Best SF Series
Edited by Harry Harrison and Brian W. Aldiss.
The first of a series of annual anthologies, for which Harrison generally chose stories from American sources, and Aldiss from British ones. The series lasted for nine volumes, ending in 1975.
"Among his other gifts, Harry Harrison is the man Diogenes was looking for; so when he first broached this anthology to me, I welcomed the notion, on the grounds that existing such annuals in my opinion were not meeting certain minimum standards of fairness towards the reader. After discussing these further, Harry said in effect, 'Write 'em down formally and I'll print 'em. Then the reader can judge for himself.'
"A tough test; but I think the outcome passes it. This volume is unusual in many respects. It is almost all fiction; though there are three editorials and the usual blurbs, the rest consists of stories and nothing but stories. With three exceptions - two of them very short - all the stories are science fiction in the traditional sense of the term; it has at long last occurred to an editor that since all fiction is speculative, that word can be stretched to cover anything, and all too often is – but not here. With one trifling exception, all the stories actually did first appear in 1967, just as the title claims. All the stories are the editors' own choices, over-ruled by nobody.
"I think the result is definitive."
"... apart from being a very good anthology of very good reading, is also an unabashed advertisement for New Worlds, the English science fiction magazine ... What we have here, in this book, then, is a direct assault on the market for Judith Merril's provinces and on her annual anthologies - and a brush-block en passant on Don Wollheim's-Terry Carr's similar book for Ace ... By reason of the details we've already discussed, it's a Serious Threat to the Opposition. Following future developments promises to be rewarding."