Inconstant Moon is a collection of seven short stories (some versions of this book have more). They are all set in the future by some degree, mostly somewhere in space.
Collections of short stories are often hard to review. In this set, two stood out as being particularly interesting - Inconstant Moon and Bordered in Black. The former of these is almost more a love story than sci-fi, but nonetheless interesting, telling the tale of a couple spending their last night alive. I liked this story mostly because it is... nice. No remarkable invention, just relatively ordinary people realising that there is nothing they can do to save themselves.
Bordered in Black is much darker, telling the tale of a the return of the first faster-than-light ship, with just one of the two crew left and a tale that either offers enormous hope, or terrible threat. What I liked about this story is the implication of threat rather than the reality of it - this isn't just a story about going to another star system and being shot at.
But... to be honest, the stories in this book are not particularly remarkable. I mean, they're perfectly readable, they make you think, and I quite liked the fact that they're mostly set in the same universe. But, I doubt I'll pick this up to read it again. It's worth a read if you have it, and if you're a big Larry Niven fan you might really like it, but I'd not go out of my way to find it.
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