A review by skjam
2014 Campbellian Anthology by Michael Hodges, Oliver Buckram, Louise Hughes, José Pablo Iriarte, Stewart C. Baker, Ada Hoffmann, Tina Gower, Nicole Galland, Ania Ahlborn, Vajra Chandrasekera, Ariel Djanikian, Evan Currie, Lisa Bolekaja, Adam Christopher, Jeffrey A. Ballard, David Carani, Ken Hinckley, M.K. Hutchins, Sean Eads, Jonas David, Alexis A. Hunter, James Bambury, Alisa Alering, Shane Halbach, John Chu, Dawn Bonanno, Lara Elena Donnelly, Kelsey Ann Barrett, Jennifer Campbell-Hicks, Holly Schofield, Brooke Bolander, Robin Wyatt Dunn, Athena Andreadis, O.J. Cade, Mark T. Barnes, Joseph Brassey, Tory Hoke, Max Gladstone, M. David Blake, A.T. Greenblatt, Cooper Moo, Anne Charnock, Erik Bear, Kate Heartfield, Robert Dawson, A.G. Carpenter, Evan Dicken, Haris A. Durrani, Bill Ferris, Jess Hyslop, Laurel Amberdine

3.0

Holy moley! This one took me five years to finish. Admittedly I was just reading for a couple of hours at a time every few months, then realized I was at the 80% mark so went at it steadily for the last two weeks to finish.

The primary virtues of this collection are size and variety. There were a lot of authors eligible for the Campbell Prize in 2014, and most of them agreed to have a sample in here.

Unfortunately, due to how long it took me to finish, the vast majority of the stories have faded from my memory, so I'm not going to do a comprehensive review. I will say that the format was least kind to novels. In several cases, the early chapters presented were background, and I could tell the excerpt cut off just before what should have been the exciting part.

Still, this was a good snapshot of the state of speculative fiction in 2014, and recommended for anyone with time on their hands.