As is unfortunately becoming a pattern for F&SF, this is filled with nice, well-written, completely safe stories. (The exception to this is Alexandra Duncan's fantastic Swamp City Lament, which alone caused my rating of this magazine to go up a star. That story on its own would rate at least a 4.5, if not a 5. SO GOOD.) This issue also continued the unfortunate trend of publishing only 2 stories by women out of 12; the numbers have been similar for every issue since I started counting. F&SF, I have so many fond memories of you, but I will not be renewing my subscription once it runs out.
Gordon Van Gelder Robert Reed Michael Alexander John Kessel Terry Bisson Alexander Jablokov Alexandra Duncan Albert E. Cowdrey - Gordon Van Gelder (born 1966) is an American science fiction editor. From 1997 until 2014, Van Gelder was editor and later publisher of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, for which he has twice won the Hugo Award for Best Editor Short Form. He was also a managing editor of The New York Review of Science Fiction from 1988 to 1993, for which he was nominated for the Hugo Award a number of times. As of January 2015, Van Gelder has stepped down as editor of Fantasy & Science Fiction in favour of Charles Coleman Finlay, but remains publisher of the magazine.