Collection of 22 master works of science fiction/fantasy by 22 authors who are gifted at story-telling and suspense. Selections by Bova; Watson; Goonan; Bishop; Moorcock; Tuttle; Carlson; Maltzberg; Koja; McDonald; Allmen; Dysos; Somtow; Fowler; De Lint, Braunbeck; Greenland; Gaiman; Gallagher; Linaweaver; Collins; Buckley; Constantine.

Includes brief idiosyncratic "Biographies" of the authors [omitted from TOC], and a "first-foot" of the "tome of tomes" dedicated to Ib J Melchior "world-class authority on the Bard of Avon", who is parodied as "Shockspeare" in a consopitious pretension to ono-eroticism using his "big words".

I found this anthology just okay in general. The stories are "about the things which bind us all... both physically and emotionally," a mix of fantasy, horror and sci-fi. As I see it, they all seem to have a theme of tombs -- not necessarily literal ones -- or death. Not all the stories appealed to me, and some I simply didn't get; maybe they just aren't to my taste. However, there are a few gems for me in the collection -- "The Unchained," beautifully written by Kathe Koja and Barry N. Malzberg; "But None I Think Do There Embrace," a witty urban fantasy by S. P. Somtow; and of course, "Queen of Knives," an unsettling poem by Master Storyteller Neil Gaiman. There were other pieces I also liked, including those by Ian McDonald, Jeremy Dyson, Christopher Fowler, Nancy A. Collins, William F. Buckley Jr., and Storm Constantine. ( )