Description:
When an anthology is titled Women Writing Science Fiction as Men, readers expect either stories on the cutting edge of feminist/gender theory, or a tribute to the late James Tiptree, Jr., the female author everyone thought was male. However, the anthology meets neither expectation. It has a different mandate. In his introduction, editor Mike Resnick states, "there is a difference in writing about a male and writing as a male." The all-female contributors were charged to write "as a male," with "each story...told in the first person of a man, and...if changing the narrator from Victor to Victoria invalidated the story we didn't want it." However, the anthology doesn't follow two-thirds of its own rules. Neither sex "change" nor biosex has had a discernable effect. The narrators tend to hold "traditionally male" jobs like astronaut, cop, soldier, engineer, superspy, and messiah, but females in these roles are hardly unusual (except messiah, a role also rare for males, and superspy, a role that doesn't exist in reality). Further, four of these sixteen original stories present Victors that cannot readily be turned into Victorias: a rapist, a James Bond parody, and two fellows fighting near-future paternity suits. Additionally, one story is narrated by a Victoria! The contributors include some big names and hot up-and-comers, among them Kay Kenyon, Mercedes Lackey, Susan R. Matthews, Terry McGarry, Severna Park, Laura Resnick, Jennifer Roberson, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Karen E. Taylor, and singer-songwriter Janis Ian. --Cynthia Ward
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