The Best from Fantasy and Science Fiction: 20th Series

by Edward L. Ferman (editor)

Contents
Cartoons • interior artwork by Gahan Wilson
1 • Shaffery Among the Immortals • (1972) • shortstory by Frederik Pohl
21 • A Different Drummer • (1971) • shortstory by Raylyn Moore
40 • The Deathbird • (1973) • novelette by Harlan Ellison
75 • Born to Exile • [Tales of Alaric the Minstrel] • (1971) • novelette by Phyllis Eisenstein
112 • Thus Love Betrays Us • (1972) • shortstory by Phyllis MacLennan
133 • The Animal Fair • (1972) • novelette by Alfred Bester
179 • Is It the End of the World? • (1972) • shortstory by Wilma Shore
191 • The Bear with the Knot on His Tail • [Stardust] • (1971) • novelette by Stephen Tall
231 • Birdlime • (1971) • shortstory by B. L. Keller
241 • The Problem of Pain • [Avalon (Technic Civilization)] • (1973) • novelette by Poul Anderson
265 • Sooner or Later or Never Never • (1972) • novelette by Gary Jennings

Genres: Short Stories, Science Fiction, Fantasy

296 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1973

About the author

Edward Ferman (born 1937) was an American science fiction and fantasy fiction editor and magazine publisher.

Ferman is the son of Joseph W. Ferman, and took over as editor of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction in 1964 when Avram Davidson, due to his residence in various Latin American locales with unreliable postal delivery, could no longer practically continue editing; on the masthead, Joseph Ferman was listed as editor and publisher for Edward Ferman's first two years. Edward Ferman would take on the role of publisher, as well, by 1970, as his father gradually retired. He remained as editor until 1991 when he hired his replacement, Kristine Kathryn Rusch. He remained as publisher of the magazine until he sold it to Gordon Van Gelder in 2000. While Ferman was the editor, many other magazines in the field began to fold or were shortlived, and his magazine, along with Analog, was one of the few which maintained a regular schedule and sustained critical appreciation for its contents.

From 1969-1970, he was the editor of Fantasy & Science Fiction's sister publication Venture Science Fiction Magazine. Together, the Fermans had also edited and published the short-lived nostalgia and humor magazine P.S. and a similarly brief run of a magazine about mysticism and other proto-New Age matters, Inner Space.

Ferman received the Hugo Award for Best Professional Editor three years in a row, from 1981 through 1983. F&SF had previously won several other Hugos under his editorship, which had been famously conducted, at least in the last decade of his tenure, from a table in the Ferman family's Connecticut house. He edited or co-edited several volumes of stories from F&SF and co-edited Final Stage with Barry N. Malzberg. It is probable that he also ghost-edited No Limits for or with Joseph Ferman, an anthology drawn from the pages of the first run of Venture.

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_L..."

Reviews

[Craig]

This is the twentieth volume of the best stories from F & SF magazine as chose by the editors; Edward L. Ferman in this case. The series wasn't really an annual by this time; the contents range from 1971 to 1973. The book has good stories from Frederik Pohl, Phyllis Eisenstein, Alfred Bester, and Stephen Tall's excellent The Bear With the Knot on His Tail. The cover of the Ace paperback is a creepy Joseph Lombardero painting of weird little creatures hiding behind toadstools and watching a spaceship fly overhead, and the book includes a handful of delightful Gahan Wilson cartoons. (Two scientists are standing in a dense jungle in front of a carnivorous plant that looks like a lot like Audrey from Little Shop of Horrors except fiercer; the plant has the lower part of a leg of a third scientist dangling from its mouth. "I suppose the least we can do is name the damned thing after poor Dembar.") My favorite is Harlan Elllison's classic The Deathbird.

[Kanlep]

Mejor que la 1ª serie.