Rated 9/10not all of the stories manage quite the same combination of fantasy, eccentricity, surrealism, and poetic justice of vance's own dying earth stories; but they all of them evince a blending of at least some of these characteristics: and it's a worthy addition to the dying earth canon - as well as having been a recognition jack vance could and did enjoy in his lifetime.
(n.b. merkin editions lose the "u" from the sub-title.)
contents:
n.b. each short story, novelette and novella is followed by an afterword by its author:
thank you, mr. vance (nf introduction) dean (r.) koontz
preface (nf) jack vance
the true vintage of erzuine thale (novelette) robert silverberg
grolion of almery (ntte) matthew hughes
the copsy door (ntte) terry dowling
caulk the witch-chaser (short story) liz williams
inescapable (ss) mike resnick
abrizonde (ntte) walter jon williams
the traditions of karzh (ntte) paula volsky
the final quest of the wizard sarnod (ntte) jeff vandermeer
the green bird (ntte) kage baker
the last golden thread (ss) phyllis eisenstein
an incident in uskvosk (ss) elizabeth moon
sylgarmo's proclamation (ntte) lucius shepard
the lamentably comical tragedy (or the laughably tragic comedy) of lixal laqavee (ntte) tad williams
guyal the curator (ntte) john c. wright
the good magician (ntte) glen cook
the return of the fire witch (ntte) elizabeth hand
the collegeum of mauge (ss) byron tetrick
evillo the cunning (ntte) tanith lee
the guiding nose of ulfänt banderōz (novella) dan simmons
frogskin cap (ss) howard waldrop
a night at the tarn house (ntte) george r. r. martin
an invocation of incuriosity (ss) neil gaiman
harpercollinspublishers harpervoyager imprint first printing, first uk h/cvr, first uk edition.
preceded by the subterranean press h/cvr first edition (burton, michigan u.s. 2009)
original anthology of stories set in jack vance's wonderful world of the dying earth,
written, composed and created in honour of the fantasy & sf grandmaster,
containing seven short stories, fourteen novelettes and one novella,
plus notes/afterwords by each of the twenty-two contributing authors,
with an introduction by dean r. koontz, and a preface by jack vance.
cover (d-j) art by david j. green
cover (d-j) price £25.00
668pp. (check) including (i-)viii pages titles, indicia, table-of-contents etc, introduction, bound with endpapers between covered boards
#1: ''the dying earth'' jack vance (hillman 1950) (lancer books 1962), q.v. for series listing, and links.
there is also a smaller format but elsewise identical (sfaicr) uk h/cvr - the harpervoyager first uk h/cvr is a what-is-now fairly standard for fiction large format uk h/cvr - that i have owned and since sold, which i believe must have been the uk bca/associates book club edition.
unfortunately, i did not note down details, such as whether the d-j bore a bca/associates book club edition cat# in addition to any isbn, nor what the isbn was, if it was not (as is now commonly, though incorrectly, the case with sfbc editions) that of the true first uk h/cvr edition given above.