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Every year budding fantasy and SF writers send in their short stories to be read and possibly published in the next Writers of the Future volume. Judges, four in all, run their eyes over the new talent, and offer their own opinion on how good they are and if they are good enough; the judges in this case are; Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Eric Flint, Dean Wesley Smith and Mike Resnick. These judges were also winners in previous contests. In this volume there are 24 winning writers whose talents have made them a success today. K.D. Wentworth is the anthologies editor, the cover artwork is by contest judge Stephan Martiniere and called "Voyage,"" while judges Dean Wesley Smith and Stephen Youll penned their essays on how to write and illustrate respectively.

Writers: Digital Rights by Brent Knowles The Black Side of Memory by Lael Salaets Lisa with Child by Alex Black Living Rooms by Laurie Tom Not in the Flesh by Adam Colston Seeing Double by Tore Crosshill Exanastasis by Brad R. Torgerson Poison Inside the Walls by Scott W. Baker Confliction by Simon Cooper Coward's Steel by K.C. Ball Written in Light by Jeff Young The House of Nameless by Jason Fisher

Illustrators: Seth J. Rowanwood Irena Kovalencko Vera Locklear Tyler Carter Jordan Cornthwaite Olivia Pelaez Jingxuan Hu Kelsey Wroten Cassandra Shaffer Rebecca Gleason R.M. Winch Rachael Jade Sweeney

The Canadian winners this year are writer Brent Knowles and illustrator Seth Rowanwood who should go on to enjoy fruitful careers in writing and art.

This anthology comes with in-depth essays on writing and illustrating by L.Ron Hubbard, Dean Wesley Smith and Stephen Youll. "The Golden Pen" by L. Ron Hubbard goes into detail on how many people have the intense desire to write whether it is a story of a novel, yet many just start at a certain level and don't go any further for certain reasons; it might be the competition from other budding writers that puts them off competing, or the sheer effort of writing itself. Hubbard explains this in his essay, telling the reader that anyone can be a writer and a professional one at that if only they realise it. He does have a point though, as there are plenty of would-be writers who could get themselves out there -- it just takes them to get noticed, and this essay gives them a few ideas as to how they can do it.

"Standing Up" by Dean Wesley Smith is an essay along similar lines to the one above, but instead draws on many of his experiences as a writer, the highs and lows of being one, and what he did to get there after a long, hard struggle to get noticed.

As for the stories, In Ada Colston's "Not in the Flesh," Technical Officer Tanaka is faced with an android that is flawed and he has to find out what that flaw is, yet because the android has a human face, he finds it hard to come to terms with terminating it, if it does prove to have faults as they believe. What would have been a routine story turns out to be one with a moral to it that has enough heart to carry the reader through all the techno-babble.

Seth J. Rowanwood's illustration for Jason Fischer's "The House of Nameless" is suitably menacing, the whole picture resembles a tarot landscape with the disturbing imagery centred on a horned demon. The piece deserves recognition as it gives off certain bad vibrations that are well suited to the story.

"Digital Rights" by Brent Knowles explores the high-tech world of computers and technology that is way into the future and its implications on those who are having their computers hacked. The woman in this story is expressing this first hand and the story goes on to tell how she copes with it, and the fact some of her friends believe her when she tells them her messages have been sabotaged. Knowles writes with a fresh outlook on sci-fi and has created a strange new world that sounds daunting even if it is far away.

Sandra Scholes often looks round for new books to interest her, when she says interest; she means comic fantasy and never seems to find any. When she isn't continuing her vast search, she writes regularly for Quailbell Magazine, The Chronicle, Love Romance Passion and Love Vampires -- it keeps her off the streets!