"SFWA Grand Master Silverberg (Voyagers) demonstrates why he merits that plaudit in this superior collection of three novels and one short story linked by the theme of humanity encountering intelligent alien life, or, as he puts it in his introduction, “reach out to meet others with uncertain hands.” “Those Who Watch” begins with an explosion over New Mexico that turns out to be a crashing spaceship; the ship’s three crew members survive and successfully pose as humans until three Earthlings see through their disguise. “The Man in the Maze” offers a less traditional story line, inspired by Sophocles’s tragedy Philoctetes and centered on diplomat Richard Muller. Muller’s the first human to contact the inhabitants of Beta Hydri IV—and he becomes a pariah upon his return to Earth. Silverberg shifts gears dramatically in “Tom O’Bedlam,” in which all of Earth’s governments have collapsed, and the eponymous lead has visions of fantastic crystalline beings that others dismiss as psychotic episodes. The anthology is enhanced by Silverberg’s introductions to each piece, which provide the personal and editorial background to the stories. Lovers of first contact fiction owe it to themselves to pick this up."--Publishers Weekly

In these nine masterly stories, David Leavitt surveys the complicated politics of human relationships in families and communities, in the present day and over the course of the last century. A "wizard at blending levity and pathos" (Chicago Tribune), Leavitt displays here his characteristic grace and intelligence, as well as his remarkable candor and wit. Here are stories that range in form from a historical survey to a police interrogation to an e-mail exchange. In "The Infection Scene," a young man's determined effort to contract HIV is juxtaposed with an account of the early life of Lord Alfred Douglas. In the title story, an expatriate tries to make sense of his ex-partner's senseless murder. In "Crossing St. Gotthard," the members of an American family traveling in Europe at the turn of the twentieth century find themselves confronting their own mortality as they plunge into a train tunnel in Switzerland. And in "Black Box," the partner of a man killed in a plane crash is drawn into an unholy alliance with a fellow "crash widow." Moving from Rome to San Francisco to Florida, from fin-de-siccle London to Hollywood in the early 1960s, these stories showcase the agility and sensitivity that have earned David Leavitt his reputation as one of the most innovative voices in contemporary short fiction.