This collection of Greg Bear's major short fiction ably demonstrates why Bear is one of science fiction's most popular authors. The multiple Hugo and Nebula Award winner offers here a feast of his most famous stories and novellas, accompanied by thoughtful introductions and afterwords that provide insight into the writer and his process. This collection contains Bear's earliest published fiction from the late 1960s and early 1970s as well his remarkable award-winning work from the 1980s and 1990s—stories like the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning novella-length version of "Blood Music" and the Hugo and Nebula Award-winner "Tangents." Also included are The Wind from a Burning Woman," in which despair and anger inspire a young woman's terrible act of vengeance; "The White Horse Child," a loving look at the nascence of the creative impulse; "Dead Run," in which the road to hell is paved with concrete, and not all intentions are good; and over twenty others.