Best of Robert Silverberg

The Best of Robert Silverberg: Stories of Six Decades is a landmark volume that offers exactly what its title promises: the finest short work of one of the finest writers ever to grace the field of science fiction. Updated and expanded from 2004’s Phases of the Moon, this mammoth collection contains twenty-six stories and novellas, along with a generous amount of introductory material. The result is the definitive one-volume overview of an extraordinary career.

The earliest story, “The Macauley Circuit,” was published in 1957, the latest, “The Prisoner,” in 2010. In between these narrative bookends are some of the most astonishing fictional creations of the modern era, many of them winners of major awards. Included among these are “Good News from the Vatican,” “Sailing to Byzantium,” “Passengers,” and “Enter a Soldier. Later, Enter Another,” as well as two of the most remarkable novellas you will ever encounter: “Nightwings” and “Born with the Dead.” Supplementing these award-winners are such bona fide classics as “Sundance,” “Schwartz Between the Galaxies,” “Capricorn Games,” and “To See the Invisible Man.” And the list goes on. Intelligent, exhilarating, and endlessly re-readable, The Best of Robert Silverberg: Stories of Six Decades is an irreplaceable volume, one that no one with an interest in modern science fiction—or in serious, ambitious fiction of any sort—can afford to miss.

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• The Road to Nightfall
• The Macauley Circuit
• Sunrise on Mercury
• Warm Man
• To See the Invisible Man
• Flies
• Passengers
• Nightwings
• Sundance
• Good News from the Vatican
• Capricorn Games
• Born with the Dead
• Schwartz between the Galaxies
• The Far Side of the Bell-Shaped Curve
• The Pope of the Chimps
• Needle in a Timestack
• Sailing to Byzantium
• Enter a Soldier. Later, Enter Another
• Hunters in the Forest
• Death Do Us Part
• Beauty in the Night
• The Millennium Express
• With Caesar in the Underworld
• Against the Current
• Defenders of the Frontier
• The Prisoner

From Publishers Weekly (Starred Review):
“In 26 elegantly conceived and written stories, protagonists travel through time, philosophize, question their morals and faith, and pursue unknowable, elusive women… Thanks to Silverberg’s commentary on each decade and story—wry, candid, and unencumbered by false modesty—the anthology also functions as a memoir of a great career in genre literature.”

From SFRevu:
“The stories highlight Silverberg’s strengths in character development and use of language to convey powerful emotions, while also showcasing his flexibility, as he experiments with different techniques over the course of his career.”

From SF Crowsnest:
“[Silverberg] is probably the best Science Fiction writer in the history of the genre so far, hence all those Nebulas.…  This is a magnificent collection from an awesome talent and deserves a place on the shelf of any SF aficionado.”