The Jack Vance Treasury

Collection - Short Stories

Plot

Jack Vance is a national treasure. One of the 20th century’s preeminent science fiction and fantasy writers, he has done more than any other author to define one of the genre’s principal forms, the planetary adventure. But whether he’s writing sf, fantasy or mystery, his distinctive storytelling voice displays an impressive gift for language and dialogue, a fine eye for world-building detail, and a keen sense of irony and the evanescence of human existence. As Dowling and Strahan say in the introduction to this volume, Jack Vance has a way of “putting us into situations where our humanity becomes the thing in focus, measured against alien overlords, exotic worlds and different cultures.” Could be why Vance’s works have claimed the Edgar, Hugo, Nebula and World Fantasy Awards, and why wordsmiths like Gene Wolfe, Harlan Ellison, Dan Simmons and George R.R. Martin credit his influence on their work. Now, the very best of the Grand Master’s shorter works has been collected in this landmark volume, a retrospective spanning the seven decades of his remarkable career. Here are “The Dragon Masters,” a Hugo winner about the rivalry between two very different men on what may be the last planet of free humans, where dragons are bred to meet human needs, just as humans are bred for the needs of alien abductors…. “Sail 25” (one of Vance’s personal favorites), which was one of the first tales to take readers into space on a solar sailship—a vessel manned by an untried crew of cadets…. the Hugo-nominated “The Miracle Workers,” about an alien world where humans have carved out feudal kingdoms for themselves, armed with backward technology, magic they only dimly understand and a few relics of higher technology 1600 years old…. “The Moon Moth,” which asks the xenological question, “how do you catch a criminal in a society where everyone goes masked?”… And the Hugo- and Nebula-winning novella, “The Last Castle,” in which a formerly submissive group of non-human slaves revolt against their human masters, only to bring about the very thing they fear most. Add to this roster stories from the Dying Earth sequence featuring Cugel the Clever, a story starring that most urbane of interstellar agents, Magnus Ridolph, a biographical sketch of and commentaries on each story by the author, and a foreword by long-time fan George R.R. Martin, and you have a collection to be cherished.