BEST SF: 1972

Superior, mostly somber, science fiction, offering among other acrid pleasures two death-centered art forms dreamed up by Aldiss and Priest, Haldeman's view of the underside of the future army Heinlein once glamorized, Keith Robert's effective variation on the what-if-the-Nazis-won-the-war theme, Purdy's look at tomorrow's version of due process, and -- as relief from the gloom -- Alex Hamilton's charming tale about the night the words escaped.