Library Journal Likes Us

"Us" being the contributers to George RR Martin’s Jack Vance anthology.

A starred review from LJ:

Songs of the Dying Earth: Stories in Honor of Jack Vance. Subterranean. Sept. 2009. c.632p. ed. by George R.R. Martin & Gardner Dozois. illus. ISBN 978-1-59606-213-9. $40. FANTASY

Of the many novels written by sf Grandmaster Vance, his "Dying Earth" series remains the most popular and most memorable of his oeuvre. Now top sf and fantasy authors including Tanith Lee, Mike Resnick (Hazards, reviewed above), Tad Williams, and Robert Silverberg have contributed stories and reminiscences to this mammoth collection of tales set in that unforgettable universe, one in which Earth’s sun is a dying red dwarf and in which irascible mages, clever scoundrels, and ordinary folk wait around for their world’s inevitable demise.

VERDICT From Dan Simmons’s new novella about a wild search for the Ultimate Library ("The Guiding Nose of Ulfänt Banderoz") to Walter Jon Williams’s tale of an architectural student caught up in a war between two great powers ("Abrizonde"), the 23 stories not only capture the unique feel of Vance’s dying universe but stand individually as one of the strongest gatherings of writers to pay homage to one of their own. Despite the price, this is highly recommended.