The Best Of

I'm immensely pleased that 2016 will see the publication of my Best Of, courtesy of Subterranean Press and Orion books, who will both be doing editions. Jonathan and Bill have done a sterling job selecting the stories, no easy task given the number to choose from, and  - since I was party to the whole process - I can state that there were some very difficult choices to be made about which pieces to omit or include. The book is physically huge, and it really wouldn't have been feasible to include any more material than what has been selected.

Subterranean themselves will be doing two editions, one of which is the Limited, which features my own artwork as shown above. The piece was done specifically for the book, while not being based on any one story - although since spaceports figure in more than one of them, it's not inappropriate. Meanwhile, Dominic Harman, who did some of my Interzone stories, is working on the cover for the main Sub Press edition. I've seen some roughs, and Dominic's cover is going to be wonderful. To add to the goodness, there will be a separate cover again for the Orion edition - and the roughs I've seen of that look pretty lovely as well.

You can find out more about the book, including the table of contents, at the Sub Press website:

http://subterraneanpress.com/store/product_detail/beyond_the_aquila_rift_the_best_of_alastair_reynolds

I've been publishing short stories for 25 years (and this year will be 27 since my first professional sale) but I can honestly say there wasn't a point in all that time where I was ever bold enough to think I'd see a "Best Of" published. Now that it's nearly here, I'm truly grateful for the continued opportunities and friendships that the field has offered me, and offer thanks to the editors and readers who have kindly seen me this far.