The James Tiptree Award Anthology 1: Sex, the Future, & Chocolate Chip Cookies

by Karen Joy Fowler (Editor), Pat Murphy (Editor), Debbie Notkin (Editor)

This debut anthology features short fiction, novel excerpts, and essays that have won the James Tiptree, Jr. Award. Created in 1991 to honor the innovative fiction of Alice Bradley Sheldon (who wrote under the pen name James Tiptree), the Tiptree Award is presented to speculative fiction that explores and expands gender roles—and in the process touches on the most fundamental of human desires: the need for sex, for love, and for acceptance. This collection includes thought-provoking essays by Suzy McKee Charnas, Karen Joy Fowler, Ursula K. Le Guin, Pat Murphy, and Joanna Russ.

Contents

Introduction by Pat Murphy and Karen Joy Fowler

"Boys" by Carol Emshwiller
"Birth Days" by Geoff Ryman
"The Snow Queen" by Hans Christian Anderson
"Everything but the Signature Is Me" by James Tiptree, Jr.
"'Tiptree' and History" by Joanna Russ
"The Lady of the Ice Garden" by Kara Dalkey
"What I Didn't See" by Karen Joy Fowler
"Travels With the Snow Queen" by Kelly Link
Excerpts from Set This House in Order by Matt Ruff
"The Catgirl Manifesto: An Introduction" by Richard Calder
"Looking Through Lace" by Ruth Nestvold
"The Ghost Girls of Rumney Mill" by Sandra McDonald
"Judging the Tiptree" by Suzy McKee Charnas
"Genre: A Word Only the French Could Love" by Ursula K. Le Guin

Genres: Science Fiction, Short Stories, Fiction, Anthologies, Fantasy, Gender, Short Story Collection

240 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 2004

About the author

Karen Joy Fowler is the New York Times bestselling author of seven novels and three short story collections. Her 2004 novel, The Jane Austen Book Club, spent thirteen weeks on the New York Times bestsellers list and was a New York Times Notable Book. Fowler’s previous novel, Sister Noon, was a finalist for the 2001 PEN/Faulkner Award for fiction. Her debut novel, Sarah Canary, won the Commonwealth medal for best first novel by a Californian, was listed for the Irish Times International Fiction Prize as well as the Bay Area Book Reviewers Prize, and was a New York Times Notable Book. Fowler’s short story collection Black Glass won the World Fantasy Award in 1999, and her collection What I Didn’t See won the World Fantasy Award in 2011. Her most recent novel We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves, won the 2014 PEN/Faulkner Award for fiction and was short-listed for the 2014 Man Booker Prize. Her new novel Booth published in March 2022.

She is the co-founder of the Otherwise Award and the current president of the Clarion Foundation (also known as Clarion San Diego). Fowler and her husband, who have two grown children and seven grandchildren, live in Santa Cruz, California. Fowler also supports a chimp named Caesar who lives at the Tacugama Chimpanzee Sanctuary in Sierra Leone.

Reviews

[Kristen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wrote my senior thesis for the KU Women's Studies department on James Tiptree, and I had been wanting the anthologies ever since. I mean, the titles alone would have sold me. :)

In this anthology, you'll find short stories, critical essays, even letters from Alice Sheldon (James Tiptree) herself. If you don't know who James Tiptree is, go now and Wiki it. I'll wait.

Fascinating stuff. So much in the Tiptree stories turns gender on its head. They're exciting, bright, well-crafted stories, and well-worthy of having an award named after them. I won't say every Tiptree nominee has knocked my socks off, but they certainly have all TRIED.

I recommend this, and any Tiptree short stories you can get your hands on, to any fans of the genre.

[Yj · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love the premise of this collection, “The Tiptree award honors fiction that explains expands gender. Fiction that seduces and repels you. Instructs and surprises you.”

High points, the Essay by Ursula K. Le Guin and the story Looking through Lace by Ruth Nestvold.

Midrange, Travels with the Snow Queen by Kelly Link and Birth Days by Geoff Ryman.

Lowest, The Cargirl Manifesto by Richard Calder.

The life of James Tiptree is also worth looking up, interesting stuff.

[Shel · Rating 5 out of 5]

From the cover blurb: "The James Tiptree Award Anthology 1 features stories and essays chosen by judges for the Tiptree Award. Thought-provoking, imaginative, and infuriating — fiction that may change your view of the world."

Right on.

Reading this amplified my growing readerly infatuation with works by Geoff Ryman (Air, "K is for Kosovo (or, Massimo’s Career)" and, in this anthology, "Birth Days") and Carol Emshwiller (The Mount, "Abomination," and, in this collection, "Boys"). Swoon!

And it moved Matt Ruff's novel Set This House in Order (excerpted here, about multiple personality disorder) to the top of my to-read list.

It does not hurt my feelings at all that Karen Joy Fowler's story "What I Didn't See" is now in triplicate on my bookshelves in this anthology, in Daughters of the Earth: Feminist Science Fiction in the Twentieth Century (2006), and in What I Didn't See: Stories (2010).

With intros by Pat Murphy and Karen Joy Fowler and essays by Suzy McKee Charnas, Ursula K. LeGuin, Joanna Russ, and Alice Sheldon. Swoon!

Notable: Writers, read Ryman's "Birth Days" for structure. This smartly structured story moves quickly through time to show the protagonist's changing perspective on his birthdays as he ages.

[Nat Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

This one is by far the best of the first three.
The stories that I really liked were Dearth, a parable about finding and choosing family and throwing "oddness" out the window, (I had read it before somewehere), Liking What You See, a mix of Kurt Vonnegut and a journalism student, dove deeply into ability, dis/Ability and assumptions made about both, capitalism, lookism and science (and I am still unpacking it)and The Glass Bottle Trick, a great mix of deep culture where the introduction to the culture is through the lives of the characters instead of a line by line description (mere desciption of a community or communities), and it lovingly walks the line between spec-fic and mythologies/truths. And also explored race! Yea!

The stories that were just good spec-fic but held no thought-provocations were Little Faces and Mountain Ways.

The stories that left me wanting, whether becasue it ended too soon and did not have enough background/explanation as in Knapsack Poems, or left me wondering about the origins of the author and orientatlism and was not full enough on character development as in Have Not Have or merely just "eh" as in Wooden Bride.

[Noam · Rating 3 out of 5]

The stories in this book varied wildly in quality, from "that was an hour of my life I'll never get back" ("Birth Days" by Geoff Ryman - they had to put it first and scare off a lot of potential readers with this all-agenda, minimal-plot, unrealistic/unlikable characters and graphic unrealistic plot devices) to the amazing Snow Queen trio (the original by Hans Christian Andersen and two beautiful and creative versions by Kara Dalkey and Kelly Link). Most of the stories were pretty good, but they really saved the best for last, so if you've just got it from the library, don't feel bad about skipping to the Snow Queen stories. I also liked "The Ghost Girls of Rumney Mill," "Boys," "Looking Through Lace" and "What I Didn't See."

[Dan Trefethen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Since 1991, the annual Tiptree award has recognized stories that explore and expand ideas about gender. For almost twenty years it has focused attention on authors who write things that often aren't easily classified, but present intriguing or startling variations on classic tropes. Featured authors include Geoff Ryman, Kelly Link, Karen Joy Fowler, Richard Calder and others.

This 2005 anthology showcases stories mostly from the early 2000s, although there are a few from the 1990s. It also contains essays by Ursula Le Guin, Joanna Russ and Suzy McKee Charnas which add a framework around the award. These early gender-wise stories are intriguing in that what was considered more radical in those days is more commonly found in SF&F publishing today.

The largest sections are an excerpt from Matt Ruff's novel about multiple personality disorder, “Set This House in Order”, and a lengthy section at the end about the legend of the Snow Queen, featuring a translation of the original Hans Christian Anderson story and two modern variations. I confess I was not as interested in the Snow Queen stories as there have been many, many fairy tale variations in the genre in the past decade or so.

It's interesting to read about the genesis of an award that so successfully foreshadowed the recent wider success of writing about gender-fluid or feminist-oriented topics.

[Lydia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read for the one "snow queen" I hadn't come across before, set in Japan, which seems a natural extension but its not gonna make it into my fav adaptations. Also had the Kelly link version which I've read before in her short story collection, but it was nice to come back to.
Overall just ok. I agree with the other reviewer that the story it starts with is the worst. Purile. And I skimmed and skipped "catgirl manifesto," which was mostly a incomprehensible, tired joke (formal analysis of something made up, ala the end of handmaids tale) anyway.
Also included is Ruth nestvolds "looking through lace," which I somehow came across years ago and loved enough to seek out its sequel and most of her other writing at the time. I should check out if she's done anything since 2012ish.

[Marianne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some satisfying stories, some haunting ones, some new to me and some I was glad to reread. Also the nonfictional bits are even more of a delight to me, a nerd about this award, than the fiction was...

CN: gendered violence, possibly more specific things I've already forgotten about because of how my brain compartmentalizes short stories once i've read 'em

[Charlie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this anthology. It really is greater than the sum of the stories. I found myself reflecting on each story, viewing it through the lense of my own genderly feelings.

[Raj · Rating 3 out of 5]

This anthology brings together short fiction that was nominated for, and some that won, the James Tiptree Award for "science fiction or fantasy that expands or explores our understanding of gender". As well as that, there are a number of essays both relating to the award itself and the wider genre. There were a number of stories here that I enjoyed a lot, and some less so.

Looking Through Lace, by Ruth Nestvold, was probably my favourite story in the collection. This is about a young xenolinguist trying to understand the complexities of an alien language while also having to overcome the prejudices of her superior. This one reminded me of some of Ursula K. Le Guin's anthropological stories and I liked the characterisation and deft worldbuilding.

I also enjoyed both the retellings of The Snow Queen (itself also included in the collection) preferring the modern Travels with the Snow Queen over the Japanese-set The Lady of the Ice Garden.

I was less keen on The Catgirl Manifesto: An Introduction by Richard Calder. This was written as an academic-style introduction to a fictional work that seemed to have a few layers of fiction to it. Perhaps I would get more out of it on a second reading, but as it stood I found it difficult to follow and somewhat incoherent.

So a good collection if you're interested in exploring gender or just want some challenging SF.

[Trin · Rating 3 out of 5]

A somewhat random collection of past Tiptree Award winners, most of these stories were at least somewhat interesting. One bored me to tears; one, Ruth Nestvold's "Looking Through Lace," absolutely blew me away; and one contained assbabies. Like, seriously, hardcore assbabies, gestated IN THE ASS. Geoff Ryman looks at fandom and goes, "Beat that, punks!"

Anyway, this was mostly a really interesting and worthwhile collection. I hope I can get my hands on the next two volumes.

[Susan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Anthologies always have some pieces I like better than others, including some I could easily have done without altogether; so my rating is necessarily an average. In fact, it was worth reading the entire book just to happen on the novella Looking Through Lace by Ruth Nestvold.

This book also mixes fiction with non-fiction, articles about the Tiptree Award itself or by award winners. I found them moderately interesting.

[Cindywho · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an odd assortment of stories, some better than others. I liked the one about the lace and the linguist. I skipped the book excerpt (I'd already read the book, and hate book excerpts - if I want to read the book, I want the whole book) There is a Snow Queen trilogy of stories 2 out of 3 that I liked. I might read the other anthologies in the series in hopes that some of the stories are good.

[Josh · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked this up to read "The Snow Queen" and related stories in order to get a background for the Joan Vinge's Hugo winner. There were a number of other interesting authors, essays, and stories here, so I ended up reading the whole thing. Like many collections, it's a mixed bag, but generally a very strong collection of sci-fi stories about gender and sexuality.

[Summer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fine anthology of fiction and critical essays exploring gender issues in speculative fiction. S.F. anthologies can be pretty hit-or-miss, but this one is well thought out and showcases some strong writers.

[Nicole Bunge · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm skipping around in this. Reading the short stories. The "Set this house in order" excerpt was cool - especially since I like "United States of Tara" so much.
"Looking thru Lace" resonated a lot. Still thinking about it several weeks later.

[Maerdi · Rating 4 out of 5]

As always, the Tiptree Anthology delivers thought-provoking and beautifully written fare.

[Mills College Library]

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