The Best American Essays 2002
edited by Stephen Jay Gould
series editor Robert Atwan
Houghton Mifflin, pb
$13.00/$10.40

Edited by Cambridge's Stephen Jay Gould, this year's edition includes Jacques Barzun, David Halberstam, Sebastian Junger, Gore Vidal, and Garry Wills among many others.

The Best American Mystery Stories 2002
edited by James Ellroy, series editor Otto Penzler
Houghton Mifflin, pb
$13.00/$10.40

The perennially popular anthology is a favorite of mystery buffs and general readers alike. This year, the world-renowned author James Ellroy lends his estimable talent to the series, offering pieces from the likes of Robert B. Parker, Joyce Carol Oates, Michael Connelly, and Stuart Kaminsky.

The Best American Nonrequired Reading
edited by Dave Eggers
series editor Michael Cart
Houghton Mifflin, pb
$13.00/$10.40

The Best American Nonrequired Reading is a selection for young people of the best literature from mainstream and alternative American periodicals: from the New Yorker to Jane, Rolling Stone to The Onion, and other magazines, 'zines, and journals that, if you're over thirty, you may never have heard of. This genre-busting collection includes fiction-young, coming-of-age, multicultural-and nonfiction, including articles on popular culture and politics, profiles, humor, satire, even alternative comics.

The Best American Science and Nature Writing 2002
edited by Natalie Angier
series editor Tim Folger
Houghton Mifflin, pb
$13.00/$10.40

This year's edition promises to be another eclectic, provocative collection, edited by Natalie Angier, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the best-selling Women: An Intimate Geography. Malcolm Gladwell, Joy Williams, Barbara Ehrenreich, Burkhard Bilger, and Dennis Overbye explore such topics as the rise and fall of Islamic science, disappearing cancers, and the meaning of mountain lions in the back yard.

The Best American Short Stories 2002
edited by Sue Miller
series editor Katrina Kenison
Houghton Mifflin
$13.00/$10.40

This year's most beloved short fiction anthology is edited by the best-selling novelist Sue Miller. The volume includes stories by Edwidge Danticat, Jill McCorkle, E. L. Doctorow, Arthur Miller, and Akhil Sharma, among others.

The Best Spiritual Writing 2002
edited by Philip Zaleski
introduction by Natalie Goldberg
HarperSanFrancisco/HarperCollins, pb
$15.95/$12.76

Philip Zaleski has brought together a collection of wise and lyrical writing about art, intimacy, prayer, love, and faith including such distinguished writers as Harvey Cox, Philip Levine, Barry Lopez, Bill McKibben, W. S. Merwin, Czeslaw Milosz, and Toni Morrison.