A very enjoyable collection indeed.Robin Wayne Bailey's Blindfold is perhaps my favourite of the bunch, though the impetus of disability shining through or being combated is perhaps handled more enjoyably in Dean Wesley Smith's A Time to dream.

I found that I preferred the combat as depicted in Wiping Out (a Robert J. Sawyer short) than that of the William H. Keith, Jr offering, but I've never read any of keith before and at least some of the Sawyer (such as the holography) was familiar.

For the best ending, I have to pick Paul Levinson's Smart Weapon; surely I have to read more of this person. And for general laughs and some rather stomach-wrenching narrative, it's That Doggone Vnorpt, by Nathan Archer.

A mixed bunch, though I've mentioned 6 of the 13 included, and of those I utterly enjoyed 5. "But the heart of space opera hasn't changed," says Larry Segriff in the introduction. He's right about that, I think. I may not agree that it's gotten better; or if things have improved, in more nuanced and complex ways than simply saying "the heart of space opera" can convey. still, I too feasted on heinlein, Dick, asimov and so forth, and therefore got enough out of this volume so that anything else that catches my eye may certainly make it to a shelf somewhere.