Old Venus Author:George R. R. Martin (Editor), Gardner Dozois (Editor) The planet Venus has loomed almost as large in the imaginations of science fiction writers as Earth’s next-nearest neighbor, Mars. But while the Red Planet conjured up in Golden Age science fiction stories was a place of vast deserts and ruined cities, bright blue Venus was its polar opposite: a steamy, swampy jungle world with strange cre... more »atures lurking amidst the dripping vegetation. Alas, just as the last century’s space probes exploded our dreams of Mars, so, too, did they shatter our romantic visions of Venus, revealing, instead of a lush paradise, a hellish world inimical to all life. But don’t despair! This new anthology of sixteen original stories by some of science fiction’s best writers--edited by #1 New York Times bestselling author George R. R. Martin and award-winning editor Gardner Dozois--turns back the clock to that more innocent time, before the hard-won knowledge of science vanquished the infinite possibilities of the imagination.
Contents:
Introduction: Return to Venusport • essay by Gardner Dozois
Frogheads / novelette by Allen Steele
The Drowned Celestial / novelette by Lavie Tidhar
Planet of Fear / novelette by Paul J. McAuley
Greeves and the Evening Star / novelette by Matthew Hughes
A Planet Called Desire / novelette by Gwyneth Jones
Living Hell / shortstory by Joe Haldeman
Bones of Air, Bones of Stone / novelette by Stephen Leigh
Ruins / novelette by Eleanor Arnason
The Tumbledowns of Cleopatra Abyss / novelette by David Brin
By Frogsled and Lizardback to Outcast Venusian Lepers / novelette by Garth Nix
The Sunset of Time / novelette by Michael Cassutt
Pale Blue Memories / novelette by Tobias S. Buckell
The Heart's Filthy Lesson / novelette by Elizabeth Bear
The Wizard of the Trees / novelette by Joe R. Lansdale
The Godstone of Venus / novelette by Mike Resnick
Botanica Veneris: Thirteen Papercuts By Ida Countess Rathangan / novelette by Ian McDonald