<DIV>Exploring the porous boundary between mainstream literary fiction and the genres of fantasy, horror, and science fiction, this collection of short stories juxtaposes the conventional and the fabulist?with dazzling results. In Rikki Ducornet's ?Lettuce,” a petitioner in a futuristic totalitarian state pays with his life when he requests permission to grow lettuce; ?Birthday of the World,” by Ursula K. Le Guin, is narrated by a woman whose brother destroys their culture when he decides he wants to be God; and the disillusioned wife in Carol Schwalberg's ?The Midnight Lover” finds the perfect marriage partner in her dreams, only to be divorced by the dream lover. Containing 50 works by genre writers Kim Stanley Robinson and Michael Moorcock and noted literary authors Laird Hunt and Brian Evenson, this compilation expands the fiction subgenre that has been called ?speculative” and ?slipstream.”</div>