Editor: Bryan Thomas Schmidt
Cover Artist: Domic Harman
Released: June 2016
Publisher: Baen Books
ISBN: 978-1-4767-8158-7
Buy: Amazon • Barnes & Noble • Baen • IndieBound • Goodreads
“Galactic Games is a collection of sport stories, mostly originals, timed to coincide with the Rio Olympics. In this case the book is dealing with attempts at interspecies sport, and (not always on purpose) managing to highlight the difficulties of fair competition between entities of a radically different physical makeup. Maybe the best take on that comes from Esther Friesner, in her wickedly funny tale of what happens when a representative of a very warlike species wants to be a cheerleader, ”Pompons and Circumstance”. The best story in the book, though, is ”The Great Ignorant Race” by Robert Reed, which throws 10,000 humans into an artificial environment with the task of figuring out what they are competing about, and then how to succeed. It’s nominally about a game then, but in reality—as sport likes to imagine itself—it’s about how games reflect human character.”—Rich Horton, Locus Magazine
The Olympic Games—man vs. man, woman vs. woman, pushing skills, minds, brains and bodies to their limits in the ultimate competition on Earth. But now mankind has reached the stars and new challenges and possibilities arisen in sports. From alien opponents to literal death defying stakes and more, galactic games have given the ultimate competition a whole new framework. GALACTIC GAMES offers 20 one of a kind stories of sports in the future. From variations on old classics like downhill figure skating or horse racing with alien kladnars, from baseball played with speedboats to basketball on Mars and golf on the moon, GALACTIC GAMES brings you a new level of competition you’ve never seen before.
Contents:
“With Fones” by Todd McCaffrey
“Little Games” by Mercedes Lackey
“Regulation” by Seanan McGuire
“Earth, Corner Pocket” by Lezli Robyn
“The Great Kladnar Race” by Randall Garrett and Robert Silverberg
“Advantages” by Louise Marley
“Louisville Slugger” by Jack C. Haldeman II
“For the Sake of the Game” by Gray Rinehart
“Shooter Ready” by Larry Correia
“Minor Hockey Gods of Barstow Station” by Beth Cato
“Pompoms and Circumstance” by Esther M. Friesner
“The Olympian” by Mike Resnick
“Petra and the Blue Goo” by Kristine Kathryn Rusch
“Green Moss River” by David Farland
“The On-Deck Circle” by Gene Wolfe
“Stress Cracks” by Anthony R. Cardno
“Run to Starlight” by George R. R. Martin
“Mars Court Rules” by Brad R. Torgersen
“Last Shot, First Shot” by Dean Wesley Smith
“The Great Ignorant Race” by Robert Reed