The Year's Best Science Fiction: Thirtieth Annual Collection

SUMMATION: 2012

Well, the physical print book didn’t die in 2012, although some commentators have been predicting that it would be totally extinct by 2015. Nor have e-books proved to be a transitory “fad,” as the more wishful thinking of the print purists once asserted that they would turn out to be.

Instead, something interesting seems to be happening. More people are reading than ever before, and it may be that rather than driving print books into extinction, the two forms are complementing each other in a synergistic way, one helping to boost the other. It may be that the more you read, in either print or electronic form, the more you want to read.

The average American adult read seventeen books in 2012, the highest figure since Gallup began tracking the figure in 1990.

A Pew Research Center survey said the percentage of adults who have read an e-book rose over the past year, from 16 percent to 23 percent. But 89 percent of regular book readers said that they had also read at least one printed book during the preceding twelve months.

Although comprehensive overall figures for 2012 won’t be available for some time yet as I type these words, according to Stephen Marche, writing in Esquire, revenue for adult hardcover books is up 8.3 percent in the January-June 2012 period from the same period in 2011, from 2.038 billion dollars to 2.207 billion. Paperback sales were up 5.2 percent (other figures suggest that this growth was mostly in trade paperbacks, while mass-market paperbacks declined, suggesting that a significant proportion of those who used to buy mass-market paperbacks are now buying e-books instead; see the novel section below for further breakdowns), while book sales for young adults and children grew by 12 percent.

According to Nicholas Carr, writing in The Wall Street Journal, “Hardcover books are displaying surprising resiliency. The growth in e-book sales is slowing markedly. And purchases of e-readers are actually shrinking, as consumers opt instead for multipurpose tablets. It may be that e-books, rather than replacing printed books, will ultimately serve a role more like audio books—a complement to traditional reading, not a substitute.” The Association of American Publishers reported that the annual growth rate for e-book sales fell during 2012, to 34 percent, still impressive, but a decline from the triple-digit growth rates of the preceding four years. Sales of dedicated e-readers were down by 36 percent in 2012, while sales of tablet computers such as the iPad and the Kindle Fire exploded.

Not that e-books are going to go away, either. A survey by children’s publisher Scholastic Inc. indicated that 46 percent of responding kids aged nine to seventeen had read an e-book, and that around half of those who have not yet read an e-book say that they want to do so, going on to state that the rise of iPads and other tablets has helped to vastly expand the availability of picture books and other children’s books in electronic format. But 80 percent of those kids who read an e-book in 2012 also read a print book.

My guess is that in the future, rather than one mode driving the other out of existence, most readers will buy books both in electronic and print forms, choosing one format or the other depending on the circumstances, convenience, their needs of the moment, even their whim. There are strong indications that in some cases people will buy both e-book and print versions of the same book. It may be true that a rising tide floats all boats.

The biggest story in the publishing world in 2012 was probably the merger of publishing giants Random House and Penguin to form Penguin Random House (and prompting wiseasses everywhere to say it should have been called “Random Penguin” instead). The merger still needs government approval to go through, but if it does, the so-called “Big Six” publishing houses will be reduced at a stroke to the “Big Five.” Since there were rumors at the end of 2012 that HarperCollins’ parent company, News Corp, is interested in acquiring Simon & Schuster’s book business, that number may be reduced even further in the near future. All this merging has, of course, prompted the usual fears that formerly independent and competing imprints will be consolidated, spelling the loss of editorial jobs and perhaps a reduction in the number of overall titles released. Elsewhere: Angry Robot launched a YA imprint, Strange Chemistry, and will launch a crime-fiction imprint, Exhibit A, later this year. PS Publishing is launching a mass-market paperback imprint, Drugstore Indian. Penguin/Berkley/NAL added a graphic novel imprint, Inklit. Orbit will launch a new “commercial fiction” imprint, Redhook. Random House announced four new digital imprints: Alibi, to publish mysteries/thrillers/suspense; Hydra, to publish SF/fantasy; Loveswept, to publish romance; and Flirt, to publish “New Adult” fiction targeting women in their twenties and thirties. HarperCollins announced a new digital YA imprint, HarperTeen Impulse. Pearson, the parent company of Penguin, acquired self-publishing company Author Solutions, Inc. Barnes & Noble has put its Sterling Publishing arm up for sale. Amazon made a deal to acquire over four hundred titles from Marshall Cavendish Children’s Books. Betsy Mitchell has been hired by e-book publisher Open Road Media as a “strategic advisor” for their SF and fantasy titles. Patrick Nolan became editor in chief and associate publisher of Penguin Books. Madeline McIntosh became Chief Operating Officer for Random House. Devi Pillai was promoted to executive editor at Orbit, and Susa Barnes to associate editor. Therese Goulding was hired as managing editor for Ann and Jeff VanderMeer’s Cheeky Frawg Books imprint. Editor David Pomerico left Del Rey to become an editor at Amazon.com’s SF imprint, 47North. Steven H. Silver resigned as editor and publisher of ISFiC Press.

It was a mostly stable year in the professional print magazine market. After years of sometimes precipitous decline, circulation figures are actually beginning to creep back up, mostly because of sales of electronic subscriptions to the magazines, as well as sales of individual electronic copies of each issue.

Asimov’s Science Fiction had another strong year, publishing excellent fiction by Elizabeth Bear, Jay Lake, Indrapramit Das, Megan Lindholm, Steven Popkes, Robert Reed, Gord Sellar, Tom Purdom, and others; their SF was considerably stronger than their fantasy this year, with the exception of a novella by Alan Smale. For the third year in a row, circulation was up. Asimov’s Science Fiction registered a 10.8 percent gain in overall circulation, up from 22,593 in 2011, to 25,025. There were 21,380 subscriptions; Newsstand sales were 3,207 copies, plus 438 digital copies sold on average each month in 2012. Sell-through jumped sharply from 28 percent to 42 percent. Sheila Williams completed her eighth year as editor of Asimov’s Science Fiction, and won her second Best Editor Hugo in a row.

Analog Science Fiction and Fact published good work by Richard A. Lovett and William Gleason, Michael Alexander and K.C. Ball, Linda Nagata, Michael Flynn, Sean McMullen, Alec Nevala-Lee, and others. Analog registered a 4.9 percent rise in overall circulation, from 26,440 to 27,803. There were 24,503 subscriptions; newsstand sales were 2,854; down slightly from 2,942, but digital sales were up sharply, from 150 digital copies sold on average each month in 2011, to 446 in 2013. Sell-through rose from 30 percent to 31 percent. Stanley Schmidt, who had been editor there for thirty-three years, retired in 2012, and has been replaced by Trevor Quachri. The year 2012 marked the magazine’s eighty-second anniversary.

The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction was almost exactly the reverse of Asimov’s Science Fiction; lots of good fantasy work appeared there in 2012, including stories by Ted Kostmatka, Rachel Pollack, Peter S. Beagle, Felicity Shoulders, John McDaid, Alter S. Reiss, and others, but little really memorable SF, with the exception of stories by Robert Reed and Andy Duncan. The magazine also registered a 20.4 percent drop in overall circulation, from 14,462 to 11,510. Print subscriptions dropped from 10,539 to 8,300. Newsstand sales dropped from 6,584 to 5,050. Sell-through rose from 38 percent to 39 percent. Figures are not available for digital subscriptions and digital copies sold, but editor Gordon Van Gelder said that they were “healthy,” and that “our bottom line in 2012 was good.” Gordon Van Gelder is in his sixteenth year as editor, and his twelfth year as owner and publisher.

Interzone is technically not a “professional magazine,” by the definition of The Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA), because of its low rates and circulation, but the literary quality of the work published there is so high that it would be ludicrous to omit it. Interzone had good work by Aliette de Bodard, Sean McMullen, Lavie Tidhar, Elizabeth Bourne, and others this year. Exact circulation figures are not available, but is guessed to be in the 2,000-copy range. TTA Press, Interzone’s publisher, also publishes straight horror or dark suspense magazine Black Static, which is beyond our purview here, but of a similar level of professional quality. Interzone and Black Static changed to a smaller trim size this year, but maintained their slick look, switching from the old 7¾" by 10¾" saddle-stitched semigloss color cover and 64-page format to a 6½" by 9¼" perfect-bound glossy color cover and 96-page format. The editors include publisher Andy Cox and Andy Hedgecock.

If you’d like to see lots of good SF and fantasy published every year, the survival of these magazines is essential, and one important way that you can help them survive is by subscribing to them. It’s never been easier to do so, something that these days can be done with just the click of a few buttons, nor has it ever before been possible to subscribe to the magazines in as many different formats, from the traditional print copy arriving by mail to downloads for your desktop or laptop available from places like Amazon.com (www.amazon.com), to versions you can read on your Kindle, Nook, or i-Pad. You can also now subscribe from overseas just as easily as you can from the United States, something formerly difficult to impossible to do.

So in hopes of making it easier for you to subscribe, I’m going to list both the Internet sites where you can subscribe online and the street addresses where you can subscribe by mail for each magazine: Asimov’s web address is www.asimovs.com, and subscribing online might be the easiest thing to do. There’s also a discounted rate for online subscriptions; its subscription address is Asimov’s Science Fiction, Dell Magazines, 267 Broadway, Fourth Floor, New York, NY 10007-2352. The annual subscription rate in the U.S. is $34.97, $44.97 overseas. Analog’s site is at www.analogsf.com; its subscription address is Analog Science Fiction and Fact, Dell Magazines, 267 Broadway, Fourth Floor, New York, NY 10007-2352. The annual subscription rate in the U.S. is $34.97, $44.97 overseas. The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction’s site is at www.sfsite.com/fsf; its subscription address is The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Spilogale, Inc., P.O. Box 3447, Hoboken, NJ 07030. The annual subscription rate in the U.S. is $34.97, $44.97 overseas. Interzone and Black Static can be subscribed to online at www.ttapress.com/onlinestore1.html; the subscription address for both is TTA Press, 5 Martins Lane, Witcham, Ely, Cambs CB6 2LB, England, UK. The price for a twelve-issue subscription is 42.00 Pounds Sterling each, or there is a reduced rate dual subscription offer of 78.00 Pounds Sterling for both magazines for twelve issues; make checks payable to “TTA Press.”

Most of these magazines are also available in various electronic formats for the Kindle, the Nook, and other handheld readers.

In truth, there’s not that much left of the print semiprozine market; in 2011, several magazines transitioned from print to electronic format, including Zahir (which subsequently died altogether), Electric Velocipede, and Black Gate, and in 2012 they were joined by criticalzine The New York Review of Science Fiction. I suspect that sooner or later most of the surviving print semiprozines will transition to electronic-only online formats, saving themselves lots of money in printing, mailing, and production costs.

The semiprozines that remained in print format mostly struggled to bring out their scheduled issues. Of the SF/fantasy print semiprozines, one of the few that managed all of its scheduled issues was the longest-running and most reliably published of all the fiction semiprozines, the Canadian On Spec, which is edited by a collective under general editor Diane L. Walton. Another collective-run SF magazine with a rotating editorial staff, Australia’s Andromeda Spaceways In-flight Magazine, managed four issues this year, as it had in 2011. Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, the long-running slipstream magazine edited by Kelly Link and Gavin Grant, managed only one issue in 2012, as did fantasy magazines Shimmer, Bull Spec, and Ireland’s long-running Albedo One. Neo-opsis managed two issues, as did Space and Time Magazine, before being sold. The small British SF magazine Jupiter, edited by Ian Redman, produced all four of its scheduled issues in 2012, as did the fantasy magazine Tales of the Talisman. Weird Tales also managed two issues, one compiled by the old editor, Ann VanderMeer, and one compiled by the new editor, Marvin Kaye.

The fact is that little really memorable fiction appeared in any of the surviving print semiprozines this year, which were far outstripped by the online magazines (see below).

With the departure of The New York Review of Science Fiction to the electronic world in mid-2012, the venerable newszine Locus: The Magazine of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Field is about all that’s left of the popular print critical magazine market. A multiple Hugo winner, it has long been your best bet for value in this category anyway, and for more than thirty years has been an indispensible source of news, information, and reviews. Happily, the magazine has survived the death of founder, publisher, and longtime editor Charles N. Brown and has continued strongly and successfully under the guidance of a staff of editors headed by Liza Groen Trombi, and including Kirsten Gong-Wong, Carolyn Cushman, Tim Pratt, Jonathan Strahan, Francesca Myman, Heather Shaw, and many others.

Most of the other surviving print critical magazines are professional journals more aimed at academics than at the average reader. The most accessible of these is probably the long-running British critical zine Foundation.

Subscription addresses are: Locus, The Magazine of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Field, Locus Publications, Inc., P.O. Box 13305, Oakland, CA, 94661, $76.00 for a one-year first-class subscription, 12 issues; Foundation, Science Fiction Foundation, Roger Robinson (SFF), 75 Rosslyn Avenue, Harold Wood, Essex RM3 ORG, UK, $37.00 for a three-issue subscription in the U.S.; On Spec, The Canadian Magazine of the Fantastic, P.O. Box 4727, Edmonton, AB, Canada T6E 5G6, for subscription information, go to Web site www.onspec.ca; Neo-opsis Science Fiction Magazine, 4129 Carey Rd., Victoria, BC, CanadaV8Z 4G5, $25.00 for a three-issue subscription; Albedo One, Albedo One Productions, 2, Post Road, Lusk, County Dublin, Ireland; $32.00 for a four-issue airmail subscription, make checks payable to “Albedo One” or pay by PayPal at www.albedo1.com; Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, Small Beer Press, 150 Pleasant Street, #306, Easthampton, MA 01027, $20.00 for four issues; Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine, Web site www.andromedaspaceways.com for subscription information; Tales of the Talisman, Hadrosaur Productions, P.O. Box 2194, Mesilla Park, NM 88047-2194, $24.00 for a four-issue subscription; Jupiter, 19 Bedford Road, Yeovil, Somerset, BA21 5UG, UK, 10 Pounds Sterling for four issues; Shimmer, P.O. Box 58591, Salt Lake City, UT 84158-0591, $22.00 for a four-issue subscription; Weird Tales, Web site www.weirdtalesmagazine.com for subscription and ordering information.

The world of online-only electronic magazines has become increasingly important in the last few years, and in 2012 electronic magazines continued to pop up all over like popping-up things that suddenly pop up. How long some of them will last is yet to be seen.

Late in the year, in one of the more interesting developments of 2012, Jonathan Strahan announced that his critically acclaimed anthology series Eclipse was transforming itself from a print anthology to an online magazine, Eclipse Online (www.nightshadebooks.com/category/eclipse), which would release two stories every month throughout the year; three issues appeared in 2012, and the literary quality was very high, with excellent stories by Lavie Tidhar, Eleanor Arnason, Christopher Barzak, K.J. Parker, and others published.

Fireside (www.firesidemag.com), edited by Brian White, debuted in 2012, as did Michael Moorcock’s New Worlds (www.newworlds.co.uk), edited by Roger Gray, and International Speculative Fiction (http://internationalsf.wordpress.com), edited by Correio do Fantastico.

Promised for next year are Galaxy’s Edge, a bimonthly e-zine edited by Mike Resnick, Waylines, edited by David Rees-Thomas and Darryl Knickrehm, and a relaunch of Amazing Stories, edited by Steve Davidson.

Lightspeed (www.lightspeedmagazine.com), edited by John Joseph Adams, had a good year, featuring strong work by Vandana Singh, Linda Nagata, Keith Brooke, Marissa Lingen, Ken Liu, Sarah Monette, Sandra McDonald, and others. Late in the year a new electronic companion horror magazine, Nightmare, was added to the Lightspeed stable.

Clarkesworld Magazine (www.clarkesworldmagazine.com), edited by Sean Wallace and Neil Clarke, also had a strong year, featuring good stuff by Carrie Vaughn, Aliette de Bodard, Indrapramit Das, Theodora Goss, Yoon Ha Lee, Xia Jia, and others.

Subterranean (http://subterraneanpress.com), edited by William K. Schafer, was a bit weak overall this year, but did publish some first-class work, mostly at novella length, by Jay Lake, K. J. Parker, Maria Dahvana Headley, Nnedi Okorafor, Ian R. MacLeod, and others.

Tor.com (www.tor.com) had good work by Elizabeth Bear, Andy Duncan, Michael Swanwick, Brit Mandelo, Paul Cornell, Pat Murphy, and others. Ellen Datlow and Ann VanderMeer joined Patrick Nielsen Hayden and Liz Gorinsky on the editorial staff.

At this point, Strange Horizons (www.strangehorizons.com) is probably the oldest continually running online magazine on the Internet, started in 2000; they publish SF, fantasy, slipstream, horror, the occasional near-mainstream story, and the literary quality is usually high, although I’d like to see them publish more science fiction. This year, they had strong work by Molly Gloss, Louise Hughes, Ellen Klages, Benjamin Rosenbaum, Kate Bachus, Samantha Henderson, and others. Longtime editors Jed Hartman and Susan Marie Groppi have stepped down, to be replaced by Brit Mandelo, An Owomoyela, and Julia Rios.

Following in the footsteps of last year’s TRSF, an all-fiction magazine produced by the publishers of MIT Technology Review, in 2012 the publishers of New Scientist magazine created Arc, edited by Simon Ings and Sumit Paul-Choudhury, and described as “a new digital magazine about the future,” featuring both fiction and a range of eclectic nonfiction, and which exists mainly as various downloadable formats for the Kindle, the iPad, iPhones, Windows PC and Mac computers. Three issues of Arc appeared in 2012, featuring good work by Paul McAuley, Alastair Reynolds, Nancy Kress, Robert Reed, and others. A new issue of TRSF is promised for 2013 as well.

Former print semiprozine Electric Velocipede is now an electronic magazine (www.electricvelocipede.com), still edited by John Kilma. They published an excellent story by Aliette de Bodard this year, as well as good stuff by Ann Leckie, Ken Liu, Derek Zumsteg, and others.

Apex Magazine (www.apexbookcompany.com/apex-online) had good work by Kij Johnson, Mary Robinette Kowal, Ken Liu, Jay Lake, and others. The new editor is Lynne M. Thomas.

Abyss & Apex (www.abyssapexzine.com) ran interesting work by Colin P. Davies, Genevieve Valentine, Jay Caselberg, Arkady Martine, and others. The longtime editor there is Wendy S. Delmater, although Carmelo Rafala is “transitioning” in to take over that position.

An e-zine devoted to “literary adventure fantasy,” Beneath Ceaseless Skies (http://beneath-ceaseless-skies.com), edited by Scott H. Andrews, had a strong year, running nice stuff by Richard Parks, Chris Willrich, Cory Skerry, Karalynn Lee, Margaret Ronald, and others.

Long-running sword and sorcery print magazine Black Gate transitioned into an electronic magazine in September of 2012 and can be found at (www.blackgate.com), where they publish one new story per year, to date featuring stories by Judith Berman, Sean McLachlan, Aaron Bradford Starr, and others.

The Australian popular-science magazine Cosmos (www.cosmosmagazine.com) is not an SF magazine per se, but for the last few years it has been running a story per issue (and also putting new fiction not published in the print magazine up on their Web site), and interesting stuff by Michael Greehut, Richard A. Lovett, Margo Lanagan, Barbara Krasnoff, and others appeared there this year. The new fiction editor is SF writer Cat Sparks.

Ideomancer Speculative Fiction (www.ideomancer.com), edited by Leah Bobet, published interesting work, usually more slipstream than SF, by Rachel Derksen, Sara K. Ellis, Wendy N. Wagner, and others.

Orson Scott Card’s InterGalactic Medicine Show (www.intergalacticmedicineshow.com), edited by Edmund R. Schubert under the direction of Card himself, had another fairly weak year, although they still ran interesting stuff from the ubiquitous Ken Liu, Tony Pi, Eric James Stone, Nancy Fulda, and others.

New SF/fantasy e-zine Daily Science Fiction (http://dailysciencefiction.com) publishes one new SF or fantasy story every single day for the entire year. Many of these were not really up to professional standards, unsurprisingly, but there were some good stories here and there by Ken Liu, Lavie Tidhar, Ruth Nestvold, Sandra McDonald, Robert Reed, Eric Brown, and others.

Redstone Science Fiction (http://redstonesciencefiction.com), edited by a collective, hasn’t updated their site since June, and may well have gone out of business.

GigaNotoSaurus (http://giganotosaurus.org), edited by Ann Leckie, published one story a month by writers such as Ken Liu, Ian McHugh, Patricia Russo, Ben Bovis, and others.

The World SF Blog (http://worldsf.wordpress.com), edited by Lavie Tidhar, is a good place to find science fiction by international authors, and also publishes news, links, roundtable discussions, essays, and interviews related to “science fiction, fantasy, horror and comics from around the world.”

A similar site is International Speculative Fiction (http://internationalSF.word press.com), edited by Roberto Mendes.

Weird Fiction Review (http://weirdfictionreview.com), edited by Ann VanderMeer and Jeff VanderMeer, which occasionally publishes fiction, bills itself as “an ongoing exploration into all facets of the weird,” including reviews, interviews, short essays, and comics.

Below this point, it becomes harder to find center-core SF, or even genre fantasy/horror, and most of the stories are slipstream or literary surrealism. Sites that feature those, as well as the occasional fantasy (and, even more occasionally, some SF) include Rudy Rucker’s Flurb (www.flurb.net), Revolution SF (www.revolutionsf.com), Heliotrope (www.heliotropemag.com); and the somewhat less slipstreamish Bewildering Stories (www.bewilderingstories.com).

In addition to original work, there’s also a lot of good reprint SF and fantasy stories out there on the Internet. Fictionwise and Electric Story, the two major sites that made downloadable fiction available for a fee, seem to have died, perhaps from competition from the e-book market, but there are sites where you can access formerly published stories for free, including Strange Horizons, Tor.com, Lightspeed, Subterranean, Abyss & Apex, and most of the sites that are associated with existent print magazines, such as Asimov’s, Analog, and The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, make previously published fiction and nonfiction available for access on their sites as well, and also regularly run teaser excerpts from stories coming up in forthcoming issues. Hundreds of out-of-print titles, both genre and mainstream, are also available for free download from Project Gutenberg (http://promo.net/pc/), and a large selection of novels and a few collections can also be accessed for free, to be either downloaded or read on-screen, at the Baen Free Library (www.baen.com/library). Sites such as Infinity Plus (http://www.infinityplus.co.uk), and The Infinite Matrix (www.infinitematrix.net) may have died as active sites, but their extensive archives of previously published material are still accessible.

There are still plenty of other reasons for SF fans to go on the Internet, though, even if you’re not looking for fiction to read. There are many general genre-related sites of interest to be found, most of which publish reviews of books as well as of movies and TV shows, sometimes comics or computer games or anime, many of which also feature interviews, critical articles, and genre-oriented news of various kinds. The best such site is easily Locus Online (http://www.locusmag.com), the online version of the newsmagazine Locus, where you can access an incredible amount of information—including book reviews, critical lists, obituary lists, links to reviews and essays appearing outside the genre, and links to extensive database archives such as the Locus Index to Science Fiction and the Locus Index to Science Fiction Awards—it’s rare when I don’t find myself accessing Locus Online several times a day. The previously mentioned Tor.com, though, rivals Locus Online as one of the most eclectic genre-oriented sites on the Internet, a Web site that, in addition to its fiction, regularly publishes articles, comics, graphics, blog entries, print and media reviews, book “rereads” and episode-by-episode “rewatches” of television shows, as well as commentary on all the above. The long-running and eclectic The New York Review of Science Fiction has ceased print publication, but can be purchased in PDF, epub, and MOBI formats, and POD editions through Weightless Books (http://weightlessbooks.com; see also www.nyrsf.com for information). Other major general-interest sites include SF Site (www.sfsite.com), SFRevu (http://www.sfsite.com/sfrevu), SFCrowsnest (www.sfcrowsnest.com), SFScope (www.sfscope.com), io9 (http:io9.com), Green Man Review (http://greenmanreview.com), The Agony Column (http://trashotron.com/agony), SFFWorld (www.sffworld.com), SFReader (http://forums.sfreader.com), and Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist (www.fantasyhotlist.blogspot.com). A great research site, invaluable if you want bibliographic information about SF and fantasy writers, is Fantastic Fiction (www.fantasticfiction.co.uk). Another fantastic research site is the searchable online update of the Hugo-winning The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (www.sf-encyclopedia.com), where you can access almost four million words of information about SF writers, books, magazines, and genre themes. Reviews of short fiction as opposed to novels are very hard to find anywhere, with the exception of Locus and Locus Online, but you can find reviews of both current and past short fiction at Best SF (www.bestsf.net), as well as at pioneering short-fiction review site Tangent Online (www.tangentonline.com). Other sites of interest include: SFF NET (www.sff.net), which features dozens of home pages and “newsgroups” for SF writers; the Science Fiction Writers of America page (www.sfwa.org); where genre news, obituaries, award information, and recommended reading lists can be accessed; Ansible (http://news.ansible.co.uk/Ansible), the online version of multiple Hugo-winner David Langford’s long-running fanzine Ansible; Book View Café (www.bookviewcafe.com) is a “consortium of over twenty professional authors,” including Vonda N. McIntyre, Laura Ann Gilman, Sarah Zittel, Brenda Clough, and others, who have created a Web site where some of their work—mostly reprints, and some novel excerpts–is made available for free.

An ever-expanding area, growing in popularity, are a number of sites where podcasts and SF-oriented radio plays can be accessed: at Audible (www.audible.com), Escape Pod (http://escapepod.org, podcasting mostly SF), The Drabblecast (www.drabblecast.org), Star Ship Sofa (www.starshipsofa.com), Pseudopod (http://pseudopod.org, podcasting mostly fantasy), and PodCastle (http://podcastle.org, podcasting mostly fantasy). There’s also a site that podcasts nonfiction interviews and reviews, Dragon Page—C Cover to Cover (www.dragonpage.com).

It was a somewhat weak year for original anthologies, although there were still a few that were worth your money.

Without a doubt, the best SF original anthology of the year was Edge of Infinity (Solaris), edited by Jonathan Strahan. True, original SF anthologies were light on the ground this year, but Edge of Infinity would be a standout in any year. Unusually, in these days when it seems almost de rigueur for editors to sneak some slipstream or fantasy stories into even ostensibly “All SF” anthologies, everything here actually is pure-quill core SF, some of it hard SF at that, and the literary quality is uniformly excellent across the board. There’s nothing that’s bad here, again unlike most anthologies, which makes it difficult to pick favorites, but among the strongest stories are those by Pat Cadigan, Paul McAuley, Gwyneth Jones, Hannu Rajaniemi, and Bruce Sterling, although there’s also excellent work here by Elizabeth Bear, James S.A. Corey, Sandra McDonald and Stephen D. Covey, John Barnes, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Stephen Baxter, Alastair Reynolds, and An Owomoyela, any of which would have been among the standout stories in any other SF anthology of the year.

None of the other original SF anthologies of the year were in this league, but there was some interesting stuff.

An odd item was Solaris Rising 1.5: An Exclusive ebook of New Science Fiction, edited by Ian Whates, and available only in e-book form. An original SF anthology designed to act as a “bridge” between 2010’s Solaris Rising print anthology and 2013’s upcoming Solaris Rising 2 anthology, it features good fiction by Adam Roberts, Aliette de Bodard, Paul Cornell, Paul Di Filippo, and others. Armored (Baen), edited by John Joseph Adams, is an all-original anthology of military SF, stories about armored fighting suits, and wearable tanks, more or less, probably first popularized by Robert A. Heinlein in his novel Starship Troopers, seen subsequently in lots of SF, including movies such as Avatar, and currently hovering right on the edge of becoming an actuality; certainly it won’t be more than ten or fifteen years at most before we have them prowling the battlefields in the real world. The best stories here are by David Klecha and Tobias S. Buckell, Alastair Reynolds, Ian Douglas, Simon R. Green, Karin Lowachee, and Sean Williams, although there’s also solid work here by Carrie Vaughn, David D. Levine, Jack McDevitt, Genevieve Valentine, Michael A. Stackpole, Tanya Huff, David Sherman, and others.

Other good original SF anthologies included Going Interstellar (Baen), edited by Les Johnson and Jack McDevitt, which contained an excellent novella by Michael Bishop, as well as solid work by Jack McDevitt, Ben Bova, and others, in addition to nonfiction essays about possible designs for interstellar spaceships by Dr. Gregory Matloff, Dr. Richard Obousy, and Les Johnson himself. (Simon & Schuster), edited by John Joseph Adams, a tribute anthology in which modern writers get to play with Edgar Rice Burroughs’s Mars and its characters and generate Barsoom stories of their own. There is a noticeable split in approach to the material here. Some authors write straightforward John Carter adventures with lots of swordplay and mayhem, chases, captures, hairsbreadth cliff-hangers, and daring escapes, much as Burroughs himself might have (although all of the authors in the book are much better writers line by line than Burroughs ever was). The best stories in this mode are probably those by S. M. Stirling and Joe R. Lansdale. The best stories here are those that take the other approach, and add a dab of playful postmodernism to the mix, including stories by Peter S. Beagle, Garth Nix, Theodora Goss, Catharynne M. Valente, Tobias S. Buckell, and Genevieve Valentine.

There were two post-Apocalyptic anthologies, After: Nineteen Stories of Apocalypse and Dystopia (Hyperion Books), edited by Ellen Datlow and Terry Windling; and Epilogue (Fablecroft Publishing), edited by Tehani Wessely, and an anthology of dystopian YA stories, Diverse Energies (Tu Books), edited by Tobias S. Buckell and Joe Monti. There were two steampunk anthologies, The Mammoth Book of Steampunk (Running Press), edited by Sean Wallace, and Steampunk III: Steampunk Revolution (Tachyon), edited by Ann VanderMeer. There were two shared-world anthologies, Man-Kzin Wars XIII (Baen), edited by Larry Niven, and Grantville Gazette VI (Baen), edited by Eric Flint. Postscripts Anthology No. 26–27: Unfit for Eden (PS Publishing), edited by Nick Gevers and Peter Crowther, was one of two Postscripts editions this year, the other, Postscripts 28–29, being a special “Gothic Fiction” edition guest edited by Danel Olson. Postscripts 26–27 was a bit weak compared to some of the earlier volumes in this series, but still contained good work by Michael Swanwick, Jessica Reisman, Steven Utley, Michael Bishop, Eric Brown, Michael Bishop, and others.

This was a very good year for anthologies that afford a view of what’s happening in fantastic literature in other countries, outside the usual genre boundaries. Anthologies of this sort included The Future is Japanese (Haikasoru), edited by Nick Mamatas and Maumi Washington; Breaking the Bow: Speculative Fiction Inspired by the Ramayana, edited by Anil Menon and Vandana Singh; Afro SF: Science Fiction by African Writers (StoryTime Press), edited by Ivor W. Hartmann; Three Messages and a Warning: Contemporary Mexican Short Stories of the Fantastic (Small Beer Press), edited by Eduardo Jiménez Mayo and Chris N. Brown; Lauriat: A Filipino-Chinese Speculative Fiction Anthology (Lethe Press), edited by Charles Tan; Walking the Clouds: An Anthology of Indigenous Science Fiction (University of Arizona), edited by Grace L. Dillon; and The Apex Book of World SF 2 (Apex Publications), edited by Lavie Tidhar.

L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future Volume XXVIII (Galaxy Press), edited by the late K. D. Wentworth, is the most recent in a long-running series featuring novice work by beginning writers, some of whom may later turn out to be important talents. Wentworth died in 2012, and her replacement has yet to be named.

Noted without comment is Rip-Off! (Audible), an audio anthology of SF and fantasy stories edited by Gardner Dozois.

Jonathan Strahan, who had an excellent year in 2012, also edited the year’s best fantasy anthology, a YA anthology about witches, Under My Hat: Tales from the Cauldron (Random House Books for Young Readers), which means that Strahan has pulled off, in my own estimation, anyway, the difficult task of editing both the best fantasy anthology and the best science fiction anthology of 2012. Not surprisingly, since it’s aimed at a YA audience, Under My Hat is not as substantial and chewy as Strahan’s Edge of Infinity, but it has a very pleasing wit and lightness of tone about it (for the most part, there are a few darker stories) that ought to appeal to the adult fantasy-reading audience as well. The best stories here include work by Peter S. Beagle, Margo Lanagan, Ellen Klages, Garth Nix, Jane Yolen, and Holly Black, although there are also good stories here by Ellen Kushner, Delia Sherman, Jim Butcher, M. Rickert, Patricia A. McKillip, Isobelle Carmody, Tim Pratt, Tanith Lee, Charles De Lint, Frances Hardinge, and Diana Peterfreund, as well as a poem by Neil Gaiman. A (mostly) reprint anthology on the same subject was this year’s Witches: Wicked, Wild & Wonderful (Prime Books), edited by Paula Guran.

Other original fantasy anthologies were Magic, An Anthology of the Esoteric and Arcane, edited by Jonathan Oliver (Solaris); Elemental Magic: All-New Tales of the Elementary Masters (DAW), edited by Mercedes Lackey; and Hex Appeal (St. Martin’s Griffin), edited by P. N. Elrod. There was a tribute anthology to Ray Bradbury, Shadow Show: All-New Stories in Celebration of Ray Bradbury (William Morrow Paperbacks), edited by Sam Weller and Mort Castle; mostly fantasy with an admixture of horror, and a tribute anthology to Charles Dickens, Pandemonium: Stories of the Smoke (Jurrasic London), edited by Anne C. Perry and Jared Shurin; which had a similar fantasy/horror mix. Other books on the borderland between fantasy and horror included An Apple for the Creature (Ace), edited by Charlaine Harris and Toni L. P. Kelner; The Alchemy Press Book of Ancient Wonders (Alchemy Press), edited by Jan Edwards and Jenny Barber; The Alchemy Press Book of Pulp Heroes (Alchemy Press), edited by Mike Chinn; and Westward Weird (DAW), edited by Martin H. Greenberg and Kerrie Hughes; which also mixed in elements of the Western.

The most prominent original horror anthology this year seemed to be A Book of Horrors (St. Martin’s Griffin), edited by Stephen Jones, but there was also a big zombie anthology, 21st Century Dead: A Zombie Anthology (St. Martin’s Griffin), edited by Christopher Golden; Danse Macabre: Close Encounters with the Reaper (EDGE), edited by Nancy Kilpatrick; and Dark Currents (NewCon Press), edited by Ian Whates; and The Weird: A Compendium of Strange and Dark Stories, edited by Ann VanderMeer and Jeff VanderMeer.

Lavie Tidhar, Aliette de Bodard, Ken Liu, Elizabeth Bear, and (as usual) Robert Reed were all highly prolific this year, publishing good stories all over, in many different markets.

SF continued to appear in places well outside accepted genre boundaries, from the science magazines Cosmos and Nature to The New Yorker, which surprised everybody by releasing a “Special SF Issue” this year.

(Finding individual pricings for all of the items from small presses mentioned in the Summation has become too time intensive, and since several of the same small presses publish anthologies, novels, and short-story collections, it seems silly to repeat addresses for them in section after section. Therefore, I’m going to attempt to list here, in one place, all the addresses for small presses that have books mentioned here or there in the Summation, whether from the anthologies section, the novel section, or the short-story collection section, and, where known, their Web site addresses. That should make it easy enough for the reader to look up the individual price of any book mentioned that isn’t from a regular trade publisher; such books are less likely to be found in your average bookstore, or even in a chain superstore, and so will probably have to be mail-ordered. Many publishers seem to sell only online, through their Web sites, and some will only accept payment through PayPal. Many books, even from some of the smaller presses, are also available through Amazon.com. If you can’t find an address for a publisher, and it’s quite likely that I’ve missed some here, or failed to update them successfully, Google it. It shouldn’t be that difficult these days to find up-to-date contact information for almost any publisher, however small.)

Addresses are: PS Publishing, Grosvener House, 1 New Road, Hornsea, West Yorkshire, HU18 1PG, England, UK www.pspublishing.co.uk; Golden Gryphon Press, 3002 Perkins Road, Urbana, IL 61802, www.goldengryphon.com; NESFA Press, P.O. Box 809, Framingham, MA 01701-0809, www.nesfa.org; Subterranean Press, P.O. Box 190106, Burton, MI 48519, www.subterraneanpress.com; Old Earth Books, P.O. Box 19951, Baltimore, MD 21211-0951, www.oldearthbooks.com; Tachyon Press, 1459 18th St. #139, San Francisco, CA 94107, www.tachyonpublications.com; Night Shade Books, 1470 NW Saltzman Road, Portland, OR 97229, www.nightshadebooks.com; Five Star Books, 295 Kennedy Memorial Drive, Waterville, ME 04901, www.galegroup.com/fivestar; NewCon Press, via www.newconpress.com; Small Beer Press, 176 Prospect Ave., Northampton, MA 01060, www.smallbeerpress.com; Locus Press, P.O. Box 13305, Oakland, CA 94661; Crescent Books, Mercat Press Ltd., 10 Coates Crescent, Edinburgh, Scotland EH3 7AL, UK, www.crescentfiction.com; Wildside Press/Borgo Press, P.O. Box 301, Holicong, PA 18928-0301, or go to www.wildsidepress.com for pricing and ordering; Edge Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing, Inc. and Tesseract Books, Ltd., P.O. Box 1714, Calgary, Alberta, T2P 2L7, Canada, www.edgewebsite.com; Aqueduct Press, P.O. Box 95787, Seattle, WA 98145-2787, www.aqueductpress.com; Phobos Books, 200 Park Avenue South, New York, NY 10003, www.phobosweb.com; Fairwood Press, 5203 Quincy Ave. SE, Auburn, WA 98092, www.fairwoodpress.com; BenBella Books, 6440 N. Central Expressway, Suite 508, Dallas, TX 75206, www.benbellabooks.com; Darkside Press, 13320 27thAve. NE, Seattle, WA 98125, www.darksidepress.com; Haffner Press, 5005 Crooks Rd., Suite 35, Royal Oak, MI 48073-1239, www.haffnerpress.com; North Atlantic Press, P.O. Box 12327, Berkeley, CA, 94701; Prime Books, P.O. Box 36503, Canton, OH, 44735, www.primebooks.net; Fairwood Press, 5203 Quincy Ave. SE, Auburn, WA 98092, www.fairwoodpress.com; MonkeyBrain Books, 11204 Crossland Drive, Austin, TX 78726, www.monkeybrainbooks.com; Wesleyan University Press, University Press of New England, Order Dept., 37 Lafayette St., Lebanon NH 03766-1405, www.wesleyan.edu/wespress; Agog! Press, P.O. Box U302, University of Wollongong, NSW 2522, Australia, www.uow.ed.au/~rhood/agogpress; Wheatland Press, via www.wheatlandpress.com; MirrorDanse Books, P.O. Box 3542, Parramatta NSW 2124, Australia, www.tabula-rasa.info/MirrorDanse; Arsenal Pulp Press, 103-1014 Homer Street, Vancouver, BC, Canada V6B 2W9, www.arsenalpress.com; DreamHaven Books, 912 W. Lake Street, Minneapolis, MN 55408; Elder Signs Press/Dimensions Books, order through www.dimensionsbooks.com; Chaosium, via www.chaosium.com; Spyre Books, P.O. Box 3005, Radford, VA 24143; SCIFI, Inc., P.O. Box 8442, Van Nuys, CA 91409-8442; Omnidawn Publishing, order through www.omnidawn.com; CSFG, Canberra Speculative Fiction Guild, www.csfg.org.au/publishing/anthologies/the_outcast; Hadley Rille Books, via www.hadleyrillebooks.com; Suddenly Press, via suddenlypress@yahoo.com; Sandstone Press, P.O. Box 5725, One High St., Dingwall, Ross-shire, IV15 9WJ; Tropism Press, via www.tropismpress.com; SF Poetry Association/Dark Regions Press, www.sfpoetry.com, send checks to Deborah Flores, SFPA Treasurer, P.O. Box 4846, Covina, CA 91723; DH Press, via diamondbookdistributors.com; Kurodahan Press, via www.kurodahan.com; Ramble House, 443 Gladstone Blvd., Shreveport LA 71104; Interstitial Arts Foundation, via www.interstitialarts.org; Raw Dog Screaming, via www.rawdogscreaming.com; Three Legged Fox Books, 98 Hythe Road, Brighton, BN1 6JS, UK; Norilana Books, via www.norilana.com; coeur de lion, via http://coeurdelion.com.au; PARSECink, via www.parsecink.org; Robert J. Sawyer Books, via www.sfwriter.com/rjsbooks.htm; Rackstraw Press, via http://rackstrawpress; Candlewick, via www.candlewick.com; Zubaan, via www.zubaanbooks.com; Utter Tower, via www.threeleggedfox.co.uk; Spilt Milk Press, via www.electricvelocipede.com; Paper Golem, via www.papergolem.com; Galaxy Press, via www.galaxypress.com.; Twelfth Planet Press, via www.twelfhplanetpress.com; Five Senses Press, via www.sensefive.com; Elastic Press, via www.elasticpress.com; Lethe Press, via www.lethepressbooks.com; Two Cranes Press, via www.twocranespress.com; Wordcraft of Oregon, via www.wordcraftoforegon.com; Down East, via www.downeast.com; ISFiC Press, 456 Douglas Ave., Elgin, IL 60120 or www.isficpress.com.

According to the newsmagazine Locus, there were 2,951 books “of interest to the SF field” published in 2012, down 4 percent from 3,071 titles in 2011, the first year of decline after five years of record numbers. Overall, new titles were down 5 percent to 2,030 from 2011’s 2,140, while reprints dropped 3 percent to 921 from 2011’s 931, cumulatively down 4 percent to 2,951 from 2011’s 3071. Hardcover sales were actually up, from 867 to 875, while the number of trade paperbacks sold saw only a slight decline, from 1,355 to 1,343; the big drop was in mass-market paperbacks, which dipped 14 percent from 849 to 733, probably because of competition with e-books, which seem to be cutting into mass-market sales more than any other category. The number of new SF novels was up 4 percent to 318 titles as opposed to 2011’s 305. The number of new fantasy novels was up by 2 percent, to 670 titles as opposed to 2011’s total of 660. Horror novels were down 10 percent, after a 9 percent drop in 2010, to 207 titles as opposed to 2011’s 229 titles. Paranormal romances were down to 314 titles as opposed to 2011’s 416 titles (although sometimes it’s almost a subjective call whether a particular novel should be pigeonholed as paranormal romance, fantasy, or horror).

Young adult novels continued to boom in SF, while declining in fantasy. YA fantasy novels made up 33 percent of the overall fantasy novel total, down from 35 percent in 2011, while YA SF novels rose from 24 percent of the overall SF novel total in 2011 to 28 percent in 2012. Most of this increase was in dystopian and post-apocalyptic YA SF novels, perhaps driven by the success of The Hunger Games novels and films.

(It’s worth noting that these totals don’t count e-books, media tie-in novels, gaming novels, novelizations of genre movies, or print-on-demand books—all of which would swell the overall total by hundreds if counted.)

As usual, busy with all the reading I have to do at shorter lengths, I didn’t have time to read many novels myself this year, so I’ll limit myself to mentioning that novels that received a lot of attention and acclaim in 2012 include:

Blue Remembered Earth (Ace Hardcover), by Alastair Reynolds; 2312 (Orbit), by Kim Stanley Robinson; Intruder (DAW), by C. J. Cherryh: The Fractal Prince (Tor), by Hannu Rajaniemi; The Hydrogen Sonata (Orbit), by Iain M. Banks; Red Country (Orbit), by Joe Abercrombie; Range of Ghosts (Tor), by Elizabeth Bear; In the Mouth of the Whale (Gollancz), by Paul McAuley; Redshirts (Tor), by John Scalzi; The Drowned Cities (Little, Brown), by Paolo Bacigalupi; Be My Enemy (Pyr), by Ian McDonald; Dodger (Harper), by Terry Pratchett; Existence (Tor), by David Brin; The Long Earth (Harper), by Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter; The Great Game (Angry Robot), by Lavie Tidhar; Apollo’s Outcasts (Pyr), by Allen Steele; The Apocalypse Codex (Ace), by Charles Stross; Some Kind of Fairy Tale (Doubleday), by Graham Joyce; Harmony (Solaris), by Keith Brooke; The Inexplicables (Tor), by Cherie Priest; Kitty Steals the Show (Tor), by Carrie Vaughn; The Rapture of the Nerds (Tor), Cory Doctorow and Charles Stross; Empty Space (Gollancz), by M. John Harrison; Bowl of Heaven (Tor), by Larry Niven and Gregory Benford; Captain Vorpatril’s Alliance (Baen), Lois McMaster Bujold; Shadows in Flight (Tor), by Orson Scott Card; Slow Apocalypse (Ace), by John Varley; Caliban’s War (Orbit), by James S.A. Corey; Sharps (Orbit), by K. J. Parker; City of Dragons (Harper Voyager), by Robin Hobb; Great North Road (Del Rey), by Peter F. Hamilton; The Fourth Wall (Orbit), by Walter Jon Williams; Ashes of Candesce (Tor), by Karl Schroeder; Whispers Under Ground (Del Rey), by Ben Aaronovitch; Queen’s Hunt (Tor), by Beth Bernobich; The King’s Blood (Orbit), by Daniel Abraham; Triggers (Ace), by Robert J. Sawyer; Forge of Darkness (Tor), by Steven Erikson; Sea Hearts (Allen & Unwin), by Margo Lanagan; Railsea (Del Rey), by China Mieville; Crucible of Gold (Del Rey), by Naomi Novik; Hide Me Among the Graves (William Morrow), by Tim Powers; The Coldest War (Tor), by Ian Tregillis; and Boneland (Fourth Estate), by Alan Garner.

For at least fifteen years now, I’ve been hearing the complaint that all the SF books have been driven off the bookstore shelves by fantasy books, but there’s still plenty of it around. On the list above, although there’s a number of fantasy titles, there are quite a few undeniably core SF titles there as well: the Robinson, the Reynolds, the McAuley, the Steele, the McDonald, the Bacigalupi, the Schroeder, the Corey, the Cherryh, the Banks, the Hamilton, and many others. Many more could be cited from the lists of small-press novels and first novels. Yes, fantasy is popular, but science fiction has not vanished yet—there’s still more good core SF out there than any one person could possibly have time to read in the course of a year.

Small presses are active in the novel market these days, where once they published mostly collections and anthologies. Novels issued by small presses this year included: The Eternal Flame: Orthogonal Book Two (Night Shade Books Books), by Greg Egan; Time and Robbery (Aqueduct Press), by Rebecca Ore; Zeuglodon (Subterranean Press), by James P. Blaylock; Black Opera (Night Shade Books), by Mary Gentle; Ison of the Isles (ChiZine), Carolyn Ives Gilman; Worldsoul (Prime Books), by Liz Williams; Everything Is Broken (Prime Books), by John Shirley; Swallowing a Donkey’s Eye (ChiZine), by Paul Tremblay; The Architect (PS Publishing), by Brendan Connell; Against the Light (47North), Dave Duncan; Hitchers (Night Shade Books), Will McIntosh; Bullettime (ChiZine), Nick Mamatas; The Croning (Night Shade Books), Laird Barron; and Crandolin (Chomu Press), by Anna Tambour.

The year’s first novels included: The Games (Del Rey), Ted Kosmatka; Throne of the Crescent Moon (DAW), by Saladin Ahmed; Grim (Scholastic), by Anna Waggener; Above (Arthur A. Levine Books), by Leah Bobet; Enchanted (Harcourt), by Alethea Kontis; Alif the Unseen (Grove Press), by G. Willow Wilson; Hidden Things (Harper Voyager), by Doyce Testerman; A Once Crowded Sky (Touchstone), by Tom King; The Minority Council (Orbit), by Kate Griffin; So Close to You (Harper Teen), by Rachel Carter; Blackwood (Strange Chemistry), by Gwenda Bond; Glitch (St. Martin’s Griffin), by Heather Anastasiu; Albert of Adelaide (Twelve), by Howard L. Anderson; Something Strange and Deadly (HarperTeen), by Susan Dennard; Three Parts Dead (Tor), by Max Gladstone; Through to You (Balzer + Bray), by Emily Hainsowrth; Seraphina (Random House), by Rachel Hartman; Shadows Cast by Stars (Atheneum), by Catherine Knutsson; Blood and Feathers (Solaris), by Lou Morgan; Fair Coin (Pyr), by E. C. Myers; Year Zero (Del Rey), by Rob Reid; The Man from Primrose Lane (Sarah Crichton), by James Renner; Something Red (Atria), by Douglas Nicholas; Strange Flesh (Simon & Schuster), by Michael Olson; Starters (Delacorte), by Lissa Price; and Living Proof (Tor), by Kira Peikoff. None of these novels generated an unusual amount of buzz; the most frequently reviewed were probably The Games and Throne of the Crescent Moon.

The strongest novella chapbooks of the year included On a Red Station, Drifting (Immersion Press), by Aliette de Bodard; Gods of Risk (Orbit), by James S. A. Corey; The Boolean Gate (Subterranean Press), by Walter Jon Williams; The Yellow Cabochon (PS Publishing), by Matthew Hughes; After the Fall, Before the Fall, During the Fall (Tachyon), by Nancy Kress; Mare Ultima (PS Publishing), by Alex Irvine; Starship Winter (PS Publishing), by Eric Brown; An Account of a Voyage from World to World (Jurassic), by Adam Roberts; Indomitable (Subterranean Press), by Terry Brooks; Face in the Crowd (Simon & Schuster), by Stephen King and Steward O’Nan; When the Blue Shift Comes (Phoenix Pick), by Robert Silverberg and Alvaro Zinos-Amaro; The Thorn and the Blossom (Quirk Books), by Theodora Goss; From Whence You Came (d.y.m.k. Productions), by Laura Ann Gilman; The Pit of Despair (PS Publishing), by Simon R. Green, and ad eternum (Subterranean Press) and Book of Iron (Subterranean Press), both by Elizabeth Bear.

As you can see, this category is largely dominated by Subterranean Press and PS Publishing.

Novel omnibuses this year included: American Science Fiction: Nine Classic Novels of the 1950s (Library of America), edited by Gary K. Wolfe; Ride the Star Winds (Baen), by A. Bertram Chandler; Thunder in the Void (Haffner), by Henry Kuttner, edited by Stephen Haffner; The Chalice of Death (Paizo/Planet Stories), by Robert Silverberg; The Planet Killers (Paizo/Planet Stories), by Robert Silverberg; A Song Called Youth (Prime Books), by John Shirley; The Ghost Pirates and Others: The Best of William Hope Hodgson (Night Shade Books), by William Hope Hodgson, edited by Jeremy Lasson (contains short stories as well); Earthblood and Other Stories (Baen), by Keith Laumer and Rosel George Brown (contains short stories as well); and Ice and Shadow (Baen), by Andre Norton. Novel omnibuses are also frequently made available through the Science Fiction Book Club.

Not even counting print-on-demand books and the availability of out-of-print books as e-books or as electronic downloads from Internet sources, a lot of long out-of-print stuff has come back into print in the last couple of years in commercial trade editions. Here are some out-of-print titles that came back into print this year, although producing a definitive list of reissued novels is probably impossible. Tor reissued: Mother of Storms, by John Barnes; Earthseed, by Pamela Sargent; After the King: Stories in Honor of J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Martin H. Greenberg; Foundation’s Friends, edited by Martin H. Greenberg; The Eye of the World, The Fires of Heaven, The Great Hunt, and Lord of Chaos, all by Robert Jordan. Orb reissued Peace, by Gene Wolfe; Downward to the Earth, by Robert Silverberg; and The Long Price: The Price of War, by Daniel Abraham. Baen reissued When the People Fell, by Cordwainer Smith; Voyage Across the Stars, by David Drake; Strangers, by Gardner Dozois; Nightmare Blue, by Gardner Dozois and George Alec Effinger; The Forerunner Factor, by Andre Norton; and An Assignment in Eternity, Sixth Column, and The Star Beast, all by Robert A. Heinlein. Subterranean Press reissued Dying of the Light, by George R. R. Martin; Phases of Gravity, by Dan Simmons; and Stranger Things Happen, by Kelly Link. Ace reissued Illegal Alien, by Robert J. Sawyer. Bantam reissued Windhaven, by George R.R. Martin and Lisa Tuttle. William Morrow reissued Stardust: The Gift Edition—Deluxe Signed Limited, by Neil Gaiman. Ballantine/Del Rey reissued: The Annotated Sword of Shannara: 35th Anniversary Edition. Houghton Mifflin reissued The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien; A Wizard of Earthsea, by Ursula K. Le Guin; and Counter-Clock World; Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said; Gather Yourself Together; and Solar Lottery, all by Philip K. Dick. Harcourt/Mariner reissued The Man in the High Castle and Time Out of Joint, by Philip K. Dick. The Library of America reissued A Princess of Mars and Tarzan of the Apes, by Edgar Rice Burroughs. Fairwood Press reissued Brittle Innings, by Michael Bishop. Roc reissued Majipoor Chronicles, by Robert Silverberg. Arc Manor reissued The Masks of Time and Thebes of the Hundred Gates, by Robert Silverberg. Chicago Review Press reissued Roadside Picnic, by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky. PM Press reissued Byzantium Endures and The Laughter of Cathage, by Michael Moorcock. Farrar, Straus and Giroux reissued A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L’Engle. Grand Central reissued The New Moon’s Arms, by Nalo Hopkinson. Scribner reissued Black House, by Stephen King and Peter Straub. Wesleyan University Press reissued Starboard Wine: More Notes on the Language of Science Fiction, by Samuel R. Delany. Open Road reissued Alien Sex, edited by Ellen Datlow. Underland Press reissued Glimmering, by Elizabeth Hand. HiLoBooks reissued When the World Shook, by H. Rider Haggard.

Many authors are now reissuing their old back titles as e-books, either through a publisher or all by themselves, so many that it’s impossible to keep track of them all here. Before you conclude that something from an author’s backlist is unavailable, though, check with the Kindle and Nook stores, and with other online vendors.

2012 was a strong year for short-story collections. The year’s best collections included: The Best of Kage Baker (Subterranean Press), by Kage Baker; Other Seasons: The Best of Neal Barrett, Jr. (Subterranean Press), by Neal Barrett, Jr.; Shoggoths in Bloom (Prime Books), by Elizabeth Bear; The Pottawatomie Giant and Other Stories (PS Publishing), by Andy Duncan; At the Mouth of the River of Bees (Small Beer Press), by Kij Johnson; Eater-of-Bone and Other Novellas (PS Publishing), by Robert Reed; The 400-Million-Year Itch (Ticonderoga), by Steven Utley; Win Some, Lose Some: The Hugo Award Winning (And Nominated) Short Fiction of Mike Resnick (ISFIC Press) by Mike Resnick; Fountain of Age: Stories (Small Beer Press), by Nancy Kress; A Stark and Wormy Knight (Subterranean Press), by Tad Williams; and The Dragon Griaule (Subterranean Press), by Lucius Shepard. Also good were: Captive Dreams (Arc Manor), by Michael F. Flynn; Neil Gwyne’s On Land and At Sea (Subterranean Press), by Kage Baker and Kathleen Bartholomew; First and Last Contacts (NewCon), by Stephen Baxter; Flying in the Heart of the Lafayette Escadrille and Other Stories (Fairwood Press), by James Van Pelt; Angels and You Dogs (PS Publishing), by Kathleen Ann Goonan; Errantry (Small Beer Press) by Elizabeth Hand; Crackpot Palace (Morrow), by Jeffery Ford; Birds and Birthdays (Aqueduct Press), by Christopher Barzak; Jagannath (Cheeky Frawg Books), by Karin Tidbeck; Near + Far (Hydra House Books), by Cat Rambo; Master of the Galaxy (PS Publishing), by Mike Resnick; Resnick’s Menagerie (Silverberry), by Mike Resnick; Moscow But Dreaming (Prime Books), by Ekaterina Sedia; Cracklespace (Twelfth Planet), by Margo Lanagan; Confessions of a Five-Chambered Heart (Subterranean Press), by Catlin R. Kiernan; You Will Meet a Stranger Far from Home (Lethe Press), by Alex Jeffers; Trapped in the Saturday Matinee (PS Publishing), by Joe R. Lansdale; Report from Planet Midnight (PM Press), by Nalo Hopkinson; The Janus Tree and Other Stories (Subterranean Press), by Glen Hirshberg; and Earth and Air: Tales of Elemental Creatures (Big Mouth House), by Peter Dickinson.

Career-spanning retrospective collections this year included: The Unreal and the Real: Selected Stories Volume One: Where on Earth (Small Beer Press), by Ursula K. Le Guin; The Unreal and the Real: Selected Stories Volume Two: Outer Space, Inner Lands (Small Beer Press), by Ursula K. Le Guin; Dream Castles: The Early Jack Vance, Volume Two (Subterranean Press), by Jack Vance, edited by Terry Dowling and Jonathan Strahan; The Collected Kessel (Baen), by John Kessel; The Collected Stories of Robert Silverberg, Volume 7: We Are For the Dark (Subterranean Press), by Robert Silverberg; The Best of Robert Silverberg: Stories of Six Decades (Subterranean Press), by Robert Silverberg; The Door Gunner and Other Perilous Flights of Fancy: A Michael Bishop Retrospective (Subterranean Press), by Michael Bishop, edited by Michael H. Hutchins; A Blink of the Screen: Collected Short Fiction (Doubleday UK), by Terry Pratchett; The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick Volume Three Upon the Dull Earth (1953–1954) (Subterranean Press), by Philip K. Dick; Kurt Vonnegut: Novels and Stories 1950–1962 (Library of America), by Kurt Vonnegut, edited by Sidney Offit; Sex and Violence in Zero-G: The Complete “Near Space” Stories: Expanded Edition (Fantastic Books), by Allen Steele; Store of the Worlds: The Stories of Robert Sheckley (New York Review Books Classics), by Robert Sheckley; A Song Called Youth (Prime Books), by John Shirley; Wonders of the Invisible World (Tachyon), by Patricia A. McKillip; Where the Summer Ends: The Best Horror Stories of Karl Edward Wagner, Volume 1 (Centipede), by Karl Edward Wagner, edited by Stephen Jones; The Ghost Pirates and Others: The Best of William Hope Hodgson (Night Shade Books—also contains a novel), by William Hope Hodgson, edited by Jeremy Lasson; and A Niche in Time and Other Stories: The Best of William F. Temple, Volume 1 (Ramble House), by William F. Temple.

As has been true for at least a decade now, small presses again dominated the list of short-story collections, with only a few trade collections being published. Subterranean Press was particularly active in this area this year.

A wide variety of “electronic collections,” often called “fiction bundles,” too many to individually list here, are also available for downloading online, at many sites. The Science Fiction Book Club continues to issue new collections as well.

The most reliable buys in the reprint anthology market, as usual, are the various Best of the Year anthologies. At the moment, science fiction is being covered by three anthologies (actually, technically, by two anthologies and by two separate half anthologies): the one you are reading at the moment, The Year’s Best Science Fiction series from St. Martin’s, edited by Gardner Dozois, now up to its thirtieth annual Collection; the Year’s Best SF series (Harper Voyager), edited by David G. Hartwell and Kathryn Cramer, now up to its seventeenth annual volume; by the science fiction half of The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of the Year: Volume Six (Night Shade Books), edited by Jonathan Strahan; and by the science fiction half of The Year’s Best Science Fiction and Fantasy: 2012 Edition (Prime Books), edited by Rich Horton (in practice, of course, these books probably won’t divide neatly in half with their coverage, and there’s likely to be more of one thing than another). The annual Nebula Awards anthology, which covers science fiction as well as fantasy of various sorts, functions as a de facto Best of the Year anthology, although it’s not usually counted among them; this year’s edition was Nebula Awards Showcase 2012 (Pyr), edited by James Patrick Kelly and John Kessel. (A similar series covering the Hugo winners began in 2010, but swiftly died.) There were three Best of the Year anthologies covering horror: The Best Horror of the Year: Volume Four (Night Shade Books), edited by Ellen Datlow, and The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror: 23 (Running Press), edited by Stephen Jones; and The Year’s Best Dark Fantasy and Horror: 2012 Edition (Prime Books), edited by Paula Guran. Fantasy, which used to have several series devoted to it, is now, with the apparent death of David G. Hartwell and Kathryn Cramer’s Year’s Best Fantasy series, covered by the fantasy halves of the Strahan and Horton anthologies, plus whatever stories fall under the Dark Fantasy part of Guran’s anthology. There was also The 2012 Rhysling Anthology (Hadrosaur Productions), edited by Lyn C. A. Gardner, which compiles the Rhysling Award-winning SF poetry of the year.

It was a somewhat weak year for large stand-alone reprint anthologies this year, especially in SF, although there were a fair number of good reprint theme anthologies.

Robots: The Recent A.I. (Prime Books), edited by Rich Horton and Sean Wallace, is a strong mixed reprint (mostly) and original anthology of, just as it says, recent stories about robots and A.I. (Artificial Intelligence, for those of you who haven’t read any science fiction since the ’50s). The one original story is a fine one, Lavie Tidhar’s “Under the Eaves,” included in this anthology, but the reprint stories are also strong, including stories by Catherynne M. Valente, Elizabeth Bear, Cory Doctorow, Ian McDonald, Rachel Swirsky, Benjamin Rosenbaum, Aliette de Bodard, Mary Robinette Kowal, James L. Cambias, Robert Reed, Tobias S. Buckell, Ken Liu, and others, all of which makes this one of the strongest reprint SF anthologies of the year.

Another good mixed reprint (mostly) and original SF anthology, by the same editorial team, is War and Space: Recent Combat (Prime Books), edited by Rich Horton and Sean Wallace, an anthology of recent Military SF, although their definition of Military SF seems a bit broader than it sometimes is. As with Robots: The Recent A.I., there is one good original story here, Sandra McDonald’s “Mehra and Jiun,” as well as strong reprints by Ken MacLeod, David Moles, Charles Coleman Finlay, Yoon Ha Lee, Paul McAuley, Tom Purdom, Nancy Kress, Alastair Reynolds, Robert Reed, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Geoffrey A. Landis, Cat Rambo, and others. Another good value for the money.

Rock On: The Greatest Hits of Science Fiction & Fantasy (Prime Books), edited by Paula Guran, is another mixed reprint (mostly) and original anthology featuring both SF and fantasy. Some of the best stories here are by Howard Waldrop, Michael Swanwick, Pat Cadigan, Norman Spinrad, Edward Bryant, Lewis Shiner, Lucius Shepard, Bruce Sterling, Alastair Reynolds, Elizabeth Bear, Bradley Denton, Elizabeth Hand, Marc Laidlaw, Caitlin R. Kiernan, John Shirley, and others, including original stories by Del James and Lawrence C. Connolly.

A good reprint anthology of parallel or alternate world stories is Other Worlds Than These (Night Shade Books), edited by John Joseph Adams, which featured good work by Ian McDonald, Alastair Reynolds, Kelly Link, Michael Swanwick, Yoon Ha Lee, Pat Cadigan, George R. R. Martin, Vandana Singh, Paul McAuley, Stephen Baxter, and others.

The Posthuman/Singularity story was never quite cohesive enough to function as a subgenre all its own, but there were lots of them throughout the ’90s and the oughts, including some of the best work of those periods, and the form is still very much an important part of the current SF scene today. Digital Rapture: The Singularity Anthology (Tachyon), edited by James Patrick Kelly and John Kessel, a reprint anthology, does a good job of providing a historical overview of the Posthuman/Singularity form, taking us from an excerpt from Olaf Stapledon’s Odd John in 1935, through perhaps the first modern posthuman story, Frederik Pohl’s “Day Million,” in 1966, through the cyberpunk days of the ’80s, represented here by Bruce Sterling, and on through the rich harvest of such stories from the ’90s and oughts to the present. The best stories here, other than those already mentioned, are probably the ones by Charles Stross, Greg Egan, Cory Doctorow and Benjamin Rosenblum, Robert Reed, Justina Robson, and Hannu Rajaniemi. The anthology also contains a reprint of Vernor Vinge’s seminal essay, “The Coming Technological Singularity: How to Survive in the Post-Human Era,” an immensely influential bit of speculation that set many of the concerns and shaped much of the content of this kind of story, and which popularized the term “Singularity” itself; there are also speculative essays by Ray Kurzweil and J. D. Bernal, and other stories by Isaac Asimov, Rudy Rucker and Eileen Gunn, Elizabeth Bear, David D. Levine, and Vinge himself.

Retro SF is represented by Tales from Super-Science Fiction (Haffner), edited by Robert Silverberg, which features pulp stories from Jack Vance, Daniel F. Galouye, James Gunn, and Silverberg himself.

Substantial reprint fantasy anthologies included The Sword & Sorcery Anthology (Tachyon), edited by David Hartwell and Jacob Wiseman, and Epic (Tachyon), edited by John Joseph Adams. For those not familiar with Sword & Sorcery, The Sword & Sorcery Anthology is a good place to start, providing a historical overview of the Sword & Sorcery subgenre, from its beginnings in the Weird Tales of the 1930s up to the present day, with original stories by Michael Swanwick and Michael Shea. Unsurprisingly, the best stories here are classics by Robert E. Howard, C. L. Moore, Fritz Leiber, Poul Anderson, Michael Moorcock, and Joanna Russ, but there’s also good stuff by Glen Cook, Rachel Pollack, George R. R. Martin, and others. Epic: Legends of Fantasy, is another meaty, solid anthology, this one all reprint, that will be valuable to beginning fantasy readers as a sampler of various fantasy styles; the best story here, and in fact one of the best fantasy novellas of the decade, is probably George R. R. Martin’s “The Mystery Knight,” an enormous novella set in the same general milieu as his bestselling A Song of Ice and Fire novels, but there are also strong stories by Robin Hobb, Patrick Rothfuss, Ursula K. Le Guin, Tad Williams, Orson Scott Card, Paolo Bacigalupi, Carrie Vaughn, Brandon Sanderson, Trudi Canavan, Aliette de Bodard, Kate Elliott, N. K. Jemisin, Juliet Marillier, and others.

Other reprint (mostly) fantasy anthologies included two books of Christmas stories, Season of Wonder (Prime Books), edited by Paula Guran, and A Cosmic Christmas (Baen), edited by Hank Davis; Witches: Wicked, Wild & Wonderful (Prime Books), edited by Paula Guran; and Circus: Fantasy Under the Big Top (Prime Books), edited by Ekaterina Sedia.

There were a lot of reprint horror anthologies, some of which included a few original stories, and occasionally an admixture of fantasy in varying strengths: The Book of Cthulhu II (Night Shade Books), edited by Ross E. Lockhart; Ghosts: Recent Hauntings (Prime Books), edited by Paula Guran; The Mammoth Book of Ghost Stories by Women (Running Press), edited by Marie O’Regan; Extreme Zombies (Prime Books), edited by Paula Guran; Obsession: Tales of Irresistible Desire (Prime Books), edited by Paula Guran; and Bloody Fabulous (Prime Books), edited by Ekaterina Sedia.

Anthologies of gay SF and fantasy and/or erotica included Heiresses of Russ 2012: The Year’s Best Lesbian Speculative Fiction (Lethe Press), edited by Connie Wilkins and Steve Berman; Fantastic Erotica: The Best of Circlet Press 2008–2012 (Circlet), edited by Cecilia Tan and Bethay Zaiatz; Beyond Binary: Genderqueer and Sexually Fluid Fiction (Lethe Press), edited by Brit Mandelo; and Wilde Stories 2012: The Year’s Best Gay Speculative Fiction (Lethe Press), edited by Steve Berman.

It was a somewhat weak year in the genre-oriented nonfiction category, mostly notable for books of essays by genre authors, including An Exile on Planet Earth: Articles and Reflections (Bodleian Library, University of Oxford), by Brian W. Aldiss; Distrust That Particular Flavor (Berkley), by William Gibson; London Peculiar and Other Nonfiction (PM Press), by Michael Moorcock, edited by Michael Moorcock and Allan Kausch; Some Remarks (William Morrow), by Neal Stephenson; Reflections: On the Magic of Writing (Greenwillow Books), by Diana Wynne Jones; and two books of essays and film reviews by Gary Westfahl, The Spacesuit Film: A History (McFarland) and A Sense-of-Wonderful Century (Borgo Press).

There were several critical studies of various genres, including Science Fiction: The 101 Best Novels (NonStop Press), by Damien Broderick and Paul Di Filippo; Strange Divisions and Alien Territories: The Sub-Genres of Science Fiction (Palgrave Macmillan), edited by Keith Brooke; Unutterable Horror: A History of Supernatural Fiction [Volume II] (Twentieth and Twenty-first Centuries) (PS Publishing), by S. T. Joshi; The Cambridge Companion to Fantasy Literature (Cambridge University Press), edited by Edward James and Farah Mendlesohn; As If: Modern Enchantment and the Literary Prehistory of Virtual Reality (Oxford University Press), by Michael Saler; and Utopian Moments: Reading Utopian Texts (Bloomsbury), by Miguel A. Ramiro Avilés and J. C. Davis. There were several studies of the work of individual authors, including a study of the work of Gene Wolfe, Gate of Horn, Book of Silk: A Guide to Gene Wolfe’s The Book of the Long Sun and The Book of the Short Sun (Sirus Fiction), by Michael Andre-Driussi; Judith Merril: A Critical Study (McFarland), by Diane Newell and Victoria Lamont; Turtle Recall: The Discworld Companion … So Far, by Terry Pratchett and Stephen Briggs; Scanned Clean: An Analysis of the Work of Michael Marshall Smith (PS Publishing), by David Sweeney; and The Manual of Aeronautics: An Illustrated Guide to the Leviathan Series (Simon Pulse), by Scott Westerfield.

All Yesterdays: Unique and Speculative Views of Dinosaurs and Other Prehistoric Animals (lulu.com), by John Conway, is not technically genre oriented, but since I’ve never meet an SF fan who wasn’t interested in dinosaurs, I’m including it anyway. If you haven’t read anything about dinosaurs for the last decade or so, this book will be an eye-opener—these definitely aren’t your father’s dinosaurs, or even the dinosaurs you used to know as a kid when you marched a plastic T. rex across the living room rug while making growling sounds; for one thing, most of them have feathers! Another book that will interest most genre readers (and which makes for a nice segue into our next section) is Dinosaur Art: The World’s Greatest Paleoart (Titan Books), edited by Steve White.

Speaking of art (see what I did there?), 2012 was a pretty weak year in the art-book market. As usual, your best bet was probably the latest in a long-running Best of the Year series for fantastic art, Spectrum 19: The Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art (Underwood Books), edited by Cathy Fenner and Arnie Fenner. Also good were Expose 10: The Finest Digital Art in the Universe (Ballistic Publishing), edited by Ronnie Gramazio; The Art of the Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt), art by J. R. R. Tolkien, edited by Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull; Art of the Dragon PB: The Definitive Collection of Contemporary Dragon Paintings (Vanguard Productions), edited by Patrick Wilshire and J. David Spurlock; Trolls (Abrams), by Brian Froud and Wendy Froud; M. W. Kaluta: Sketchbook Series 1: Sketchbook (IDW Publishing), by Michael William Kaluta; and, a bit on the edge of genre, but still vaguely justifiable because of its fantastic imagery, In Wonderland: The Surrealist Adventures of Women Artists in Mexico and the United States (Prestel USA), edited by Ilene Susan Fort and Tere Arcq, with Terri Geis.

According to the Box Office Mojo site (www.boxofficemojo.com), nine out of ten of the year’s top-earning movies were genre films of one sort or another (if you’re willing to count animated films and superhero movies as being “genre films”), as were sixteen out of the top twenty, and forty-five out of the top one hundred.

Like last year; four out of five of the year’s top five box-office champs were genre movies—and if you’re willing to accept the James Bond movie Skyfall as a genre film, as some would be, then all five were (I’m not willing to go that far myself, thinking that it stretches the already somewhat stretched definition of a “genre film” past the useful point, although it certainly could be argued that some of the impossible physical action would qualify as fantasy). Two of the top five were superhero movies, Marvel’s The Avengers and The Dark Knight Rises, and one was a dystopian science fiction movie based on a bestselling YA series, The Hunger Games. Skyfall finished in fourth place, and a supernatural vampire romance, The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part II, came in fifth. The following five of the top ten were made up of the cinematic version of a classic fantasy novel, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, a relaunch of a superhero franchise, The Amazing Spider-Man, an animated fantasy movie, Brave, a slob comedy about a living, talking teddy bear, Ted, and a new addition to a successful animated franchise (also about talking animals), Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted. Further down the list were animated film Dr. Seuss’s The Lorax at eleventh place, SF comedy Men in Black 3 at twelfth place, animated films Wreck-It Ralph and Ice Age: Continental Drift at thirteenth and fourteenth places, fantasy film Snow White and the Huntsman in fifteenth place, animated horror comedy Hotel Transylvania in sixteenth place, and, finishing disappointingly in twentieth place, Prometheus, the prequel to Alien. The only nongenre movies in the top twenty were Skyfall, in fourth place, and Lincoln, Taken 2, and 21 Jump Street, at seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth places, respectively.

None of this should be surprising, and is the reason why a shitload (this is a precise critical term) of genre films are coming up in 2013. Genre films of one sort or another have dominated the box office top ten for more than a decade now. You have to go all the way back to 1998 to find a year when the year’s top earner was a nongenre film, Saving Private Ryan.

The year’s number-one box office champ was Marvel’s The Avengers, which so far has earned an amazing $1,511,757,910 worldwide. Directed by cult-favorite Joss Whedon, creator of the TV classic Buffy the Vampire Slayer, it was also a pretty entertaining movie, as even those who are lukewarm about superhero movies, like me, had to admit. Next was the finale of the Christopher Nolan–directed Batman trilogy, The Dark Knight Rises, which raked in $1,081,041,287 worldwide, and which I was less enthusiastic about, not that anyone cares. There’s a long fall thereafter to the movie in third place, The Hunger Games, which earned a “mere” $686,533,290 worldwide.

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, a prequel of sorts to the Lord of the Rings movies, was released in mid-December to scathing reviews and a moderately sluggish domestic box-office start, reaching only sixth place in the 2012 ranking; by the second week in January 2013, though, it had recovered—in my opinion, because positive word-of-mouth reviews had had a chance to kick in, balancing the critical drubbing—and has already earned $824,820,000 worldwide overall, with probably a lot more to come in the rest of the year. I liked it quite a bit myself, although it’s hard to argue against the opinion that it’s too long, and would be a better movie with at least a half hour trimmed out of it (this seems to be a weakness of Peter Jackson movies; Jackson’s King Kong had a good movie buried in it, but would have greatly benefited from having an hour cut from it). Martin Freeman was marvelous as Bilbo, as were (as usual) Andy Serkis as Gollum and Ian McKellan as Gandalf. In a controversial move, director Peter Jackson decided to stretch The Hobbit into three movies rather than one, or even two, and the second movie, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, will be out late in 2013.

I also enjoyed another of the year’s most critically savaged movies, John Carter, a film version of Edgar Rice Burroughs’s famous adventure novel, A Princess of Mars, which sends a heroic swashbuckler from Virginia to Mars to cross swords with the ferocious alien warriors who live there. Effectively sabotaged by its own studio (which dubbed it “the biggest bomb of all time” while it was still in theaters), critically drubbed, and given little real promotional or advertising support, it failed at the box office, unsurprisingly, although even so it came close to earning back its enormous production budget, earning $282,778,100 worldwide, and might have been a blockbuster with some studio support. In contrast to most reviews, word-of-mouth about it among many fans has been good to excellent, and although it’s hardly without flaws, it’s a solidly entertaining movie that deserved better.

The much-hyped Dark Shadows remake ended up in only thirty-sixth place on the box-office list, and the similarly hyped Frankenweenie made it only to ninetieth place. Josh Whedon’s other 2012 movie, the clever postmodern horror film The Cabin in the Woods, made it only to seventy-eighth place, but got a lot of critical respect and some great reviews.

As usual, there were few movies that could be considered science fiction movies, as opposed to fantasy movies and superhero movies. Two of them have already been mentioned, The Hunger Games, the most successful SF movie of the year at the box office, and John Carter. Perhaps the most eagerly awaited SF movie of 2012 was Prometheus, a prequel of sorts to Alien; unfortunately, it underperformed at the box office, and was widely savaged in both professional and word-of-mouth reviews, proving a disappointment to many, although it did have a few avid supporters. The only other SF movies were a continuation of the Men in Black SF comedy franchise, Men in Black 3, which finished in twelfth place on the box office list, a convoluted time-travel thriller, Looper, which placed fortieth, an alien invasion movie loosely based on—or at least inspired by—a children’s board game, Battleship, in forty-second place, and a perhaps ill-advised remake of Total Recall, which managed to make it only to fifty-first place. The reincarnation saga Cloud Atlas, which had a section set in the future, and so could be considered an SF movie of sorts, got some good reviews, but finished dead last in the list of a hundred bestselling movies. Argo, one of the most critically acclaimed movies of the year, has a tenuous connection to SF: the book the real-life conspirators claimed to be making as a cover story was Roger Zelazny’s Lord of Light. However, it would be too much of a stretch to claim it as an SF movie, or even as a genre film.

As some of these immense sums should indicate, it wasn’t a bad year at the box office for the movie industry. Overall profits were up 6.5 percent, to 10.83 billion from 2011’s 10.17 billion, and ticket sales were up to 1.36 billion, from 201l’s 1.28 billion—still a fair distance from 2002’s record 1.58 billion. In spite of the recession and the price of tickets, which keeps inching up, and the availability of movies on TV and via the Internet, many people are still willing to buy tickets—although I suspect that they’re more willing to shell out for widescreen big-budget spectaculars with lots of splashy special effects than they are for quieter movies, for which they might be willing to wait until they come out on DVD.

Most of the buzz about upcoming films seems to center around the new Star Trek film, Star Trek Into Darkness, and the second Hobbit movie, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, but I suspect that the giant robots-fight-Godzilla-like-monsters film, Pacific Rim, is also going to make a bazillion bucks, and there’s also a fair amount of anticipation about the movie version of Orson Scott Card’s novel Ender’s Game and the new Hunger Games movie, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire. There’ll also be a big-budget reimagining of The Wizard of Oz, called Oz the Great and Powerful.

There are so many fantasy/SF shows on television now that, like cowboy shows in the ’50s, it’s sometimes hard to keep track of them all. As was true of 2011, the big success story of 2012 was probably HBO’s A Game of Thrones, based on the bestselling Song of Ice and Fire series of fantasy novels by George R. R. Martin, which managed to become even more popular than it had been the year before, and is now a full-fledged Cultural Phenomenon—Game of Thrones references are now understood by just about everybody, even those who don’t usually self-identify as fantasy fans, and pop up everywhere, from The Big Bang Theory to Saturday Night Live, which ran a satire of the show, complete with a satirical take on Martin himself. Needless to say, it’s coming back in 2013. HBO’s other genre show, the campy vampire show True Blood, is also coming back in 2013, for what may or may not be its last season, depending, I would imagine, on whether or not it pulls itself out of the ratings slump that has eaten (sucked?) away its audience during the previous two seasons. The show could still be turned around, but the quality of the writing needs to improve from an awful fifth season and an only so-so sixth season to the level of the first couple of seasons.

That other Cultural Phenomenon, Dr. Who (which has won so many Hugo Awards by now that fans joke that the Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form category should be renamed the Dr. Who category), is, of course, also returning in 2013.

The two big debut SF shows of the last couple of seasons were Terra Nova and Falling Skies, both boasting unusually high budgets for television, and both produced by movie director Steve Spielberg. Falling Skies, in which embattled guerilla militiamen battle alien invaders, has survived and become moderately successful, but Terra Nova, in which refuges flee through time to the dinosaur era, never really did catch on, and has died. Another Spielberg-produced show, the horror series The River, also died. One big-budget TV show upon which a lot of hopes were pinned, Alcatraz, by Lost creator J. J. Abrahms, died as well, after a disappointingly short run, as did Last Resort, supernatural show 666 Park Avenue, A Gifted Man, The Secret Circle, The Event, and Ringer, which had excited some fans by bringing Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s Sarah Michelle Gellar back to the small screen. Long-running supernatural shows Medium and Ghost Whisperer died, as did Legend of the Seeker, Merlin, and Camelot, as well as the SF comedy Eureka. Cult favorite SF show Fringe will run its last few episodes in 2013, and then die, too, after five seasons.

Supernatural, The Vampire Diaries, The Walking Dead, Teen Wolf, Being Human, the animated Star Wars: The Clone Wars, and American Horror Story are all coming back, as are the dueling fairy-tale series, Grimm and Once Upon a Time. SF comedies Warehouse 13 and Futurama are returning, as is semi-SF (a straight thriller, really, other than the heroes having a super-advanced computer that helps them spot crimes before they happen) show, Person of Interest. Touch is returning, but is said to be “on the bubble,” and may not last much longer. Coming up sometime in 2013 is a TV movie prequel to Battlestar Galactica, called Battlestar Galactica: Blood and Chrome.

Of the new shows already on the air, the most buzz so far seems to be generated by Arrow, a gritty reboot of D.C. Comics long-running superhero character, Green Arrow. Revolution, set in a world in which electricity no longer works and people are reduced to using horses, swords, and bows (think Hunger Games, set in a post-apocalyptic, no-technology future), has also generated some buzz, but seems a bit shaky in the ratings, as is the new version of Beauty and the Beast.

New shows coming up include Defiance, an SF/western described as “Deadwood with aliens,” Orphan Black, a clone drama, Zero Hour, an X-Files-like show that tackles conspiracy theories, Under the Dome, which follows people imprisoned under a dome by mysterious forces, Continuum, about a time-traveling cop, Lost Girl, which explores the problems of fairies exiled in the modern world, supernatural show Da Vinci’s Demons, and a new version of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Do No Harm. The most fan anticipation seems to be building for a rumored Avengers spinoff series to be directed by Joss Whedon, S.H.I.E.L.D.

Miniseries versions of Kim Stanley Robinson’s Red Mars, Joe Haldeman’s The Forever War, and Philip Jose Farmer’s Riverworld have been promised for so long now that I begin to wonder if we’ll ever see them at all.

Chicon 7: The 70th World Science Fiction Convention, was held in Chicago, Illinois, from August 30 to September 3, 2012. The 2012 Hugo Awards, presented at Chicon 7, were: Best Novel, Among Others, by Jo Walton; Best Novella, “The Man Who Bridged the Mist,” by Kij Johnson; Best Novelette, “Six Months, Three Days,” by Charlie Jane Anders; Best Short Story, “The Paper Menagerie,” by Ken Liu; Best Related Work, The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, Third Edition, by John Clute, David Langford, Peter Nicholls, and Graham Sleight; Best Editor, Long Form, Betsy Wollheim; Best Editor, Short Form, Sheila Williams; Best Professional Artist, John Picacio; Best Dramatic Presentation (short form), Doctor Who: “The Doctor’s Wife”; Best Dramatic Presentation (long form), Game of Thrones—Season 1; Best Graphic Story, Digger, by Ursula Vernon; Best Semiprozine, Locus; Best Fanzine, SF Signal; Best Fan Writer, Jim C. Hines; Best Fan Artist, Maurine Starkey; plus the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer to E. Lily Yu.

The 2011 Nebula Awards, presented at a banquet at the Hyatt Regency Crystal City hotel in Arlington, Virginia, on May 19, 2012, were: Best Novel, Among Others, by Jo Walton; Best Novella, “The Man Who Bridged the Mist,” by Kij Johnson; Best Novelette, “What We Found,” by Geoff Ryman; Best Short Story, “The Paper Menagerie,” by Ken Liu; Ray Bradbury Award, Doctor Who: “The Doctor’s Wife”; the Andre Norton Award, The Freedom Maze, by Delia Sherman; Solstice Awards to Octavia E. Butler and John Clute; the Service to SFWA Award to Clarence Howard “Bud” Webster; and the Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master Award to Connie Willis.

The 2012 World Fantasy Awards, presented at a banquet on November 4, 2012 in Toronto, Canada, during the Twenty-First Annual World Fantasy Convention, were: Best Novel, Osama, by Lavie Tidhar; Best Novella, “A Small Price to Pay for Birdsong,” by K. J. Parker; Best Short Fiction, “The Paper Menagerie,” by Ken Liu; Best Collection, The Bible Repairman and Other Stories, by Tim Powers; Best Anthology, The Weird, edited by Ann and Jeff VanderMeer; Best Artist, John Coulthart; Special Award (Professional), to Eric Lane; Special Award (Non-Professional), to Raymond Russell and Rosalie Parker; plus the Life Achievement Award to George R. R. Martin and Alan Garner.

The 2011 Bram Stoker Awards, presented by the Horror Writers of America on April 1, 2012 in Salt Lake City, Utah, were: Best Novel, Flesh Eaters, by Joe McKinney; Best First Novel, Isis Unbound, by Allyson Bird; Best Young Adult Novel, The Screaming Season, by Nancy Holder and Dust & Decay, by Jonathan Mayberry (tie); Best Long Fiction, The Ballad of Ballard and Sandrine, by Peter Straub; Best Short Fiction, “Herman Wouk Is Still Alive,” by Stephen King; Best Collection, The Corn Maiden and Other Nightmares, by Joyce Carol Oates; Best Anthology, Demons: Encounters with the Devil and his Minions, Fallen Angels and the Possessed, edited by John Skipp; Best Nonfiction, Stephen King: A Literary Companion, by Rocky Wood; Best Poetry Collection, How to Recognize a Demon Has Become Your Friend, by Linda Addison; plus Lifetime Achievement Awards to Rick Hautala and Joe R. Lansdale.

The 2012 John W. Campbell Memorial Award was won by The Islanders, by Christopher Priest and The Highest Frontier, by Joan Slonczewsk (tie).

The 2012 Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for Best Short Story was won by “The Choice,” by Paul McAuley.

The 2012 Philip K. Dick Memorial Award went to Equations of Life/Samuel Petrovitch, by Simon Morden.

The 2012 Arthur C. Clarke award was won by The Testament of Jessie Lamb, by Jane Rogers.

The 2012 James Tiptree, Jr. Memorial Award was won by The Drowning Girl, by Caitlin R. Kiernan, and Ancient, Ancient, by Kiini Ibura Salaam.

The 2011 Sidewise Award went to Wake Up and Dream, by Ian R. MacLeod (Long Form) and “Paradise Is a Walled Garden,” by Lisa Goldstein (Short Form).

The Cordwainer Smith Rediscovery Award went to Katherine MacLean.

Dead in 2012 or early 2013 were:

RAY BRADBURY, 91, one of the best-known and most iconic of all SF/fantasy writers, winner of the World Fantasy Award for Lifetime Achievement, the SFWA Grand Master Award, the Stoker Life Achievement Award, and many other honors, author of such famous books as The Martian Chronicles, Fahrenheit 451, Dandelion Wine, and Something Wicked This Way Comes, as well as hundreds of short stories and essays; HARRY HARRISON, 87, another giant of the SF field, author of Make Room, Make Room (filmed as Soylent Green), Deathworld, Bill, the Galactic Hero, the many Stainless Steel Rat books, and dozens of others; GORE VIDAL, 86, prolific author, essayist, political commentator, and media celebrity, whose twenty-five books include SF novels such as A Visit to a Small Planet, Kalki, and Messiah; BORIS STUGATSKY, 79, who, writing with his late brother ARKADY, became perhaps Russia’s best-known SF writer, internationally renowned for the novel Roadside Picnic; CHRISTOPHER SAMUEL YOUD, 89, British SF author who wrote as JOHN CHRISTOPHER, best known for the novel No Blade of Grass, as well as the YA The Tripod Trilogy: The White Mountains, The City of Gold and Lead, and The Pool of Fire; CARLOS FUENTES, 82, famous Mexican magical realist; JIM YOUNG, 61, SF writer, actor, longtime fan, diplomat, a personal friend; MARK BOURNE, 50, SF writer, creator of planetarium shows and museum exhibitions, longtime fan, a personal friend; STEVEN UTLEY, 65, one of the most acclaimed and prolific authors at short-story length of his generation, someone who sold dozens of brilliant stories to practically every market in existence, best known for his long-running series of Silurian tales, a friend; K. D. WENTWORTH, 61, SF writer and editor, longtime fan, a friend; KEVIN O’ DONNELL, JR., 61, SF writer with ten novels and more than fifty short stories to his credit, former SFWA officer; JOSEPHA SHERMAN, 65, SF writer, editor, folklorist, longtime fan, a friend; SIR PATRICK MOORE, 89, astronomer, TV presenter, science popularizer, and author; JANET BERLINER, 73, SF writer, editor, anthologist; ARDATH MAYHAR, 81, SF writer; MICHEAL ALEXANDER, SF writer and Clarion West graduate; SUZANNE ALLÉS BLOM, 64, SF writer; PETER PHILLIPS, 92, SF writer; STUART J. BYRNE, 97, SF writer; GENE DeWEESE, 78, writer of SF and media novels; ROLAND C. WAGNER, 51, French writer, translator, editor; PAUL HAINES, 41, Australian SF writer; CHRISTINE BROOKE-ROSE, 89, novelist and scholar; MARGARET MAHY, 76, children’s book author; NICK WEBB, 63, British publisher and author; JEFF MILLAR, 70, writer of the long-running syndicated comic strip Tank McNamara, as well as the occasional SF story; ADAM NISWANDER, 66, author and bookseller; GRETTA M. ANDERSON, 55, editor and publisher; HILARY RUBINSTEIN, 86, literary agent and editor; JACK SCOVIL, 74, literary agent; WENDY WEIL, 72, literary agent; JACQUES GOIMARD, 78, French critic and editor; LISTER MATHESON, 63, academic who was the former director of the Clarion Workshop; STUART TEITLER, 71, bookseller and collector; JEAN GIRAUD, a.k.a. MOEBIUS, 73, internationally renowned French artist and illustrator, widely influential with his work in comics, books, and films, inducted into The Science Fiction Hall of Fame; RALPH McQUARRIE, 82, artist, conceptual designer and illustrator largely responsible for the look of the Star Wars films; LEO DILLION, 79, artist and illustrator, with his wife and collaborator Diane Dillion part of a Hugo-winning artistic team who illustrated a huge number of children’s books, fantasy novels, and SF novels; MAURICE SENDAK, 83, children’s author and artist, best known for Where the Wild Things Are and In the Night Kitchen; MICHAEL EMBDEN, 63, British cover artist and illustrator; DAVID GROVE, 72, SF cover artist and illustrator; ALAN HUNTER, 89, British fan artist; CYNTHIA GOLDSTONE, 90, artist, writer, and longtime fan; NEIL ARMSTRONG, 82, astronaut, the first human being to walk on the moon; SALLY RIDE, 61, astronaut, the first American woman to travel into space; JONATHAN FRID, 87, television actor, best known for playing vampire Barnabas Collins on the original TV supernatural soap opera version of Dark Shadows; ERNEST BORGNINE, 95, television and movie actor, best known to genre audiences for roles in Ice Station Zebra, Small Soldiers, and SpongeBob SquarePants; LARRY HAGMAN, 81, television actor, best known for his role as J.R. on Dallas, but also known to genre audiences for his role on I Dream of Jeannie; JACK KLUGMAN, 90, television actor best known for roles in The Odd Couple and Quincy, who also appeared in The Twilight Zone and The Outer Limits; HERBERT LOM, 95, movie actor, best-known these days for his role in the Inspector Clouseau movies, but who also played The Phantom of the Opera, Professor Van Helsing, and Captain Nemo; CHARLES DURNING, 89, movie actor, known for his roles in Twilight’s Last Gleaming, The Muppet Movie, and The Last Countdown; MICHAEL CLARKE DUNCAN, 54, movie actor, star of The Green Mile; MICHAEL O’HARE, 60, television actor, best known for his role on Babylon 5; RICHARD DAWSON, 79, longtime game show host of Family Feud who also costarred in The Running Man; HARRY CAREY, JR., 91, veteran movie actor mostly known for his roles in many Western movies, who also costarred in Back to the Future Part III; RICHARD ZANUCK, 77, movie producer, producer or coproducer of such genre films as Jaws, Cocoon, and Planet of the Apes; GERRY ANDERSON, 83, creator of British television shows for children such as Supercar, Fireball XLS, Thunderbirds, and Captain Scarlet; JAY KAY KLEIN, 80, photographer, artist, longtime fan; JANE FRANCES GUNN, 87, wife of SF writer and critic James Gunn; RICHARD S. SIMAK, 64, son of SF writer Clifford D. Simak and occasional SF writer himself; HELEN SAPANARA KEARNEY, 92, mother of SF writer Pat Cadigan.