Bill Congreve and Michelle Marquardt are both publishers (as 'MirrorDanse') and editors of the new series of Year's Best Australian Science Fiction & Fantasy. They are determined to hold up the flag of Australian science fiction, however difficult.

Congreve and Marquardt have had no problems finding good stories. Australia is crawling with ambitious science fiction writers and publishers. Usually writers' work emerges from small 'alternative' publishers whose books are sold in specialist stores.

The stories this year show high technical competency. You won't find better writing in any recent collection of mainstream Australian short stories.

Margo Lanagan's poetic and intense prose has already been recognised. Her two books, White Time and Black Juice, have jumped into international recognition.

"Singing My Sister Down", her story in Year's Best, is picking up awards everywhere. On the surface, it is merely the story of a strange form of execution. The person to be executed, the 'sister' of the title, stands in a mud lake, until she sinks beneath it. This process takes all day, and the storyteller and his mother spend that whole day with their sister.

Lanagan's sensuous and empathic prose takes us into the heart of this alien civilisation.

In Terry Dowling's "Flashmen", Earth is afflicted by aliens so different that humans have trouble understanding or defending themselves against them. Do these aliens even realise humans live on Earth? Bands of heroes who tackle these aliens find themselves part of a separate warrior culture.

Other stories in this fine collection are by Kim Westwood, Rjurik Davidson, Brendon D.

Carson, Geoffrey Maloney, Brendan Duffy, and Ben Peek.