As a reader the best part of an interlinked short story collection is the links. Whenever I stumble upon a connection in my reading I am delighted. There’s lots of clever linking in unexpected ways…
Posts tagged Short Stories
Bark is Kind of a Bore
A new short story collection by Lorrie Moore had me giddy with anticipation when it arrived on my doorstep lo those many months ago when the arctic February winds howled and most of Minnesota was…
Of Course it Doesn’t Suck
I recently confessed on Book Riot, that I might be the slightest bit irrational when it comes to the books of Elizabeth McCracken. I discovered Elizabeth McCracken in the mid-nineties about the same time I…
One More Ugh: Ughs & Other Ughs
I can’t remember the last time I read a book as sad and cynical as B.J. Novak’s collection of flash fiction One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories. I can’t tell if these stories are…
The reason I sing J. Geils Band’s ‘Centerfold’ every morning
The titles of Karen Russell’s books make my brain do a kind of Weird-Al-esque karaoke. I like to believe this has more to do with Russell’s imaginative stories infiltrating my brain than anything else. When…
No such thing as just a girl
Every six months or so for the past decade, I’d randomly type ‘Elissa Schappell’ into Amazon’s search bar and cross my fingers. I kept hoping and hoping that she had released a book that some…
Everyone should just stop writing stories about offices now
If I had a dollar for every time I have referenced, linked to, or told someone about Daniel Orozco’s short story “Orientation” (which you can listen to right here, fast forward to about 50:45), I…
Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self
Sometimes when I read short story collections I try to figure out what the author’s thing is. By thing I mean the big issue they address in their writing. While it’s easy to extrapolate from…
Literary husbandry
In my head if Mary Gaitskill’s writing and Philip Roth’s writing were to meet, have sex, and create a baby, that baby would be Gina Frangello’s writing. I choose Gaitskill because, like Frangello, she writes…