Twenty substantial stories, 195095, featuring magic in all its many and startling guises. Included are: ``Mazirian the Magician,'' from Jack Vance's first masterpiece, The Dying Earth; a tale of Lankhmar and Gray Mouser, from Fritz Leiber; one of Larry Niven's ``fading magic'' yarns; magic in pre-Revolutionary America (Katherine Kurtz); Zenna Henderson's classic ``The Anything Box''; one of Ursula K. Le Guin's stories from which developed the magnificent Wizard of Earthsea trilogy; Merlin vs. Lancelot (Roger Zelazny); and the ultimate magic word (F. Paul Wilson). Wrapping up the all-star cast are: Orson Scott Card, Robert Silverberg, Melanie Rawn, Joe Haldeman, Raymond E. Feist, C.J. Cherryh, Andre Norton, Mercedes Lackey, Ray Bradbury, Marion Zimmer Bradley, Greg Bear, and Christopher Stasheff. A well-chosen, pleasingly varied assemblage that deftly avoids both the overly familiar and the tediously obscure.
