The Solaris Book of New Fantasy tackles its chosen genre in its entirety – everything from the continuing worlds of the big commercial article to the idiosyncratic fabulations of New Weird and other style-driven artists of prose. Thus the book... may fail to please either the Tolkienian or the Mievillean constituencies. But there is plenty of pleasing work on display, so the reader should simply keep the virtues of eclecticism in mind. Scott Thomas’s novelette, “Lt Privet’s Love Song”, is a beautiful, rollicking old-fashioned tale of love and honor at sea, in an engaging style... Elegance is also a major feature of Lucius Shepard’s “Chinandega”, but here the burden is unrelievedly grim... Those are especial highlights, but also very worthwhile are “King Tales” by Jeff VanderMeer, an amusing triptych of fairy stories in the manner of James Thurber... “A Man Falls” by Jay Lake is an enigmatic account of a prince’s efforts to bring together tribes which are menacingly different; and “In Between Dreams”, Christopher Barzak’s outre narrative of an ensorcelled sleeper’s rescue by a sexually ambiguous apartment cleaner... And “The Song Her Heart Sang” by Steven Savile impresses with its murdered scholars pleading to be heard through the porous barrier separating them from the living. So The Solaris Book of New Fantasy has a good spread of quality.
-- Nick Gevers, Locus
Not only does the compilation masterfully celebrate the rich diversity of the fantasy genre, it also showcases a wonderful array of writers, both new and established, that deserve a much larger audience. In fact, the best part of the anthology I thought was its excellent selection of authors who probably don’t get enough credit and I for one was grateful for the opportunity to meet writers I had never heard of or was only familiar with by reputation. So in the end, no matter what kind of a fantasy reader you are, I believe there’s something in The Solaris Book of New Fantasy for everyone and I hope that Solaris will continue producing these anthologies for years to come…
-- Fantasy Book Critic
Short fiction has a long tradition in the genre and Solaris is continuing the tradition by the genre in publishing multiple anthologies. The mix of authors in this volume is, as one would hope with such an anthology, varied. George Mann, the editor of this anthology, begins his introduction by asking “What is Fantasy?” Not an uncommon question, and a question that readers ask quite often. It is an open ended question, I think, and one just to provoke thought. The stories here provide a very good, if not quite exhaustive, sampling of the many flavors offered by fantasy ... Chadbourn’s story was a solid opening story and I probably enjoyed Resnick’s, Savile’s, and McKenna’s the most. The stories that did work for by authors introduced to me by this volume have me interested in perusing their work. I don’t think Mann’s question was answered, but his goal of presenting an “exploration of High Fantasy, Dark Fantasy, Comic Fantasy, Magic Realism…” was achieved, in terms of various types of fantasy included in the volume, even if all the stories didn’t explicitly work for me. Should this book turn out to be the first of annual series of fantasy anthologies, then readers will pleased.
-- Rob H Bedford, SFF World
I have to say that I am very impressed. I liked 13 out of 16 stories - which is as good a number as I ever get from an anthology. What's more - I understood and applauded the reason for the inclusion of the three I wasn't wowed by. What George has done, and what makes this anthology so useful to me personally, is to take a very comprehensive, catholic view of the fantasy field. Rather than produce a book entirely composed of traditional fantasy or entirely composed of literary/slipstream fantasy, he's put out an anthology showcasing a broad range of fantasy offerings. As such, this makes the anthology a wonderful overview of the current state of the field (perhaps even a more accurate one than a Year's Best collection might present, with its understandable slant towards literary works).
-- Lou Anders
This latest, door stop-sized collection of new fantasy fiction is filled with some of the best and most interesting contemporary voices in the genre….
Running the gamut from historical fantasy to more traditional and contemporary fare, this new Solaris collection showcases not only the heavy hitters like Jeff Vandermeer and Mike Resnick but newer names like James Maxey and TA Pratt... The beauty of a book like this is that if you don’t like a particular story you can simply skip to the next, and Mann has selected a varied and consistently interesting collection of stories... Inevitably, not every story here will be to your taste; but that’s the point of a varied collection like this. Packed with unique voices and great stories this is a hugely impressive sampler of modern fantasy.
-- Dreamwatch - Total SciFi
Short fiction has a long tradition in the genre and Solaris is continuing the tradition by the genre in publishing multiple anthologies... The mix of authors in this volume is, as one would hope with such an anthology, varied... The stories here provide a very good, if not quite exhaustive, sampling of the many flavors offered by fantasy... The stories that did work for by authors introduced to me by this volume have me interested in perusing their work. Should this book turn out to be the first of annual series of fantasy anthologies, then readers will pleased.
-- SFF World
