While I liked some of the stories, others were a bit of a trudge to get through. ( )

Not as good as expected given the high proportion of contributors whom I've previously read and enjoyed, but none the less a interesting selection of short stories you're unlikely to have come across before.

This is a selection of the more or less founding members of Book View Cafe. The book is divided up into technically five sections of different forms of Fantasy described as High, Others, Modern, Merlin and Ancient. There are only two Merlin stories so I'd have grouped that into Ancient myself. Note that Modern does not seem to mean Urban which is distinctly lacking. Each author only appears once, with the exception of the last story - “The Natural History and Extinction of the People of the Sea” by Vonda N. McIntyre (Illustrator: Ursula K. Le Guin) That is a 2nd offering from both. I didn't know UlG could draw that well!

As always with an anthology it's difficult to review, but suffice to say none of the stories really grabbed me, even the normally engaging leGuin. However none of them were really clunkers either and most were interesting. There are some very strange twists on the definition of Fantasy, and some very unusual worlds. Short stories are a good format for this because although the world is never fully explained, if it doesn't appeal to you the next story is always there shortly after. All the usual themes though, strong women, heros in adversity, what it means to be a hero, kindness and compassion in unexpected places. There is very little of the classic Sword and Sorcery style fantasy even though a few tales start out that way. ( )