I’m collaborating with Shane Jackson (remember that name) on a novel, and we decided on space opera as our genre. Since the most recent space opera I’d read was Mike Resnick’s Widowmaker (from 1996), I wanted an update on what the field was like now.
Wandering the aisles at Borders, I found a short story collection called The New Space Opera 2 (2009, edited by Gardner Dozois and Jonathan Strahan). Man, it’s been ages since I read a short story, because I’ve been focusing on novel writing and felt that novel reading would be the best preparation. But I’m really liking these stories.
There are a lot of great contributors here too…Cory Doctorow, Elizabeth Moon, Mike Resnick, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, John Scalzi, Bruce Sterling, Bill Willingham, and more. And Jay Lake, who’s been particularly inspiring to me recently, but I’ll save that for another post.
Anyway, great stuff here. I’m six stories in, and hungry for more. I was tempted to head right for the Resnick story, but since it’s toward the end I’ll save that for a nice dessert.