The World Treasury of Science Fiction

This is a collection of science fiction short stories, some of which are outstanding and brilliant. If you love science fiction, you must have this book in your collection.

With over 50 stories, this collection is sure to give you a good helping of stories you'll like(provided that you are a science fiction fan, of course). No, there's not any order to them, and yes, the introductions to the stories are stale, but how can these possibly detract from the quality of the stories themselves? I've read approximately half of them since I started reading a week or so again, and so far have disliked only three, and only two of those I skipped over(I couldn't stand the Italo Calvino stories). It's a good deal, that's for sure. Pick this up if you're a scifi fan looking for some fun reading material.

With over 50 stories and over 1050 pages of text, "The World Treasury of Science Fiction" is quite a heavy read. The book contains shorts from almost all of the major science fiction writers of the 20th Century (at least up until 1989, when it was published). Some of the tales are among the best I've ever read, like Phillip K. Dick's chilling military piece "Second Variety," Kurt Vonnegot's angry satire "Harrison Bergeron,' Larry Niven's apocalyptic "Inconstant Moon" and Rene Rebetez-Cortes's evolutionary horror story "The New Prehistory." Others I didn't like so much, but some of that was a matter of taste not quality.The book is not presented in any kind of recognizable order, but there is a brief introdutory blurb for each author. I would recommend it with the caveat that most readers are likely to skip over some of the less appealing entries.

Without a doubt, its title alone (The World Treasury of Science Fiction) does not deceive. Contemporary scifi from tons of cultures are represented in this book. Many of the stories are translated from other languages, and are rare (and wonderful) finds indeed. The commentary before each story is expertly written, with references to similar stories in the same book. The World Treasury covers a wide spectrum: from the traditional appeal of John W. Campbell to the surrealist (and very creepy) mood of French writer Boris Vian. The World Treasury of Science Fiction is a superior examination of scifi in other cultures; it really suprised me how vastly different eastern European and Asian sf is from our traditional American and British works. This collection is for any devout science fiction fan, especailly if you want to learn the true diversity of modern science fiction.

The table of contents for this book reads like a who's who of great science fiction. From the provoking anger of Kurt Vonnegut Jr.'s "Harrison Bergeron" and the forsight of Arthur C. Clark's "A Meeting With Medusa" to the eerie "Dead Past" by Isaac Asimov this volume has something for everyone. Weather hardcore devotee or casual reader this is a must own book.