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story identification - Anthology: Vampirism as a cure for HIV; house full of odd characters; arrows on a path through the afterlife


In the mid-90's, I read a wonderful collection of stories that I've been trying to find since. The book was titled something like Year's Best Science Fiction & Fantasy Stories, I believe published in some time in the 1980's or early 1990's.



Some of the stories I remember included:



  • A women tries to convince a vampire to transform her as a way to cure her HIV infection.

  • A man with the power to control minds comes upon a house populated by other strange characters, including a sentient radio, an old man with a lightning bolt tattoo who flies around the world to keep the Earth's plates stitched together, and a woman in the attic who uncontrollably shape-shifts into the love of whoever she talks to.

  • A story in the afterlife, where people are endlessly walking down a path, and two characters begin unlocking the subtle code of the arrows inscribed on the ground.


Any help tracking this book down would be greatly appreciated!



Answer



The Year's Best Fantasy Stories 13 (1987).


The first story you described is Something in the Blood by Richard Purtill.



The second one is A Place to Stay for a Little While by Jim Aikin.


Excerpt:



It was a very unusual household among whose members were a man who patched holes in the world, a shapechanger, and even a talking radio. It was also a very peaceful domicile until a man who had the ability to control minds became a resident.


“I can't cope,” Cynthia Lutz said to the radio. “I simply cannot cope.” “Oh, come on,” the radio said. It was a wooden table model that dated from about 1933. "Things aren't that bad. Things have been this bad before.”



The third story could be Long, Long Ago by R. Chetwynd-Hayes.


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