The distant and near future, artificial intelligence and the transformation of human biological nature, postmodern literary game and detective story, post-apocalypse and alternative reality, space expansion, living ships and contacts with alien intelligence, Earth, the solar system and deep space - the whole spectrum of science fiction featured in Gardner Dozois's new anthology. As always, he brings to the reader's attention the best examples of the genre - novels and stories written by Alastair Reynolds, Paul Macauley, Pat Cadigan, Adam Roberts, Richard Charles Wilson, Robert Reed, Hannu Ryaniemi and many others.