Tombs

I found this anthology just okay in general. The stories are "about the things which bind us all... both physically and emotionally," a mix of fantasy, horror and sci-fi. As I see it, they all seem to have a theme of tombs -- not necessarily literal ones -- or death. Not all the stories appealed to me, and some I simply didn't get; maybe they just aren't to my taste. However, there are a few gems for me in the collection -- "The Unchained," beautifully written by Kathe Koja and Barry N. Malzberg; "But None I Think Do There Embrace," a witty urban fantasy by S. P. Somtow; and of course, "Queen of Knives," an unsettling poem by Master Storyteller Neil Gaiman. There were other pieces I also liked, including those by Ian McDonald, Jeremy show more Dyson, Christopher Fowler, Nancy A. Collins, William F. Buckley Jr., and Storm Constantine. show less

Collection of 22 master works of science fiction/fantasy by 22 authors who are gifted at story-telling and suspense. Selections by Bova; Watson; Goonan; Bishop; Moorcock; Tuttle; Carlson; Maltzberg; Koja; McDonald; Allmen; Dysos; Somtow; Fowler; De Lint, Braunbeck; Greenland; Gaiman; Gallagher; Linaweaver; Collins; Buckley; Constantine.

Includes brief idiosyncratic "Biographies" of the authors [omitted from TOC], and a "first-foot" of the "tome of tomes" dedicated to Ib J Melchior "world-class authority on the Bard of Avon", who is parodied as "Shockspeare" in a consopitious pretension to ono-eroticism using his "big words".