"One of the literary giants of science fiction."
--The Denver Post
"Wolfe is a sophisticated stylist, and has more in common with writers such as Jorge Luis Borges than almost any science fiction writer both in terms of craft and themes."
--The Boston Globe
Gene Wolfe, of whom the Washington Post said, "Of all SF writers currently active none is held in higher esteem," has selected the short fiction he considers his best into one volume.
There are many award nominees and winners among the thirty-one stories here, and many that have been selected for various Year's Best anthologies over the last forty years, including "Petting Zoo," "The Tree Is My Hat," "The Island of Dr. Death and Other Stories," "The Hero as Werwolf," "Seven American Nights," "The Fifth Head of Cerberus," "The Detective of Dreams," and "A Cabin on the Coast." Gene Wolfe has produced possibly the finest and most significant body of short fiction in the SF and fantasy field in the last forty years, and is certainly among the great living writers to emerge from the genres. This is the first retrospective collection of his entire career. It is for the ages.
"Gene Wolfe is the smartest, subtlest, most dangerous writer alive today."
--Neil Gaiman
About the Author: Gene Wolfe (1931-2019) was the Nebula Award-winning author of The Book of the New Sun tetralogy in the Solar Cycle, as well as the World Fantasy Award winners The Shadow of the Torturer and Soldier of Sidon. He was also a prolific writer of distinguished short fiction, which has been collected in such award-winning volumes as Storeys from the Old Hotel and The Best of Gene Wolfe.
A recipient of the World Fantasy Award for Life Achievement, the Edward E. Smith Memorial Award, and six Locus Awards, among many other honors, Wolfe was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in 2007, and named Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America in 2012.
