"David G. Hartwell. - Years Best Fantasy 2" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hartwell David G)

specifically as fantasy are up to this task, so we set out to find these stories, and we looked for them in
the genre anthologies, magazines, and small press pamphlets. Some fine fantasy writers will still be
missing. A fair number of the best fantasy writers these days write only novels, or if they do write short
fiction, do so only every few years, and sometimes it is not their best work.

In 2001, books by the big names were selling better than ever, sliding through the publishing and
distribution process perhaps even easier than before. Hardcover editions contribute substantially to the
support of every fantasy and science fiction publishing line. The trade paperback is now well-established
as the safety net of a number of publishers and writers.

The year ended with the Christmas of Harry Potter and Tolkien movies (and of new Robert Jordan and
Terry Good-kind blockbuster fantasy novels), which we hope has given a push to fantasy sales in general
during difficult times.

The small presses were again a vigorous presence this year. We have a strong short fiction field today
because the small presses and semiprofessional magazines and anthologies are printing and circulating a
majority of the high quality short stories published in fantasy, science fiction, and horror. The U.S. is the
only English language country that still has any professional, large-circulation magazines, though Canada,
Australia, and the UK have several excellent magazines. The semiprozines of our field mirror the “little
magazines” of the mainstream in function, holding to professional editorial standards and publishing the
next generation of writers, along with some of the present masters. What a change that is in the U.S.,
though it has been gradually emerging for more than a decade.

The best original anthologies of the year in our opinion were Starlight 3, edited by Patrick Nielsen
Hayden (Tor) and Red Shift edited by Al Sarrantonio (Roc). Of those, the particular excellences of
Starlight were mostly in the realm of fantasy, and the especial pleasures of Red Shift were mostly in SF.
Also of interest is Fantasmas: Supernatural Stories by Mexican American Writers, edited by Rob
Johnson, from Bilingual Press of Tempe Arizona, a volume of reinterpretations of folktales in
contemporary settings.

We write in January 2002, but the anxious outlines of the publishing future are becoming clear for the
coming year. Fantasy and science fiction publishing as we have always known it is concentrated in nine
mass market and hardcover publishing lines (Ace, Bantam, Baen, DAW, Del Rey, Eos, Roc, Tor, and
Warner), and those lines are hard-pressed to continue distributing the number of new titles they have
been able to in the past. Mass market distributors in general are pressing all publishers to reduce the
number of titles and just publish “big books.”

The last sf and fantasy magazines that are widely distributed (Analog, Asimov’s, F&SF, Realms of
Fantasy) are being charged more by the same distributors for distribution because they are not as
high-circulation as The New Yorker or Playboy (who are also under pressure). So the infield magazines
are hard-pressed but are only a special case of the widespread difficulties facing all magazines.

In 2001, electronic text failed to live up to the advance publicity (both Random House and Warner
closed their etext operations by the end of 2001). Print-on-demand became a very small success. The
Wall Street Journal, in a recent article surveying 2500 titles, quoted the figure of 88 copies as the
average sale of a print-on-demand title. Of the several high-paying online short fiction markets announced
last year that helped to cushion the loss of print media markets for short fiction, one survives.

It was another good year to be reading the magazines, both pro and semiprofessional. It was a strong
year for novellas, and there were more than a hundred shorter stories in consideration, from which we