John C. Wright's short story GUEST LAW appears in

Cover of Years Best SF, Gardner Dozois, Ed.

THE SPACE OPERA RENAISSANCE

 

Kathryn Cramer & David G. Hartwell (Editors)

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ISBN #

0765306174
Published
July 1998
as a hardback
by Tor books.

 

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Book Description:

From Booklist

Hartwell and Cramer have well-honed reputations for consummate editorial acumen, thanks to the renowned hard-sf anthology The Ascent of Wonder (1994) and the consistently excellent Year's Best SF. Now, in an exhaustive compendium spanning eight decades, they provide a definitive overview of space opera. Originally a contemptuous label for pulpy adventure sf, space opera has matured into sf's most popular subcategory, in print and on screen: think Star Wars and Stephen Baxter's universe-spanning sagas. Beginning with "The Star Stealers," by Edmond Hamilton, arguably the first practitioner of space opera, Hartwell and Cramer cut a wide swath through the genre, from pieces by such departed masters as Cordwainer Smith and Leigh Brackett down to others by such rising stars as Tony Daniel and Charles Stross. Thirty-two tales in all trace space opera's evolution from its lurid early obsession with impossible planets to its contemporary fascination with wormholes and posthumans. While the massive volume may not be ideal schlep-along reading, it is an important resource for any comprehensive sf library. Carl Hays

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Praise

“We are in the hands of a loving expert.”

—John Updike on The World Treasury of SF
 

“An editor extraordinaire.”

—Publishers Weekly on David G. Hartwell
 

“One of the definitive anthologies of the genre.”

—Des Moines Register on The Science Fiction Century
 

“Demonstrates the fact that science fiction is alive and well in the ’90s…A fine addition of any science fiction collection."

—VOYA on Visions of Wonder

 

Review by John DeNardo at SfSignal of GUEST LAW

Synopsis: Two ships in the far future meet in the Void; one is the noble ship Procrustes containing evolved humans who obey strict customs, the other an ancient ship whose captain boards Procrustes and must obey guest law.

 

Review: The background for this story is as intriguing as the story itself: Earth has been overrun by machines and the remnants of humanity have lived for eons in space, adapting their bodies and their customs to the ways of space. Guest law requires that ships meeting in space must share resources and crew. The dilemma of the story is whether the ancient ship will honor guest law. The Procrustes' social structure is class-based, with lowly manual laborers (like the Engineer called Smith) being fourth-class citizens, their lives in the hands of the noble captain (a hermaphrodite named Ereshkigal) and her vassals. When the captain named Descender visits from the ancient ship, things start out relatively normal, but then take a sharp turn towards creepy tension. All, as one might suspect, is not what it appears to be. With good ol' classic sf flavor and a surprise or two to boot, this was an entertaining read.

 

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