The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror 2008: 21st Annual Collection

Sir Hereward and Mister Fitz #1- ... Go to War Again

by Ellen Datlow (Editor), Kelly Link, Gavin J. Grant

As in every year since 1988, the editors tirelessly scoured story collections, magazines, and anthologies worldwide to compile a delightful, diverse feast of short stories and poems.

On this anniversary, the editors have increased the size of  the collection to 300,000 words of fiction and poetry, including works by Billy Collins, Ted Chiang, Karen Joy Fowler, Elizabeth Hand, Glen Hirshberg, Joyce Carol Oates, and new World Fantasy Award winner M. Rickert. With impeccably researched summations of the field by the editors, Honorable Mentions, and articles by Edward Bryant, Charles de Lint and Jeff VanderMeer on media, music and graphic novels, this is a heady brew topped off by an unparalleled list of sources of fabulous works both light and dark.

Genres: Fantasy, Horror, Anthologies, Short Stories, Fiction, Short Story Collection, Speculative Fiction

576 pages, Hardcover

First published September 30, 2008

About the author

Ellen Datlow has been editing science fiction, fantasy, and horror short fiction for forty years as fiction editor of OMNI Magazine and editor of Event Horizon and SCIFICTION. She currently acquires short stories and novellas for Tor.com. In addition, she has edited about one hundred science fiction, fantasy, and horror anthologies, including the annual The Best Horror of the Year series, The Doll Collection, Mad Hatters and March Hares, The Devil and the Deep: Horror Stories of the Sea, Echoes: The Saga Anthology of Ghost Stories, Edited By, and Final Cuts: New Tales of Hollywood Horror and Other Spectacles.
She's won multiple World Fantasy Awards, Locus Awards, Hugo Awards, Bram Stoker Awards, International Horror Guild Awards, Shirley Jackson Awards, and the 2012 Il Posto Nero Black Spot Award for Excellence as Best Foreign Editor. Datlow was named recipient of the 2007 Karl Edward Wagner Award, given at the British Fantasy Convention for "outstanding contribution to the genre," was honored with the Life Achievement Award by the Horror Writers Association, in acknowledgment of superior achievement over an entire career, and honored with the World Fantasy Life Achievement Award at the 2014 World Fantasy Convention.

Reviews

[Mary Blake · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every collection I’ve read that was edited by Ellen Datlow and/or Toni L.P. Kelner has been the shit.

[Wealhtheow · Rating 3 out of 5]

As with most anthologies, there are two losers for every enjoyable story. In this case, though, I generally disliked stories purely because they did not fit to my personal taste. (A few too many were pretentious stories about the mystical ways of writers.) Still, it was a nice change from disliking stories because they're sloppy cliched messes.

I enjoyed:
"The Cambist and Lord Iron: A fairy tale of economics" by Daniel Abraham. A debauched lord with unlimited wealth and power finds amusement out of setting unsolvable riddles to a humble money-changer.

"The Last Worders" by Karen Joy Fowler. Twin sisters think precisely alike--until a small betrayal that tears them forever assunder.

"Winter's Wife" by Elizabeth Hand. A young boy observes his mysterious neighbor Winter, and Winter's equally fascinating and obscure new wife from Iceland. I love the magic here.

"A Reversal of Fortune" by Holly Black. Black is one of the very few authors who can write believable lower class teenager protagonists. Nikki lives in a trailer park with her erstwhile brother and devoted dog, and spends the summer missing her best friend and getting most of her calories from candy stolen from her job. When her dog is hit by her crush's truck, she challenges the devil to a candy-eating contest: she could win her dog's life, or lose her soul. Luckily, Nikki is as clever and gutsy as she is stubborn.

"The Boulder" by Lucy Kemnitzer is a well-crafted modern perspective on the classic "stolen beneath the Hill" fairy tale.

"The Hill" by Tanith Lee. The only one of the "horror" stories herein to actually have a scary moment. Disturbing imagery and a great concept, but the real strength here is the main character's sensible inner voice. The ending spends a little too much time explaining every bit of the mystery, but Lee does a good job of laying the clues throughout the story.

"Lovers: (Jaafar the Winged)" by Khaled Mattawa is the only poem I liked in this collection, despite Billy Collins's inclusion.

"Sir Hereward and Mister Fitz Go to War Again" by Garth Nix is a great adventure story. Nix is a true adept at creating interesting fantasy worlds and relatable heroes. Hereward is a mercenary knight who likes fine clothes, scarred lovers, and his former nursemaid, current companion, the ensorcelled puppet Fitz.

The anthology ends with the excellent "The Evolution of Trickster Stories Among the Dogs of North Park After the Change" by Kij Johnson. The animals of Earth all learned to speak in the same moment, but their newfound ability to communicate makes their former loving owners wary, shamed, and distrustful. Really interesting meditation on slavery and trust.

[Jayme · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was a total surprise. I got it expecting to pick out a few of the better looking stories to read at most and I expected a lot of the stereotypical stories you would think are included in a fantasy and horror anthology. There wasn't a single dragon or elf in the whole book and I could not have been happier about that. The stories were incredibly original and I read ever single one.

However, I wasn't a huge fan of the poetry, but I'm in no position to criticize poetry in the first place.

These are my five favourite stories from the lot, the best of the best:
1.The Cambist and Lord Iron by Daniel Abraham
2.Winter's Wife by Elizabeth Hand
3.The Gray Boy's Work by M.T. Anderson
4.The Merchant and the Alchemists Gate by Ted Chiang
5.The Evolution of Trickster Stories by Kij Johnson

And I have a sixth, "Rats", because it was such a unique way to use a fairy tale. I haven't read anything like it before.

[Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall I was disappointed with this anthology. I didn't find many of the stories compelling or interesting. I think this is mainly due to the difficulty in creating suspense-rich worlds in a short story format. The stories that I did really enjoy were as follows:

The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairy Tale of Economics: I really liked how the writer integrated some principles of economics into the story and how they were used to explore two very interesting characters.

The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate: Nice collection of parables that integrated time travel nicely in a criminally underused classical arab setting.

A Reversal of Fortune: Because who doesn't like stories about going toe-to-toe with the devil for the life of your dog.

Sir Hereward and Mister Fitz go to war again: Nice little fantasy story about a pair of mercenaries that carry our a sacred duty in the course of their travels. Nice world building in a limited space.

Closest Dreams: A very chilling story about an victim of abuse.

Still, these were a small minority of the total stories and poems in the anthology.

[Mary Overton]

"Mother's Milk" by Mary Overton, originally published in ZAHIR 13, is listed as an honorable mention .... along with a gazillion other stories.

[Jaimie · Rating 1 out of 5]

In 2008 I was busy moving out of my parents’ house and going to university in another city to complete a reading-intensive English Literature and History degree, so I was understandably out of touch with the current publishing trends in my favourite genre. And yet, if this collection showcasing the “year’s best” fantasy and horror is anything to go by, I apparently wasn’t missing out on much… Reading this collection was honestly a slog, and I am hard pressed to recall any stories that stood out to me from the over 2 months it took to get from cover to cover. What I do recall is a decidedly sharp focus on stories with strong horror elements and a preponderance of tales with overtly obnoxious chauvinist tone. I’m talking stories where all the women are typified by the male gaze, the protagonists mansplain ad nauseum to the reader, and are narrated via storytelling that relies on shock value, violence, and expectedly sordid mystery to get us to the finale. Honestly, very few of the tales made it past the first few pages for me, and I regularly found myself throwing the collection down in disgust to pick up literally anything else on my TBR to remedy my reading mood. It’s really too bad that the collection was so disappointing, because I was looking forward to getting into some short stories, discovering some new authors, and revisiting a time period in publishing that I seemingly missed out on. So much for nostalgia always being a positive recollection, I guess…

[Julie Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a huge omnibus of 36 stories and 7 poems as chosen by Ellen Datlow for works premiering in 2008. With so much to choose from, there are some wonderful standouts and some that just made me go, "Huh?" (luckily, only 3 of them made me do that). I read this throughout February (a story or sometimes two each night before bed), and now I just want all of the collections I don't have yet.

Here are some of my notes:

The Forest by Laird Barron - feels like you have to be high to appreciate it

The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate by Ted Chiang - an Egyptian fable about a Gate of Years which transports you 20 years into a fixed future - I really liked this one

Rats - by Veronica Schanoes - a familiar, darkly modernized fairy tale .. with rats - I liked this one too

The Swing by Don Tumasonis - where a swing appears to swallow up young girls - I liked this one, but it was one of those reads where you really need to pay attention to catch all of the nuances

My two favorites:

The Fiddler of Bayou Teche by Delia Sherman - about a girl named Cadence with white skin, hair, and pink eyes who was found in the swamp by loup-garous (werewolves) and raised by Tante Eulalie, a woman with many gifts, including healing, in her self-imposed swamp exile. Cadence eventually finds herself in a battle with a fiddler who can "fiddle the Devil out of Hell."

Winter's Wife by Elizabeth Hand - In Shaker Harbor, ME, Roderick Gale Winter, much beloved by his neighbors, including 15-year-old Justin, takes a wife from Iceland (Vaia). In Roderick's house, huldu folk reside as carvings in the beams of the house. When the King's Pines, three majestic pines near the water, are threatened by a wealthy and selfish area developer, strange happenings abound.

I love collections like these, and as I said before, reading this one made me put the others on my to-buy list. If you like fantastically dark tales, this is probably a collection you'll want too.

BOOK RATING: 4.5 out of 5 stars

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Always a grand assorted bag. Here's what I liked:

"The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairy Tale of Economics" by Daniel Abraham - a fantastic story that actually makes economic matters interesting; "Vampires in the Lemon Grove" by Karen Russell - in which vampires are on the hunt for new wondrous tastes; the poem "Scenes of Hell" by Billy Collins - both Boschian and modern; "The Last Worders" by Karen Joy Fowler - where twins are not the best of friends; "The Monsters of Heaven" by Nathan Ballingrud - defenseless angels and parents in pain; "The Fiddler of Bayou Teche" by Delia Sherman - an evocative story of the Louisiana bayou; "Winter's Wife" by Elizabeth Hand - the wife can be a little stony; the poem "Troll" by Nathalie Anderson - sing-songingly rhythmic; "The Drowned Life" by Jeffrey Ford - a literal story of drowning in debt; the poem "Follow Me Home" by Sonya Taaffe - the imagery is tough to shake; "The Forest" by Laird Barron - an eldritch tale of obsession and what exists beyond humankind; "Up the Fire Road" by Eileen Gunn - a hilarous tale of something strange in the mountains; "A Reversal of Fortune" by Holly Black - dealings with the devil; the poem "Village Smart" by Maggie Smith - a condensed fairy tale; "The Hill" by Tanith Lee - a dry tale of the fantastic; "The Hide" by Liz Williams - creepy and sad; "Closet Dreams" by Lisa Tuttle - truly heartbreaking; and "The Evolution of Trickster Stories Among the Dogs of North Park After the Change" by Kij Johnson - what if dogs could talk?

That's a lot of good stories!

[Christine · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've been buying this series every year for 18 years, starting with the third volumne (and I picked up the first two as well). This series is great not only for the short fiction contained in each book, but for the essays that appear in the beginning. You get a nice overview of fantasy and horror books, an obit section, film and music overview as well as comics, but not Marvel and DC. It's a must read for me.

This editon was better than last years. Sometimes, the editions seem to have too much from other anthologies the editors have done; this is not the case here.

LIke most editions, this one has a few "really, you thought this was good" stories in it, but overall the stories are wonderful. The collection starts out strong with "The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairy Tale of Economics" by Daniel Abraham. This short story should be a must read for any business major. The collection also finishes on a high note, at least for us dog lovers, with "The Evolution of Trickster Stories AMong the Dogs of North Park After the Change" by Kij Johnson.
Other stand out stories include "Vampires in the Lemon Grove", "The House of Mechanical Pain", "Mr. Poo-Poo", and "Winter's Wife". "Winter's Wife is particularly good because of how it is told; not too much but not too little either. The too little being told is the problem with a few of the stories, including "The Last Worders".

For me, the best story in the collection is "Rats" by Veronica Schanoes, though I would argue that it is not fantasy nor horror. It is a poignant fairy tale, a real fairy tale.

[Dan · Rating 2 out of 5]

I gave the anthology, as a whole, two stars because I found most of the stores mediocre and rather forgettable. However, there are a few I really enjoyed and want to point those out. I'm not going to give a synopsis of each of one. You can look them up yourself if you're that intrigued. They are:

"The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairy Tale of Economics" by Daniel Abraham
"The Swing" by Don Tumasonis
"The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate" by Ted Chiang
"Closet Dreams" by Lisa Tuttle
"The Evolution of Trickster Stories Among the Dogs of North Park After the Change" by Kij Johnson
"A Reversal of Fortune" by Holly Black

The last one on the list barely made the cut because I have a weakness for stories about people who try to bargain with the devil.

For a little balance, here are the stories that stand out to me for being exceptionally awful:

"Up the Fire Road" by Eileen Gunn
"Rats" by Veronica Schanoes
"A Perfect and Unmappable Grace" by Jack M. Haringa
"England and Nowhere" by Tim Nickels

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've been reading the Year's Best Fantasy & Horror for most of its run, always devouring the essays at the beginning, then carefully skipping or skimming the stories introduced by Ellen Datlow, and reading those edited by (then) Terri Windling and (now) Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant. I really can't read horror, but I find myself peeking in. Surely the best horror is worth reading, right? It's a delicate balance. A single story in one of these anthologies when I was a teenager is responsible for the fact that I can't watch even the most comedic zombie movies without nightmares.
In any case, there are several excellent stories in this collection. The standouts for me are "The Merchant & The Alchemist's Gate" by Ted Chiang (also available as an e-book), Jeffrey Ford's haunting "The Drowned Life", Holly Black's "A Reversal of Fortune", and Veronica Schanoes' Nancy Spungen-inspired fairy tale "Rats".

[Genevieve Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

This excellent collection makes me sad that it was the last (though Datlow is editing a horror-specific anthology; being less of a fan of horror than of fantasy, however, for me it comes to the same thing in the end). There isn't a weak piece in it, though everyone will like some stories better than others, and it includes stories by authors who are (or who have since become) household names as well as relative unknowns. The review essay was interesting and provided fodder for additional reading, but I was primarily there for the fiction and the anthology fulfilled that portion admirably. It's unfortunate that it isn't continuing as venues for short fiction are generally going under and/or becoming less visible--a bit puzzling since short stories seem tailor-made for online reading. Perhaps this, or something like it, will be reborn online.

[Michael · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not being able to invest in this anthology is a bigger mystery than anything in the anthology itself. Perhaps it's the "in-circle" selection of authors, or the fact that the stories aren't clearly foreshadowed (so it feels like a crap shoot), or the fact that most of the stories are fantasy, when the intention existed mostly for horror. Regardless, much of the storytelling seems simply included because the writers were looking to write something to get published in this anthology, not because the stories flowed naturally from them. Definitely not worth the $35 list price, the book seems better suited for library time-killing.

[Charlotte · Rating 5 out of 5]

Okay, so I haven't read every single story in here, but I've read a lot of them, and this book is LONG. It is also awesome. The overall quality of the stories is great, it's just that some of the horror ones are not quite to my taste. I get scared, or grossed out. LOVE Daniel Abraham's story "The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairy Tale of Economics." And this is worth buying for the 50+ pages of other reading recommendations (annotated) at the beginning alone. I'm so sad this series is being discontinued.

[Leigh · Rating 3 out of 5]

In short, this book is simply too much of a good thing. There are 63 pages of editorial writing about the background of horror and fantasy, and obits of writers and all sorts of flotsam. The text is dense and there are ALOT of stories jammed into this book. The cover's text states "more than 250,000 words..". Folks, that's too much. I'd prefer a smaller anthology and a more exclusive set of stories. I have some small anthologies in my personal collection and nearly every story is a true gem. An anthology this size, clunkers are inevitable.

[Gregory]

"The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairy Tale of Economics" by Daniel Abraham - 5 stars

"Holiday" by M. Rickert - 5 stars

[Soelo · Rating 4 out of 5]

I did not read every story. I am not a big horror fan.
Great: The Cambist and Lord Iron was great and makes philosophical point without being dry
Vampires in the Lemon Grove
The Merchant and the Alchemist's Gate
Good:
Sir Hereward and Mister Fitz Go to War Again
Splitfoot
Rats - true, sad
Winter's Wife
Not as good:
Up the Fire Road
Holiday

[Brenda Sutton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once again Datlow, Link, and Grant have created a collection of powerful fiction. The very first story, "The Cambist and Lord Iron: A Fairy Tale of Economics", is one of the best stories I've EVER read.

[Kathy Sebesta · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well I didn't read the intro stuff - all 100+ pages. And I didn't read the horror stories (identified as being chosen by Ellen Datlow). Which means I read about a third of the 550ish pages and found perhaps three stories I liked well enough to recall. Must not have been my year.

[Felix · Rating 3 out of 5]

voluminous collection of short-stories, thematically there's a clear tendency towards horror, only a handful of stories being included that I'd consider fantasy.

[bluetyson]

The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror 2008: 21st Annual Collection (Year's Best Fantasy and Horror) by Kelly Link (2008)

[Nesie · Rating 5 out of 5]

http://www.greenmanreview.com/book/bo...

[Beth · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love short stories and these were some really great ones.