Aug 12
Click for full imageMatt Comments: Thought this might give you paws for thought (sorry…)! An interesting variation on the usual cat people.
Published 2008
(Average: 8.52 out of 10)
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Matt Comments: Thought this might give you paws for thought (sorry…)! An interesting variation on the usual cat people.
Published 2008
(Average: 8.52 out of 10)Loading...
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August 12th, 2013 at 9:52 am
Features Peter S. Beagle, so of course the cover artist depicts a dog.
August 12th, 2013 at 12:57 pm
I weep for American fantasy.
“OK you lot, we got to do a book for Americans. What do Americans like?”
“Motorcycles!”
“Dogs!”
“Riding along on Route 66 through the Old West!”
“Perfect!”
August 12th, 2013 at 1:49 pm
Clearly, the problem here is that the artist hasn’t been house trained. I mean, Oliver Wetter? Also known as Oliver “all over” Wetter.
August 12th, 2013 at 2:09 pm
The title is actually Best American Fantasy 2008, not Best American Fantasy 2. Obviously GSS Admin couldn’t see past the dog’s big head.
Hard to work the accelerator and brakes without opposable thumbs. Doggie’s gonna die in a crash.
August 12th, 2013 at 2:31 pm
@Bibliomancer!
YOU! You doubt my powers! MY POWERS?!?! Actually you should… Apparently there is three of these collections and this is the second one, hence the 2.
http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pe.cgi?24559
To be fair you are right. But maybe I should have called it: Best American Fantasy 2Cn&
August 12th, 2013 at 2:44 pm
@ GSS Admin, yes, three – and only three – collections.
http://www.bestamericanfantasy.com/ (click on weblog link, right.)
You’ll note with vindication that even they refer to today’s subject as BAF2.
August 12th, 2013 at 3:56 pm
@GSS Admin — You are correct. (Sometimes even a blind squirrel finds a nut).
Here is Vandermeer doing some editor-splaining on the title changes. Curiously he shows a book photo of the dog cover with neither a 2 nor a 2008.
@Tom Hering — There were apparently plans for BAF4, BAF5, & BAF6 but the series was cancelled after BAF3.
Perhaps they paid Stephen King too much for his included story. Here is a series obituary written by Mrs. Editor: bestamericanfantasy.blogspot.com
August 12th, 2013 at 4:49 pm
I do like the editors… then the series editor… maybe there was an editor war!
@Biblomancer – Maybe because what’s above is an advanced copy! What Matt the OP has there is a collectable! Just think how much it will be worth in… years… to come!
Not to belittle someone having to close their doors on a book series, they said this:
With that in mind I find it interesting they went for a dog person riding a motor cycle.
August 12th, 2013 at 4:51 pm
If that title was a Jeopardy answer the question would have to be ‘Who was Sarah Palin?’.
Headlight needs some splattered bugs. Rider needs a big red calico handkerchief tied around his neck.
August 12th, 2013 at 5:53 pm
It was a theme in those days.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Starwater-Strains-Gene-Wolfe/dp/0765312034
(I sometimes think Wolfe’s publishers want everyone to buy ereaders. The covers for the Short Sun books in particular)
But… why does a dog need a tassled waistcoat?
August 12th, 2013 at 7:09 pm
Shame that born-to-be-wild doggie didn’t get an extended outing through the rest of the series. I’m SURE it would have been a bit hit if they’d also shown him surfing, say, or driving a London bus.
August 12th, 2013 at 7:14 pm
Git your motor growlin’
Wag out on the highway
Sniffin’ out adventure
Pausing at lampposts in mah way
You and me we’re gonna catch some sticks
Take the world with big wet licks
Gettin’ away with inappropriate behaviour
Who needs to be housetrained?
Like a true nature’s pooch
We were born, born to wake you up at half three in the morning…
Er, it’s getting away from me now.
August 12th, 2013 at 7:14 pm
Needs a “Font problems” tag – note the random italic letters in the title, and the Y, which seems to be from a different typeface altogether.
August 12th, 2013 at 7:17 pm
@ SI, I think she meant to say, “A collection of short stories, in a time when genre readers like to lose themselves in an open-ended series of 800-page novels, was always going to be a difficult sell.”
August 12th, 2013 at 8:06 pm
If that story is not called “Dog on a Hog” they really dropped the ball.
August 12th, 2013 at 9:27 pm
@rags: ‘Harley and Me’
August 13th, 2013 at 2:51 am
“I’m a Mog, half man, half dog. I’m my own best friend.”
August 13th, 2013 at 2:56 am
I LOVE this site, so am perhaps perversely happy to have a book I edited show up here. Story behind the cover is that the cover for the first volume was amazing and promoted the idea of a cross-genre anthology–both mainstream and genre–but the publisher wasn’t able to push the brand in the right way, and decided on a more genre-y cover for the second volume…I can’t say I ever loved this cover, and this one tanked in part because we abandoned our brand too soon, but we didn’t have any choice at the time due to bookstore pressure. Anyway, it is indeed a dog on a hog. LOL!!!
August 13th, 2013 at 3:23 am
At least this looks like some kind of dog-man, rather than a man with a dog’s head. I suppose that’s some kind of improvement.
August 13th, 2013 at 4:39 am
The “Y” is indeed the capital italic “Y” of that typeface.
August 13th, 2013 at 6:33 am
The dog is probably a mule running a shipment of horse across the border for some fat cat.
August 13th, 2013 at 2:43 pm
@B. Chiclitz — The dog was then arrested by the pigs because some snake ratted him out.
August 13th, 2013 at 6:33 pm
@B’Mancer—
🙂
August 13th, 2013 at 10:05 pm
Born To Be Spayed
August 14th, 2013 at 12:25 am
@Bibliomancer – And then in prison he turned stool pigeon to avoid being turned into someone’s bitch.
August 14th, 2013 at 8:11 am
Random italics are the best italics! Also doubt the wisdom to put in a dog-themed cover and mentioning Peter S. *Beagle* on it, as awesome author as he is. The jokes just write themselves.
But still, dogs on motorcycles are awesome. Not as awesome as wolves on motorcycles though! Riding through the wilderness can be harsh.
August 18th, 2013 at 12:37 pm
Not so much “Easy Rider” as “Easy Rover”…
August 25th, 2013 at 6:11 pm
I was thinking Terrier on a Triumph, but ooops, ‘American’ fantasy. No helmet. Hmm, obviously a loner, a rebel, a 1%’er. A member of Satan’s Scottie Dogs perhaps?
August 26th, 2013 at 9:11 am
Fantasy publishing has gone to the dogs.
BA-DA-BUM! Thank you, thank you!
September 26th, 2013 at 2:48 pm
I wonder what he’s thinking about…
October 25th, 2013 at 3:48 am
@Tag Wizard — could we have an “authors in the comments” tag on this forgotten classic? Although, technically, Mr. Vandermeer is the editor.
October 25th, 2013 at 9:48 am
Certainly, sir. Thanks!
June 26th, 2014 at 3:40 pm
To me it looks like the mutt has a long-suffering expression on his face, as if he’s thinking, “Christ, can’t wait to get off this bike.”
April 27th, 2018 at 5:54 am
So this was the origin of the “author in the comments” tag?
April 27th, 2018 at 7:28 am
@Anti-Sceptic (30)—with that expression, maybe: “I wish everybody looking at this cover would stop assuming I just peed on the Rte. 66 sign.”
April 27th, 2018 at 12:39 pm
@RachelJ – Oh no. We had Harlan Ellison long before this.
April 27th, 2018 at 12:43 pm
@Raoul. Silly me. How could I forget that?
April 27th, 2018 at 12:48 pm
Question is this, in fact, a common thing for Americans to fantasise about? Being a motorcycle-riding canine?
April 27th, 2018 at 1:41 pm
Greatest TV show ever, both 60’s and 80’s.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqhbQ9zxgdU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0p8oeiVDcx4
April 27th, 2018 at 4:05 pm
You know, I always imagined that Route 66 looked a bit bigger, more desert-ish and less like Northamptonshire that this. At least Fido’s driving on the left, even if he’s ignoring helmet regulations for motorcyling in the UK.
April 27th, 2018 at 5:23 pm
It’s a muttercycle.
April 27th, 2018 at 6:32 pm
@Tor M: a-and a really fast one. Whenever the mutt gets in trouble, he just hops on his cycle and fleas!
April 27th, 2018 at 9:14 pm
I love going back to old posts…I think I’ve finally come to an answer of my 5 year old question: He’s thinking to himself (itself?) “Gosh, I’m bone tired of this long ride. A good thing that Rte. 66 sign was back there for me to pee on.” @B.Chiclitz 😉
April 27th, 2018 at 9:47 pm
Why settle for sticking you head out the window when you can ride an entire vehicle that’s out the window!
April 28th, 2018 at 11:09 am
The Random Italics is my new band name. Thanks,
Best American Fantasy 2.
April 28th, 2018 at 2:04 pm
@ drlemaster: Good show, sir! I LOL’d.
May 1st, 2018 at 2:41 am
“Ladeez, gents, and canines of the Route 66 Roadhouse, put yer paws together for Francis Boyle and The Random Italics!!!”
(that was hard to type!)
I’ve been on Route 66. It doesn’t look like that at all.
November 15th, 2019 at 10:02 am
BEST AMERICAN FANTASY 2020 will feature a State of the Union speech by the President.
November 16th, 2019 at 10:03 am
@ARY: No, that’s Worst American Horror 2020.
November 18th, 2019 at 5:52 am
@GSS ex-noob: in Fantasy America, the speech will be given by President Puppy Biker.
November 19th, 2019 at 5:43 am
@Bruce: It would be nice to have a Good Boy in the WH.
September 10th, 2022 at 5:10 am
I was just on Rt. 66 today. The bit that runs congruent with 11th St. in Tulsa, to be exact. I *really* doesn’t look like the book cover….