As usual, a good mix, with the disadvantage that you'll probably dislike as many as you like. Once you get used to expecting that from a Best of the Year, it's fine. And makes us appreciate how hard it must be to be the editors who choose these, trying to give all angles a voice.Worth reading, but most of the stories didn't stick with me afterward.

A good collection of stories. Average story rating came out to 3.65, but I bumped it up a bit for the general enjoyment I got out of reading this anthology. Full reviews (with some spoilers) below.(view spoiler)["Let's Play Dead" by Senaa Ahmad4/5A strong start. Anne Boleyn dies again and again, and comes back again and again. A story about the pain of resilience."Survival Guide" by Karin Lowachee4.5/5A young boy connects to school through an educational AI programmed to act and sound like his d...

This collection is a fantastic experience—a mix of authors I know and ones I don’t, stories that range across the genres from Middle Earth type fantasy (maybe just one of those) to hard core military science fiction, many that felt particularly pandemic specific!! .Perhaps my favorite was “Beyond the Dragon’s Gate” by Yoon Ha Lee (I did not realize this is the same author from Dragon Pearl—a book I loved and am reading aloud with a class right now!). .A LOT of these stories were terrifying. I th...

Very interesting collection of sci fi and fantasy short stories! Some hit me more than others. I'm writing this review purely so I can remember and identify the stories later. Let's Play Dead - Anne Boleyn won't stay dead. Excellent start to the series - 5 starsSurvival Guide - Automated education system corrupting the minds of our youth. It was okay - 3 starsTiger's Feast - Bullied girl feeds a tiger her rage. It was okay - 3.5 starsThe Pill - Everyone wants a quick fix to thin-ness.Disturbing,...

Widely speculative collection, from mildly future to space to horror absurd. I most enjoyed The Pill (Meg Elison), Crawfather (Mel Kassel), Skipping Stones In the Dark (Amman Sabet), and Two Truths and a Lie (Sarah Pinsker).

Usually I like this annual collection, although I don't read it every year, but this year's selection really didn't do it for me. I like the diversity of authors, writing styles, themes and ideas, but most of the stories here are rather far from my usual space opera wheelhouse. I loved Kate Elliot's The Long Walk. Amman Sabet's Skipping Stones in the Dark is slightly disturbing food for thought for a space opera buff like me. Gene Doucette's Schrödinger's Catastrophe is a romp. Most of the other...

These are always hit and miss for me. This one was mostly misses with a few unbelievably great stories.Standouts:Let's Play Dead, by Senaa Ahmad: 4/5Brutal story about difficult women who refuse and resist, and persist, even through death. Beautiful prose.The Pill, by Meg Elison: 5/5Fantastic story. This is what I'm here for. It would be a perfect inclusion for J. Michael Straczynski’s finishing of Harlan Ellison's The Last Dangerous Visions anthology (if it indeed ever actually comes out).The B...

Overall, these short stories were surprisingly average Science Fiction/Fantasy reads, but I really liked Tochi Onyebuchi's "How to Pay Reparations: A Documentary" and Yohanca Delgado's "Our Language".

The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2021 is now out! The stories have been selected by series editor John Joseph Adams and a guest editor, the best-selling author Veronica Roth. Between fantasy and science fiction, there is a lot that this book covers. From a family’s grudge against a giant crawdad to AI-controlled generation spaceships. From African mysticism and indigenous views to experimental medicine to space flight, these stories cover a range of science fiction and fantasy theme...

final ratings for the two stories i didn't update on: "brother rifle" -- 2/5"the rat" -- 3/ 5average rating comes out to a 2.85, which tbh feels a little high. i just wasn't blown away by this collection, and it got to the point that even the stories i liked left me feeling a little hollow. a lot of them follow the same trajectory wherein we meander toward a finish line that announces the moral of the story all along. it's just not a format that works for me, and i'm left feeling underwhelmed an...

The series editor, J.J. Adams, selects 80 stories and strips all identifying info and sends them to the guest editor, who downselects to 20 to publish. Theoretically, the guest editor doesn't know the authors or publication sources. It makes for an interesting selection, and sometimes means an author has two stories in this 'best of' collection (normally not done in most 'best of' anthologies).It's interesting to see what each guest editor seems to prefer. In this one, Veronica Roth seems to foc...

As usual with an anthology, hits and misses. Most of the stories were "well, I'll read them to see if it gets good; at least it's short". And some of them got good…The ones I enjoyed more than others The Cleaners The first part of The Long Walk Two Truths and a Lie And This is How to Stay Alive The Rat One Time, a Reluctant Traveler Skipping Stones in the Dark Brother Rifle Schrodinger’s Catastrophe (probably the best of the lot, bo...

The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2021 collects short F&SF stories published in 2020. The Foreword and Introduction describe the full selection criteria, which are quite complex, but they boil down to this: series editor John Joseph Adams tried to read every short speculative fiction published for the year (in English, in North America, anyway), and honestly did a fairly thorough job. Adams then chose the ones he most admired, and passed his long list on to this year's editor Veronic...

A really nice anthology of short stories! A ton of magical realist and Earth-focused pieces, from giant Minnesota crawdad to flesh tigers to undead queens to impossible public access shows to memory cleaners.Favorite pieces include:Survival Guide (Lowachee did workshop my first Shared Worlds story when I was super young)The PillThe CleanersThe Beast AdjoinsThe Long WalkTwo Truths and a Lie (though it felt more like horror).The only piece that will go onto the Best Short Prose list will be The Pi...

Anthologies are always a mixed bag, and this was no different. Particular favorites, in descending order of how much I enjoyed them :* Schrodinger’s Catastrophe by Gene Doucette - This was an extremely interesting idea that was hilariously executed. Comedic science fiction has a very high bar in my head, so this one really impressed me. * How to Pay Reparations: a Documentary by Tochi Onyebuchi - A great example of how "good intentions" are almost always never enough.* Two Truths and a Lie by Sa...

I've read 11 of the 20 stories - I'll read the remaining 9, but this 'best of' falls into the more common trap of not really looking for the best stories, but looking for certain author identity and/or approved narrative. 2 of the 11 stories I've read so far have nothing to do with sci-fi/fantasy - one of them actually admits this in the author notes. It makes me think about all the great sci-fi/fantasy that gets left out because it doesn't check certain boxes.As for the 11 stories I've read, th...

Veronica Roth and JJA did an amazing job as co-editors of this anthology! There was not a SINGLE bad story among them! My biggest problem with anthologies has always been that there's usually one or two stand-outs, a bunch of meh/all-right stories, and then some outright bad ones. I liked all twenty stories in here (at least to some extent), and there were a bunch I absolutely LOVED. I sat down with the intention of reading one or two stories and then coming back to the volume later, but I ended...

This took forever to read since it's 20 storiesBut fuck it was awesomeFelt really inspired reading this

Solid 4 stars.Pros* The stories are very diverse in topics. I was afraid everything will be about pandemic this year, but there is literally just one story about it.* The stories do not push for any political agenda. Somehow this became mainstream lately - writers don't write, but must show their political views and make sure the reader get them till the last details. I gave up on one sci-fi anthology recently, since I couldn't read pure propaganda in a story after story. This one promised in th...

I loved most of these stories, though my favorite was definitely the first one. Some of stories weren't so well written, including the one about the AIs who changed spaceship shells and the one about the pandemic in the year 2040 or something like that. But "Let's Play Dead", "Crawfather", "How to Pay Reparations: A Documentary", "Our Language", "Schroödinger's Catastrophe", "The Cleaners", "And This Is How To Stay Alive", "The Beat Adjoins", "The Long Walk", "Skipping Stones in the Dark", and "...