Cities: The Very Best Of Fantasy Comes to Town [Paperback]

The title of this collection is "Cities," and by the editor's foreword, I was led to expect four novellas that reflected upon the nature of cities -- which sounded very interesting. I decided to buy this book because of that choice of theme, and because China Mieville, now one of my favorite authors, was one of the contributors, and to a lesser extent, because Michael Moorcock was a contributor.

Of the four stories, only one really engaged the theme of the nature of cities: Paul Di Filippo's "A Year in the Linear City," which was a very good story about a incredibly vast and strangely contrived city, the nature of which the inhabitants scarcely thought about. It was one of the few works of fiction I've read in which having a protagonist who is a writer of fiction actually worked well.

China Mieville's books "Perdido Street Station" and "The Scar" were, quite intensely, engaged in depicting the nature of the cities they describe, so I was a bit surprised that Mieville's story in this collection, "The Tain," didn't seem so engaged. At least the story was definitely set in an urban environment, and was an interesting twist on the survival tale, all the more so because of Mieville's typical mockery of the excesses of the very genre he's writing in, within the story.

Michael Moorcock's "Firing the Cathedral" was the most disappointing of the four stories in the collection. It didn't engage with the theme of the nature of cities at all. As far as I could tell, none of the action of the story took place in a city. It was broken into several subsections, each starting with some quotes to reflect the political situation of the present day real world, which were mildly interested, and followed by some disjointed conversations in which characters that I suppose we're expected to recognize from other Moorcock stories exchange smarmy inside jokes, leaving the reader completely outside. I couldn't figure out if there really was any story. It may have had something to do with global warming, but I couldn't be sure. It certainly wasn't entertaining or interesting.

Geoff Ryman's story, "V.A.O.," took place entirely within a retirement home, in which aging cyberpunk hackers tracked down one of their own gone rogue. It seemed like yet another attempt to put a fresh spin on the painful cliches of cyberpunk, by taking up the theme of aging. There was certainly nothing about cities, per se.

Overall, I found this a mediocre collection, which didn't live up to my expectations of quality, nor, more surprisingly, even particularly address the theme that was supposed to tie this book together. While Filippo's story was excellent, and Mieville's was good, I wouldn't have bought this book had I realized that's all I'd get.

Cities is a compilation of four stories by authors who are all masters of their craft; Paul Di Filippo, China Mieville, Michael Moorcock, and Geoff Ryman.

Beginning with Paul Di Filippo's `A Year In The Linear City', the book takes off like a bullet from a gun. Di Filippo's envisioned city is hundreds of thousands of blocks long, but bordered on one side by a river and on the other side by railroad tracks. Beyond these boundaries exist The Wrong Side Of The Tracks and The Other Shore, places of myth and superstition. The world is cleansed of their dead by the Fisherwives and the Yardbulls, celestial beings who come for the spirits of the dead. This is a truly outstanding tale of a strange city in a strange world, with compelling characters and original plotline. Need I say more?

Next is China Mieville's `The Tain', a unique and horrifying tale of what lays in wait behind our own mirrors. Call it a tale of vampires, or a tale of spectral imagery, a curse behind vanity, or a strange sci-fi-fantasy yarn of alternate universe/reality, but what it really amounts to is a chilling tale that is well worth picking up this book strictly for `The Tain' by itself.

Michel Moorcock's `Firing The Cathedral' would be the one letdown in the book, regardless of what high esteem I hold Moorcock in. This is a `Jerry Cornelius' adventure, but I think even fans of Moorcock's `Jerry' will find this short story to be just a tad too meandering. Moorcock is an extremely talented writer whom I felt was merely left wandering through the haze of useless obliqueness when this story was conceived. `Cathedral' touches down into the prose style of "guess what I'm thinking" sci-fi jumbles that I usually try to avoid. The writing was just a little too disjointed, and Moorcock is normally much better than this individual story.

Last of the collection is `V.A.O.' by Geoff Ryman, perhaps not as well known as the other three authors, but he writes a masterpiece with this tale of elderly inhabitants of a nursing home. V.A.O. stands for Victim Activated Ordinance, a security system put into place to protect the wealthy elders from the violent youths of the time. Or is it the elderly who are violent? In a closely monitored `home', these aged folks hide their computer codes beneath videos of golf matches, codes that launder money and track the activities of The Silhouette, leader of the `Age Rage' gang.

Cities is an outstanding addition to your collection of strange places to go, and I highly recommend you pick up a copy if you are a fan of any one of these four talented authors. If you aren't now, you soon will be. Enjoy!

These stories are very loosely based on the 'cities' concept. I obtained a copy just to be able to read Miëville's _The Tain_, which was worth it. DiFilippo's novella is great as well. Moorcock's story is only barely readable, but the story's sprinkled with an interesting collection of up-to-date political quotation. The editing is okay, and Crowther's introduction is short but succinct. Worth its price for the first two stories, and you could consider the other two as bonus material.