A mixed bag as any anthology... but with some serious gems inside! Notes on the favourite stories to follow

A majority of these stories are some of the best I've heard. Stellar group of authors.

This was a wonderful read; I wrote down all the authors to find their works separately. Short stories are always a hit with me, but this collection was so diverse and not a single story I didn't finish. Gardner Dozois died in 2018 which made me want to go and not only read his stuff, but find his other collections. I'm currently looking for "The Book of Swords" at the library, but I'm not sure it can top this.

All the stories are pleasant and entertaining; most of them are pretty generic and unmemorable. "Powerful magicians" is a pretty hoary trope, and while the authors portray it well, it feels like a good rendition of something I've seen a million times before.My main takeaway would be not to read this all at once. One story at a time would probably be a welcome entertainment; a bunch of them in sequence felt very tedious to me. (Full disclosure: at some point I started skipping between the stories...

"Here are dreams that, it is my fervent hope, will still be touching other people's minds and hearts and stirring them in their turn to dream long after everyone in this anthology or associated with it have gone to dust," says the introduction to what's presumably the last collection overseen by the great anthologist Dozois. Reading that, one inevitably wonders whether he knew his own departure was scheduled for even before its publication. A companion piece to The Book of Swords, it claims on t...

The Return of the Pig by K.J. Parker 4* - I enjoyed this story. A fund series of misadventures that end up revealed to be of an unseen purpose by our narrator wizard. Community Services by Megan Lindholm5* - Sad and tragic. This one hit me right in the gut, probably because I'm a dad watching my daughter grow up and leaving some toys behind. Flint and Mirror by John Crowley3* - Promising start to the story but it did satisfy me with the resolution. The Friends of Masquelayne the Incomparable, by...

As with any anthology, there were some good, some great, and a few meh. The sheer variety was impressive, though, and I discovered a few new-to-me authors. yay! Highlights for me included THE BIOGRAPHY OF A BOUNCING BOY TERROR: CHAPTER TWO: JUMPING JACK IN LOVE, by Ysabeau S Wilce and THE STAFF IN THE STONE, by Garth Nix.

Overall rating: 4The usual mix of high quality, diverse and imaginative tales that one expects from a Gardner Dozois anthology. There is a selection of authors from very different backgrounds. This may have been Dozois’ last anthology. RIP Gardner. We will miss your wonderful story collections.The theme is obviously magic and fantasy. There are witches, wizards, sorcerers, etc.The Return of the Pig by K.J. Parker (aka Tom Holt)3.5Audio reader: Elliot HillWeird and gripping tale of nasty and brut...

I picked just a few of these from some favorite authors, and all were quite good. In particular, the Scott Lynch story, which is the longest in the collection and a bit of a departure from his normal fare, as well as the story by Matthew Hughes, who never fails to deliver an utterly amusing experience.The Friends of Masquelayne the Incomparable by Matthew Hughes (4.5) - A jealous wizard bites off more than he can chew when he takes on an upstart wizard with enigmatic powers. Hughes has a real gi...

The Book of Swords⭐⭐⭐1/2 (Bertie Botts Every Flavour Beans) Read full review at: https://grimmsnaughtblog.home.blog/More diverse than Book of Swords, but that’s to be expected with the change of subject. Magic does not have to be wandwork, incantations or potions, but can be pretty much anything. Like eating toys to remain young (Yes, that’s an actual thing in one story. Thank you Megan Lindholm!). It can also be set successfully in different moods and tones. All from heart crushing to overly

"The Book of Magic" is the latest in what now has become an annual collection of hefty anthology series consisting of:2009 - "Songs of the Dying Earth: Stories in Honor of Jack Vance"2010 – "Warriors - a military-themed cross-genre anthology" 2010 - "Songs of Love and Death" 2011 - "Down These Strange Streets"2013 - "Dangerous Women"2013 – "Old Mars"2014 – "Rogues"2015 - "Old Venus"2017 - "The Book of Swords"2018 - "The Book of Magic"Contents and my story ratings for "The Book of Magic":xi - Int...

Everyone knows that short story collections will be a mixed bag. This one was a better bag than most. I only disliked 3 out of 17, which is very good odds for a short story compilation. I found the Bouncing Boy Terror to be irritating in its alliteration, the GRRM one to be as creepily porny as he always is, and the Andy Duncan Americana one to be just awful. I cannot stand Americana lit. I don't even know if Americana is the word. Like, folksy squared. Excessive folk. Unacceptable. But Masquela...

The Book of Magic carries on what The Book of Swords achieved by bringing together a finely edited compilation of stories once more. This time, of course, it was centered around magic and it's users and seeing the many interpretations of that was excellent. I liked most of the stories in this, though I few didn't quite reach me the way I would hope as with any collection. Overall, I recommend this if you want a taste of magic!

COMMUNITY SERVICE (5*) by Megan Lindholm (aka Robin Hobb) is just fantastic. I want more. I read a snippet somewhere suggesting she might be attempting a full length novel with the protagonist. Please. I loved the bit about the junk drawer and the bookish magic: the world building is first class.Quotes:I felt the vindictive satisfaction of someone who was finally able to betray a traitorous friend.I knew if he apologised again I'd never be able to forgive him. There's something terrible about he...

Short story collection he was editing when he died, his estate published it. An ok collection of fantasy topped easily by the last story in it. The Fall and Rise of the House of the Wizard Malkuril, by Scott Lynch, was wonderful. The rest of the stories varied from 2 to 4, but that was a 5.

We've reached the (most likely) last anthology that Gardner Dozois edited during his lifetime. He didn't live to see it published. Now, unless the big publishing houses start doing some Jimi Hendrix or J.R.R. Tolkien trick, where they come up with new material some 40-50 years after (supposedly from the artists' attics), we can safely assume this is it.Sister anthology of last year's The Book of Swords this one obviously follows the same formula: 17 novelettes, ranging from the medieval to the u...

My third book in the #dymocksreadingchallenge is The Book of Magic! Like all of the Gardner Dozois (RIP) anthologies, it's a hell of a stacked deck of authors, including Garth Nix, Tim Powers, and Scott Lynch. Like any anthology, there are some stories you like more than others- I didn't particularly like one about Irish folklore, for example- but some are real great. The real gutpunch story here is Megan "Robin Hobb" Lindholms, which is creepy and heartbreaking.

... Magic predates Art. In fact, Art may have been invented as a tool to express Magic, to give Magic a practical means of execution—to make it work. So that if you go back far enough, artist and sorcerer are indistinguishable, one and the same—a claim that can still be made with a good deal of validity to this very day. —Gardner DozoisHaving a great love for Gardner Dozois' science fiction anthologies and loving the cover, I decided to give this collection a whirl. Disappointingly, it rather mi...

Decent collection of fantasy short stories. Personally I enjoyed the offerings from K.J. Parker, Matthew Hughes, Tim Parker, Garth Nix, and Scott Lynch the most. I'll definitely have to track down more stuff by all of these authors.

Short stories anthologies are not my favorites, but this was mostly enjoyable, squeezed in between other books. My favorites come from pens of George R.R.Martin(a surprise, seeing as I abandoned ASOIAF) and Matthew Hughes. It was also nice to read more Ysabeau S. Wilce, and it's high time to start reading some Kate Elliott work.