That Best-of-Year Time of Year

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So far as I know, nobody has ever matched Joe Haldeman's enviable accomplishment of losing track of how many Hugos and Nebulas he has. "I know it's five of one and four of the other," he told me me some time ago. But I have no idea whether I have more Hugos or Nebulas."  (Spoiler alert: I just checked on the Inntertubes and he since won another award, bringing him up to five each.)

I have, however, achieved the semienviable state of never having any clear idea of whether I have stories in the upcoming best-of-year anthologies, and if so how many. This is the time of year they come out, so every now and then I receive a package and a pleasant surprise in the mail.

Over the past week, I've received two such anthologies: Gardner Dozois' The Year's Best Science
Fiction (the 32nd! all edited by him!) and Allan Kaster's audio anthology The Year's Top Ten Tales of Science Fiction 7 .

Both include, among very good company, my own story, "Passage of Earth."

Do I sound immodest? I think it would be false not to. It would be a slap in the face to all the new writers who are looking forward to their own first appearance in one of these anthologies to pretend I didn't glory in it. Every appearance in one of these things is a big deal to me.

Also, as I said, a pleasant surprise.


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