Read The Mammoth Book of Best New Science Fiction: 23rd Annual Collection for Free Online

discussed below.
    Slipstream anthologies included: Interfictions 2: An Anthology of Interstitial Writing (Small Beer Press), edited by Delia Sherman and Christopher Barzak; Conjunctions: 52, Betwixt the Between: Impossible Realism (Bard College), edited by Bradford Morrow and Brian Evenson; and an anthology of flash fiction, Last Drink Bird Head (Ministry of Whimsy), edited by Ann VanderMeer and Jeff VanderMeer.
    Shared world anthologies included Wild Cards: Suicide Kings (Tor Books), edited by George R.R. Martin; Man-Kzin Wars XII (Baen Books), created by Larry Niven; Changing the World: All New Tales of Valdemar (DAW Books), edited by Mercedes Lackey; New Ceres Nights (Twelfth Planet Press), edited by Alisa Krasnostein and Tehani Wesely; Grants Pass (Morrigan Books), edited by Jennifer Brozek and Amanda Pillar; and The Grantville Gazette V (Baen Books), edited by Eric Flint.
    A long-running series featuring novice work by beginning writers, some of whom may later turn out to be important talents, changed editors this year, as the late Algis Budrys handed the torch to K.D. Wentworth, who continued the series with L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future Volume XXV (Galaxy Press).
    A relatively new phenomenon is paranormal romance anthologies. They included Strange Brew (St. Martin’s Griffin), edited by P.N. Elrod, and a bunch of anthologies with no editor listed: Mean Streets (Roc), Must Love Hellhounds (Berkley Books), and Never After (Jove).
    As in 2008, there were a lot of stories about robots this year, roughly divided into stories about robots working out compassionate relationships with humans and robots creating their own societies, loosely modeled on human culture, after all the humans are dead. As has been the case for a couple of years now, there were a number of stories that featured flying sailing ships (shades of Peter Pan!) and/or zeppelins. There were lots of steampunk stories, in both print and electronic venues, and, in spite of the death of dedicated alternate history magazine Paradox , still many alternate history stories as well. (Judging whether a given story is steampunk or alternate history is sometimes a judgment call, as by definition all steampunk is also alternate history, but you can usually tell where the strongest emphasis lies.) There weren’t as many zombie stories as last year, although there was another dedicated zombie anthology, so perhaps they will rest quietly in their graves for a bit. Lots of vampire stories, it almost goes without saying.
    SF continued to appear in places well outside accepted genre boundaries, from science magazines Cosmos, Nature , and New Scientist to The New Yorker.
    Finding individual pricings for all of the items from small presses mentioned in this summation has become too time-intensive, and since several of the same small presses publish anthologies, novels, and short-story collections, it seems silly to repeat addresses for them in section after section. Therefore, I’m going to attempt to list here, in one place, all the addresses for small presses that have books mentioned here or there in this summation, whether from the anthology section, the novel section, or the short-story collection section, and, where known, their website addresses. That should make it easy enough for the reader to look up the individual price of any book mentioned that isn’t from a regular trade publisher; such books are less likely to be found in your average bookstore, or even in a chain superstore, and so will probably have to be mail-ordered. Many publishers seem to sell only online, through their websites, and some will only accept payment through PayPal. Many books, even from some of the smaller presses, are also available through Amazon.com.
    Addresses: PS Publishing , Grosvenor House, 1 New Road, Hornsea, East Yorkshire, HU18 1PG, England; www.pspublishing.co.uk. Golden Gryphon Press , 3002 Perkins Road, Urbana, IL 61802; www.goldengryphon. com. NESFA Press , P.O.