Edited by Jonathan Strahan
Night Shade Books, $14.99, 230 pages
Eclipse Four, the fourth volume in this anthology collection is a pleasure and a treat for fans of science fiction. There are 15 short stories in this collection, ranging in length from a page or two, to 20-odd pages. They also range along the sci-fi spectrum from strongly science and spaceship based traditional science fiction to stories that flirt with the fantasy boundary, and well as many places in between. This anthology, like others in the series, use the idea of an eclipse as a connective thread, and this volume emphasizes the rarity and the mysterious and marvelous nature of the eclipse, rather than its more scientific side. The stories are all well written and compelling, with one or two standouts that linger in the imagination. The editor offers the book as both a resurrection and as homage to the great science fiction anthologies of the mid-20th centuries succeeding in both tasks, as well as offering a look at how broad and welcoming the field of science fiction has become.
Katie Richards