at emerging trends. The last sixty years have been full of stories of one or other possible Armageddon, whether by nuclear war, plague, cosmic catastrophe or, more recently, global warming, terrorism, genetic engineering, AIDS and other pandemics. These stories, both pre- and post-apocalyptic, describe the fall of civilization, the destruction of the entire Earth, or the end of the Universe itself. Many of the stories reflect on humankind's infinite capacity for self-destruction, but the stories are by no means all downbeat or depressing - one key theme explores what the aftermath of a cataclysm might be and how humans strive to survive. Sailing To Byzantium / Robert Silverberg -- Surfacing / Walter Jon Williams -- The Hemingway Hoax / Joe Haldeman -- Mr. Boy / James Patrick Kelly -- Beggars In Spain / Nancy Kress -- Griffin's Egg / Michael Swanwick -- Outnumbering The Dead / Frederik Pohl -- Forgiveness Day / Ursula K. Le Guin -- The Cost To Be Wise / Maureen F. Mchugh -- Oceanic / Greg Egan -- Tendeléo's Story / Ian Mcdonald -- New Light On The Drake Equation / Ian R. Macleod -- Turquoise Days / Alastair Reynolds. Edited And With An Introduction By Gardner Dozois. "The very best short SF and fantasy fiction as chosen by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America." Stories of the fall of civilisation, the destruction of the Earth and the end of the Universe itself For that rare but thrilling sense of wonder - 25 awesome SF stories. The ultimate anthology of science fiction novellas.