The Best of Subterranean

Book excerpt: From its launch in 2005 to its final issue in 2014, "Subterranean" magazine published stories by the leading lights of science fiction and fantasy literature. From Hugo and Nebula winners to Pulitzer and Booker Prize finalists to "New York Times" bestsellers, this anthology collects 30 pieces of "Subterranean's" best, representing diverse, breathtaking short fiction from today's modern masters. In "Last Breath" Joe Hill spins the tale of a man who collects the breaths of the dying for his haunting museum. Catherynne M. Valente's "White Lines on a Green Field" chronicles what might happen if Coyote became a small town high school quarterback. Karen Joy Fowler's "Younger Women" finds a woman confronting her daughter's new boyfriend, who happens to be a vampire. Visit the Twilight Zone via George R.R. Martin in the script "The Toys of Caliban." In Ted Chiang's "The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling" the narratives of a journalist and a young man are told in contrast, both impacted by technology and literacy. And in Kelley Armstrong's "The Screams of Dragons" a boy is declared a changeling and things only get stranger from there. Other pieces visit far-flung space and intimate sick rooms, the futuristic pyramids of the rich and a jungle where a man-eating tiger stalks a village. "The Best of Subterranean," edited by William Schafer, is a must-have anthology that brings together more than 700 pages of stories as varied and distinguished as their authors, and which are utterly unforgettable.