I found that the fervor of getting a new book quickly died while reading this storybook. The stories did not explain themselves well. Many brought in characters without explaining who they were or how they got there, and in quite a few of these stories nothing at all happened until the last page of the tale. If youre looking for an exciting book with a good storyline and interesting characters, I suggest you pass this book by. However it would be insulting to suggest that the language used to write the books was not well done. The main problem with this book is that many of the stories hardly ever explained themselves. Even though the overall book was not my cup of tea there were definite high points. My favorite story was The Devil is a Gentleman, by Raymond Benson. It interesting and fast-paced, plus it explained itself very well and was anything but boring. Another story I enjoyed very much was Protection, by Timothy Zahn. I found it fast paced, exiting and well written. In complete contrast to my favorite stories are stories that I found so confusing and slow that I couldnt even finish them. Two of these are Siren Tears, by John Lambshed, in which nothing much happened except that a man walked around town, and Black Rider, by Brian Hopkins, which started off well and then just seemed to drift into nonsense. All in all, not one of the better books Ive ever read.