Novel Ideas, ed. by Brian M. Thomsen

This collection of short stories by famous science fiction authors is absolutely fantastic. The link between the stories is that all of them were later turned into either full-length novels or movies, and almost all of these later products became quite famous. For instance, we have David Brin's short story "The Postman," which most will recognize immediately as that Kevin Costner movie. And "The Lady in the Tower," which evolved into Anne McCaffery's series about the Rowan. Orson Scott Card's short story on which Ender's Game is based in also included. As such, each of these short stories is a piece of literature from science fictions best contemporary authors.

There is a beauty to the short story that is notoriously difficult to capture. Good short stories don't need to be novelized; they are perfect snapshots of a very short period of time in the lives of the characters. These snapshots, when an author attempts to expand them into a full-length book, can fall flat quite easily. But each of these author's excelled at both the short story and novelized versions of their creations. This is a truly wonderful read for anybody, but particularly for sci-fi fans who are familiar with the full-length versions of these stories.