Tom Shippey inherited J. R. R. Tolkien's Chair of Medieval English Language at the University of Leeds, where he taught the syllabus Tolkien had set up. He now holds the Walter J. Ong Chair of Humanities at St Louis University, Missouri, specializing in Medieval Literature, Old English Arthurian and Romance Literature, Fantasy, and Science Fiction. He has written and edited numerous books, including J. R. R. Tolkien: Author of the Century (2001), The Road to Middle-earth (second edition, 1992), The Oxford Book of Fantasy Stories (reissue, 2003), and Fiction 2000: Cyberpunk and the Future of Narrative (co-edited with George Slusser, 1993).

Review from previous edition 'both authoritative and audacious, up-to-date and historically wise, the best yet introduction to a bewildering field'

• Introduction ; The Land Ironclads ; Finis ; As Easy as ABC ; The Metal Man ; A Martian Odyssey ; Night ; Desertion ; The Piper's Son ; The Monster ; The Second Night of Summer ; Second Dawn ; Crucifixus Etiam ; The Tunnel Under the World ; Who Can Replace a Man? ; Billennium ; The Ballard of Lost C'mell ; Semley's Necklace ; How Beautiful with Banners ; A Criminal Act ; Problems of Creativeness ; How the Whip Came Back ; Cloak of Anarchy ; A Thing of Beauty ; The Screwfly Solution ; The Way of Cross and Dragon ; Swarm ; Burning Chrome ; Silicon Muse ; Karl and the Ogre ; Piecework ; Select Bibliography ; Sources

Tom Shippey inherited J. R. R. Tolkien's Chair of Medieval English Language at the University of Leeds, where he taught the syllabus Tolkien had set up. He now holds the Walter J. Ong Chair of Humanities at St Louis University, Missouri, specializing in Medieval Literature, Old English Arthurian and Romance Literature, Fantasy, and Science Fiction. He has written and edited numerous books, including J. R. R. Tolkien: Author of the Century (2001), The Road to Middle-earth (second edition, 1992), The Oxford Book of Fantasy Stories (reissue, 2003), and Fiction 2000: Cyberpunk and the Future of Narrative (co-edited with George Slusser, 1993).

Review from previous edition 'both authoritative and audacious, up-to-date and historically wise, the best yet introduction to a bewildering field'

• Introduction ; The Land Ironclads ; Finis ; As Easy as ABC ; The Metal Man ; A Martian Odyssey ; Night ; Desertion ; The Piper's Son ; The Monster ; The Second Night of Summer ; Second Dawn ; Crucifixus Etiam ; The Tunnel Under the World ; Who Can Replace a Man? ; Billennium ; The Ballard of Lost C'mell ; Semley's Necklace ; How Beautiful with Banners ; A Criminal Act ; Problems of Creativeness ; How the Whip Came Back ; Cloak of Anarchy ; A Thing of Beauty ; The Screwfly Solution ; The Way of Cross and Dragon ; Swarm ; Burning Chrome ; Silicon Muse ; Karl and the Ogre ; Piecework ; Select Bibliography ; Sources

Tom Shippey inherited J. R. R. Tolkien's Chair of Medieval English Language at the University of Leeds, where he taught the syllabus Tolkien had set up. He now holds the Walter J. Ong Chair of Humanities at St Louis University, Missouri, specializing in Medieval Literature, Old English Arthurian and Romance Literature, Fantasy, and Science Fiction. He has written and edited numerous books, including J. R. R. Tolkien: Author of the Century (2001), The Road to Middle-earth (second edition, 1992), The Oxford Book of Fantasy Stories (reissue, 2003), and Fiction 2000: Cyberpunk and the Future of Narrative (co-edited with George Slusser, 1993).

Review from previous edition 'both authoritative and audacious, up-to-date and historically wise, the best yet introduction to a bewildering field'

• Introduction ; The Land Ironclads ; Finis ; As Easy as ABC ; The Metal Man ; A Martian Odyssey ; Night ; Desertion ; The Piper's Son ; The Monster ; The Second Night of Summer ; Second Dawn ; Crucifixus Etiam ; The Tunnel Under the World ; Who Can Replace a Man? ; Billennium ; The Ballard of Lost C'mell ; Semley's Necklace ; How Beautiful with Banners ; A Criminal Act ; Problems of Creativeness ; How the Whip Came Back ; Cloak of Anarchy ; A Thing of Beauty ; The Screwfly Solution ; The Way of Cross and Dragon ; Swarm ; Burning Chrome ; Silicon Muse ; Karl and the Ogre ; Piecework ; Select Bibliography ; Sources