Cascor is a Discriminator whom we first encounter in a Raffalon story, set in Mr. Hughes’s version of Jack Vance’s Dying Earth; this anthology contains all of the Raffalon stories that feature Cascor, as well as about four stories in which Cascor himself is the main character and two new stories that center more on Margolyam, a sorceress who works with Cascor. The last two, “Tome-Tickler” and “The Touch,” are original to this volume; the others have been previously published in F&SF. I like Cascor - he’s often a pawn of the gods (or godlings), but manages to maintain a sense of himself most of the time and that self is quite committed to his work. He also, over the period of time covered in these stories, comes to see Margolyam and his other co-workers as a makeshift family of sorts, even having all of them live together. I especially liked the new stories, though, because the first provides a new side to Margolyam that we had not previously seen and the second gives her backstory, which is quite satisfying. In his introduction, Mr. Hughes says that these are the last stories that he will set in this world (he’s been writing historical fiction lately), but I hope he changes his mind because I for one would love to read more about these characters. You don’t need to be familiar with this universe before starting these stories and if you like them, you can be happy with the knowledge that there are a number of other books that are available so you can visit that world many more times in the future; recommended! ( )