CHRISTMAS FOREVER
edited by David G. Hartwell
Expect neither old favorites nor unjustly neglected gems: these are 28 all-new tales with a Yuletide flavor, ranging from fairy tales to hard sf, assembled by one of the field's most highly regarded editors. The standard Christmas themes covered here include Santa, Jesus, reindeer, a Christmas Carol, the Three Kings, and so forth, though often from odd or unexpected viewpoints: alien planets, visiting aliens, demons, Wonderland, spirits, toyland, multicultural mayhem, mysteries, Sherlock Holmes, starships, superstition, morals, disasters, ecological doomsday, and connections even more tenuous. Notwithstanding the parade of famous names (e.g., Roger Zelazny, Joan Aiken, Gene Wolfe, Charles de Lint, Rudy Rucker, Damon Knight, Alan Dean Foster, Robert Sheckley, Brian Stableford, Michael Bishop), skeptical browsers will be forgiven for regarding somewhat cynically askance a volume whose sole raison d'etre is to cash in on the festivities.