My "best of the year" picks: 2010

My picks follow, in no particular order. Actually, I normally add new entries at bottom - so list is generally in order in which I found the stories.

Here is some background information, & how I pick the stories.

The list.

Links on author or publisher name fetch more matching fiction.

1. [ss] Peter Watts' "The Things"; download text/MP3; Clarkesworld, #40 (January 2010); fanfic: A retelling of John Campbell's "Who Goes There?" from the point of view of the alien.
2. [ss] E O Wilson's "Trailhead"; download; The New Yorker, 25 January 2010; hard sf: Life-cycle of a colony of ants!
3. [novelette] Claire Keegan's "Foster"; download; The New Yorker, 15 February 2010; non-genre: Portrait of some typical people around us, seen through the eyes of a little girl.
4. [ss] Nathan Englander's "Free Fruit for Young Widows"; download; The New Yorker, 17 May 2010; non-genre: Experience in a German concentration camp during World War II has killed something human in a survivor.
   
   Caution: It's a very dark story.
5. [ss] Eric Brown's "Laying the Ghost"; download text/audio; Clarkesworld, #49 (October 2010): A woman is about to bury...

Related.

1. Fiction originally published during 2010.
   
2. My "best of the year" 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009 picks.
3. "Best of" lists.

Legend: ss = short story; ff = flash fiction.