The February 2004 issue of Locus Magazine is the annual Year-in-Review issue, looking back at 2003, with:

• Recommended reading essays by Locus reviewers (and a couple guests)
  
  
• Summaries of the year in book and magazine publishing
  
  
• And a composite recommended reading list of books and stories
  
  
• Plus, the ballot for this year's Locus Poll and Survey
  
  

• An interview with writer Spider Robinson
  
  
• News stories covering the preliminary Nebula ballot, the Philip K. Dick Award nominees, Ursula K. Le Guin's ALA Lifetime Award, the controversy of British Honours, and more
  
  
• People & Publishing items about Ursula K. Le Guin, Geoffrey A. Landis, Anne Rice, Stephen R. Donaldson, Frank M. Robinson, Carol Emshwiller, Dan Simmons, and many others
  
  
• Obituaries of Joan Aiken (with an appreciation by John Clute), Jack Cady (with an appreciation by Gordon Van Gelder), and Norman Talbot
  
  
• Lots of reviews, including Gary K. Wolfe on new novels by Gregory Benford and Ken MacLeod, Faren Miller on Robin Hobb and Karen Traviss, Russell Letson on Neal Stephenson, Nick Gevers on Mary Gentle, Carolyn Cushman on Mercedes Lackey and Kristine Kathryn Rusch, and Karen Haber on Neil Gaiman and Frank Frazetta, among many others