There isn't one story in The Best of Connie Willis that feels like filler. Each and every solid, well-crafted, beautifully rendered bit of speculative fiction is the utmost, the very best, of Willis--who writes with verve, wit and laugh-out-loud silliness as she brings joy and love, warmth and chills, truth and life to all her wordy children. This greatest-hits collection is a triumph of short form speculative fiction, an oeuvre of passionate work collected into one must-read volume.
"A Letter from the Clearys" is a poignant post-apocalyptic tale, told through the eyes of a young woman just starting to understand the doomed, dead world around her. "At the Rialto" is a scattershot tale about a professor at the Quantum Physicists Annual Meeting in Hollywood, Calif., a place where reality is often suspended, only more so in this short story. A super short story revolving around dead Emily Dickinson and Orson Welles's Martians will reward close reading with genuine laughter on every page, while another tale of the ghost of famed skeptic H.L. Mencken is both instructive, politically astute and a delight to read.
Every story, whether dealing with the London Blitz or with angry, glaring aliens who've come to tell us off, is a complete world unto itself--and none of them ever actually feels "short." Willis is a masterful sculptor of infinite variety, and the many works in The Best of Connie Willis show just how much of a grand master she is. --Rob LeFebvre