Mike Resnick is a prolific science fiction novelist, a distinguished SF anthologist, and the author of tales about the galaxy’s deadliest assassin, its finest brothel, its most powerful telepath, and its only traveling carnival. You might suspect that he’d also be capable of writing highly polished short stories that span an astonishing variety of subjects and moods. You’d be right, and Will the Last Person to Leave the Planet Please Shut Off the Sun? is proof of it.

Many of the stories that make up the collection fit into one or another of Resnick’s larger fictional projects. Two are from his award-winning Kirinyaga cycle, one is set in the alternate New York City of the John Justin Mallory novels (Stalking the Unicorn and sequels), and two are part of a loose series of alternate-history adventures centered on Teddy Roosevelt. Others are one-off tales written for other people’s anthologies, demonstrating Resnick’s penchant for writing “against the grain” of such projects.

Humor abounds – corruption at the elephant-racing track, a bar owner's battle of wits with a bureaucrat, and Robin Hood's mom kvetching about her son -- but this is more than just a collection of funny stories. "Watching Marcia" is a creepy look inside the mind of a stalker-voyeur, "The Last Dog" a moving tale of inter-species friendship, and "Beachcomber" a piece of literary sleight-of-hand that transforms the comic image of a robot half-buried in the beach at Coney Island into a serious meditation on what it means to be human. The last story, "Winter Solstice," is a tale about Merlin and old age: poignant in its own right, and heartbreaking if (having read the author's note) you know what inspired it.

If you're already a fan of Resnick's work, this collection is well worth your time; if you're not, it's an excellent introduction. ( )