Anthologies & Short Stories

Book SynopsisTrade Review“For the past decade, Penguin has been producing handsome hardcover versions of their classics (…) both elegant and quirky in shocks of bright color” –The New York Times

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Book SynopsisThe perfect gift this Christmas season: a generous selection of some of the greatest festive stories of all timeThis is a collection of the most magical, moving, chilling and surprising Christmas stories from around the world, taking us from frozen Nordic woods to glittering Paris, a New York speakeasy to an English country house, bustling Lagos to midnight mass in Rio, and even outer space. Here are classic tales from writers including Truman Capote, Shirley Jackson, Dylan Thomas, Saki and Chekhov, as well as little-known treasures such as Italo Calvino''s wry sideways look at Christmas consumerism, Wolfdietrich Schnurre''s story of festive ingenuity in Berlin, Selma Lagerlof''s enchanted forest in Sweden, and Irène Nemerovsky''s dark family portrait. Featuring santas, ghosts, trolls, unexpected guests, curmudgeons and miracles, here is Christmas as imagined by some of the greatest short story writers of all time.Trade ReviewFrom Hans Christian Andersen to Angela Carter, this greatest hits compilation also happens to be beautifully published. Inside you'll find ghosts, miracles, grouchy curmudgeons and plenty of snow * Daily Mail Books of the Year *Perfect for any looming Boxing Day boredom. The list of rather superior contributors includes the likes of Truman Capote, Shirley Jackson, Italo Calvino and Dylan Thomas * Herald Scotland Books of the Year *

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Book SynopsisCecelia Ahern at her quirky, magical best' Daily MailNow an Apple Original series from Apple TV+A story for every woman.A story for every moment.Whether you want to laughTo be movedTo loveTo feel less guiltTo cryTo be comfortedTo ROARThere is a story for you.From Sunday Times bestselling author Cecelia Ahern comes a collection of witty, original and moving stories for women everywhere.Funny, wise and weighty, in a very good wayread one or two of Ahern's fables at a time [to] truly appreciate their wit, pathos and imagination.' IndependentWitty, playful, entertaining but also thought-provoking, salutary and empowering' Daily MailA Radio 2 Bookclub Choice.Trade Review‘A wonderful, inspiring collection…the kind of book everyone should have on their shelf’ Libby Page, bestselling author of The Lido ‘These provocative and witty stories prove it’s time to recognise Cecelia Ahern as one of our finest writers’ John Boyne, bestselling author of The Heart’s Invisible Furies ‘These stories sing from the page … sharp, clever, witty: a joy to read’ Donal Ryan, bestselling author of The Spinning Heart ‘An impressive, timely and entertaining collection’ Observer ‘Confidential, sympathetic and witty’ The Times ‘Funny, magical, her most powerful, most feminist work yet’ Irish Sunday Independent ‘Smart and provocative…told with wit and verve.’ Mirror ‘Intriguing, substantial and impactful…The quiet call to arms that women never knew they needed’ Irish Independent ‘Witty, smart, perpetually readable, this is the perfect collection’ Heat ‘Inventive and ingenious, with a doffing of the cap to Angela Carter and Margaret Atwood’ Stylist ‘Witty and relatable’ Woman and Home ‘Stories worth waiting for’ Image ‘Rich, challenging and comic’ Daily Express ‘Thought-provoking, clever and humorous… startlingly original and very enjoyable’ Women’s Weekly

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Book SynopsisOne of Stevenson's most famous and enduringly popular works, the Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde describes the mysterious relationship between a respectable and affable doctor and his brutal associate. Set in the grimy streets of Victorian London, this tale of murder, split personality and obscure science, with its chilling final revelation, became an instant horror classic when it was first published in 1886, and has enthralled and terrified generations of readers ever since. This volume also contains seven other Gothic stories by Stevenson - such as 'The Body Snatchers', 'Markheim' and 'Olalla' - showcasing the author's mastery of the horror genre and his interest in both the otherworldly and the strange ways the human brain can distort reality.

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Book SynopsisJorge Luis Borges''s Labyrinths is a collection of short stories and essays showcasing one of Latin America''s most influential and imaginative writers. This Penguin Modern Classics edition is edited by Donald A. Yates and James E. Irby, with an introduction by James E. Irby and a preface by André Maurois.Jorge Luis Borges was a literary spellbinder whose tales of magic, mystery and murder are shot through with deep philosophical paradoxes. This collection brings together many of his stories, including the celebrated ''Library of Babel'', whose infinite shelves contain every book that could ever exist, ''Funes the Memorious'' the tale of a man fated never to forget a single detail of his life, and ''Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote'', in which a French poet makes it his life''s work to create an identical copy of Don Quixote. In later life, dogged by increasing blindness, Borges used essays and brief tantalising parables to explore the enigma of time

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Book SynopsisThe Complete Short Stories of Roald Dahl in the second of two unsettling and sinister volumes.''Dahl finds the child in the adult and the adult in the child and, with a little smile, he sticks the knife in both'' Anthony Horowitz, from his introductionRoald Dahl is one of the world''s most popular writers, equally at home writing for both children and adults. In this, the second of two volumes chronologically collecting all his published adult short stories, we experience Dahl''s dark and powerful imagination in full flight in 28 stories written between 1954 and 1988 (including eight tales which are not available in any other printed edition).Here, in ''Parson''s Pleasure'', a piece of furniture is the subject of a deceitful bargain; in ''William and Mary'', a wife revenges herself on her dead husband; and in ''Royal Jelly'' some new parents find an unusual and unsettling way to give their newborn its start in life.Whether you''re

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Book SynopsisNights of the Creaking Bed is full of colourful characters involved in affecting dramas: a girl who is rejected in love because she has three brothers to look after; a middle aged housewife who finds love again but has an impossible decision to make; a young man who can't get the image of his naked, beautiful mother out of his mind; a child so poor he has to hawk onions on Christmas day - and many others. Some, initially full of hope, find their lives blighted by the cruelty of others, or by being in the wrong place at the wrong time, or by just not knowing the "right" people. Corruption, religious intolerance, gratuitous violence, the irresponsible attitudes of some men to their offspring and the importance of joy are some of the big themes that underlie this memorable collection.Trade Review"This is a cohesive, stylish collection, with atmospheric scenes and noir elements. Toni Kan's stories look behind shuttered window to express the unspeakable in the everyday." - Molara Wood, writer and cultural critic; “Beginning with deliberate brevity and ending on a note of lush lyricism, these fascinating vignettes of Lagos life showcase an array of peripatetic characters who are hopelessly stuck in their dilemmas.” - Sefi Atta, author of Everything Good Will Come;Table of ContentsStrangers 1 The Passion of Pololo 13 My Perfect Life 20 Broda Sonnie 35 The Harbinger 47 Nights of the Creaking Bed 56 The Echo of Silence 62 God is Listening 69 Ahmed 87 Buzz 94 Onions 107 The Devil’s Overtime 113 The Car They Borrowed 134 Sad Eyes 145 The Phone Call Goodnight 150

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Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics.I am writing this under an appreciable mental strain, since by tonight I shall be no more.This selection of works showcases the best-known, most chilling stories of H. P. Lovecraft, including Dagon, The Call of Cthulhu, The Thing on the Doorstep and Herbert West Reanimator. They feature such deadly horrors as terrifying sea-creatures, menaces from outer space, evil-worshipping cults and unexpected murder by familiar hands. There is no place so frightful that Lovecraft did not venture there, and these tales will leave the imagination reeling, yet dare you to turn the pageTrade Review‘Lovecraft’s fiction … casts a spell. From generation to generation, the cult grows’ New York Times

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Book SynopsisRichard Yates was born in 1926 in New York and lived in California. His prize-winning stories began to appear in 1953 and his first novel, Revolutionary Road, was nominated for the National Book Award in 1961. He is the author of eight other works, including the novels A Good School, The Easter Parade, and Disturbing the Peace, and two collections of short stories, Eleven Kinds of Loneliness and Liars in Love. He died in 1992.Trade ReviewThe most perceptive author of the twentieth century * The Times *Yates is a realist par excellence, the natural heir to Hemingway's pared-to-the-bones style and the antecedent of Carver's flat minimalism. There is something else though: a kind of transparency, almost a translucency, that owes more to Fitzgerald, his great literary hero... Read and weep -- Kate Atkinson * Guardian *Yates created what is almost the New York equivalent of Dubliners * New York Times *Eloquent and powerful... Wryly funny even when he's quietly tearing your heart out * Harper's *Extravagantly gifted... Yates' eye and ear are unsurpassed; I know of no writer whose senses are in more admirable condition. It is they that make his characters live, make these stories move and beat - they, and the sure perfection of his writing * Esquire *

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Book SynopsisJulian Barnes is the author of thirteen novels, including The Sense of an Ending, which won the 2011 Man Booker Prize for Fiction, and Sunday Times bestsellers The Noise of Time and The Only Story. He has also written three books of short stories, four collections of essays and three books of non-fiction, including the Sunday Times number one bestseller Levels of Life and Nothing To Be Frightened Of, which won the 2021 Yasnaya Polyana Prize in Russia. In 2017 he was awarded the Légion d'honneur.Trade ReviewPulse is Barnes’s 17th book and is a masterclass in the shorter form. -- Elizabeth Day * Observer *Julian Barnes writes so exquisitely that every page of this collection contains literary pearls * Mail on Sunday *All the stories in Pulse have the absolute completeness and density of the very best short fiction * New Statesman *Masterclasses in the form, full of the sidelong wit and intelligence that make the writer one of our most consistently deft short-form stylists * Daily Telegraph *Barnes' stylish prose, eye for emotional detail and sense of absurdity never let him down... He suits the short story very well * Literary Review *

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Book SynopsisIsak Dinesen was the pen-name of Karen Blixen, who was born in Rungsted, Denmark in 1885. After studying art at Copenhagen, Paris and Rome, she married her cousin, Baron Bror Blixen-Finecke, in 1914. Together they went to Kenya to manage a coffee plantation. After their divorce in 1921, she continued to run the plantation until a collapse in the coffee market forced her back to Denmark in 1931.

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Book SynopsisThis new volume of eight short stories offers students of German at all levels the opportunity to enjoy a wide range of contemporary literature in the original, with the aid of parallel translations.The majority of these stories have been written in the past decade, and reflect a rich diversity of styles and themes. Complete with notes, the stories make excellent reading in either language.Table of ContentsShort Stories in GermanIntroductionThe Listener, or a Description of a Route with a Hidden MotiveSiegfried Lenz (b. 1926)Waiting for the Guests Dieter Wellershoff (b. 1925)Eating Mussels (Excerpt) Birgit Vanderbeke (b. 1956)The Good Old Days Gabriele Wohmann (b. 1932)Lascia Judith Hermann (b. 1970)Chicago/Shanty Town Georg Klein (b. 1953)Grandfather and the Decision-makers Christoph Hein (b. 1944)The Suspect Jurek Becker (b. 1937)Notes on German TextAcknowledgments

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Book SynopsisDorothy Parker, more than any of her contemporaries, captured the spirit of the Jazz Age in her poetry and prose, and The Collected Dorothy Parker includes an introduction by Brendan Gill in Penguin Modern Classics.Dorothy Parker was the most talked-about woman of her day, notorious as the hard-drinking bad girl with a talent for stinging repartee and endlessly quotable one-liners. The decadent 1920s and 1930s in New York were a time of great experiment and daring for women. For the rich, life seemed a continual party, but the excesses took their emotional toll. In the bitingly witty poems and stories collected here, along with her articles and reviews, she brilliantly captures the spirit of the decadent Jazz Age in New York, exposing both the dazzle and the darkness. But beneath the sharp perceptions and acidic humour, much of her work poignantly expresses the deep vulnerability of a troubled, self-destructive woman who, in the words of philosopher Irwin Edman, was '

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Book SynopsisFirst published in 1949, THE GOLDEN APPLES is an acutely observed, richly atmospheric portrayal of small town life in Morgana, Mississippi. There''s Snowdie, who has to bring up her twin boys alone after her husband, King Maclain, disappears one day, discarding his hat on the banks of the Big Black. There''s Loch Morrison, convalescing with malaria, who watches from his bedroom window as wayward Virgie Rainey meets a sailor in the vacant house opposite. Meanwhile, Miss Eckhart the piano teacher, grieving the loss of her most promising pupil, tries her hand at arson.Eudora Welty has a fine ear for dialogue and describes each of the characters in incisive, haunting prose. ''...in the South,'' she says, ''everybody stays busy talking all the time - they''re not sorry for you to overhear their tales''. Welty deftly picks up their stories to create an unflinching potrait of everyday life in the American South and offers a deeply moving look at human nature.Trade ReviewA great and generous achievement -- Jonathan RabanI doubt that a better book about 'the South' - one that more completely gets the feel of the particular texture of Southern life and its special tone and pattern - has ever been written * New Yorker *A hauntingly beautiful work...This excellent new edition is prefaced with an essay by Paul Binding which sheds light on the mythic structures that underpin the tales * The Independent, Paperbacks of the Year *

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Book SynopsisEdgar Allan Poe's extraordinary Gothic tales are classics of horror fiction, and created many of the conventions which still dominate the genre of detective fiction. This selection places the most popular against travel narrative, essays, and political satires.Trade ReviewI picked up The Pit and The Pendulum and Other Stories by Edgar Allan Poe, a collection which just got a convenient small hardcover reprint from Oxford University Press. * John DeNardo, Kirkus Reviews *With scholarly annotations and bibliography, an informative introduction, and useful chronology, Oxford University Press has produced a highly attractive volume suitable for all species of reader. * Chris Hill, The Fortean Times *Bound in glorious purple, this new edition of Edgar Allan Poe's tales from Oxford World's Classics reprints some neglected Poe tales among the usual classics. * Oliver Tearle, Interesting Literature *This is a fine introduction to not only the man himself but also the genre of Gothic fiction... Check it out if you have not already. * Ian Macleod, Frightfest *Table of ContentsIntroductionMS Found in a BottleBerenicëMorellaLigeiaThe Man That Was Used UpThe Fall of the House of UsherWilliam WilsonThe Man of the CrowdThe Murders in the Rue MorgueEleonoraThe Masque of the Red DeathThe Pit and the PendulumThe Mystery of Marie RogêtThe Tell-Tale HeartThe Gold-BugThe Black CatA Tale of the Ragged MountainsThe Purloined LetterThe Systems of Doctor Tarr and Professor FetherThe Imp of the PerverseThe Cask of AmontilladoThe Domain of ArnheimHop-FrogVon Kempelen and his DiscoveryExplanatory Notes

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Book SynopsisArthur Conan Doyle famously killed off Sherlock Holmes in 1893. While the outcry that supposedly followed was mostly apocryphal, Doyle was tempted to return to Holmes in 1901-2 with The Hound of the Baskervilles, the success of which led to a more permanent revival. The thirteen tales that followed make up this volume.Table of ContentsIntroduction Note on the Text Select Bibliography The Return of Sherlock Holmes The Empty House The Norwood Builder The Dancing Men The Solitary Cyclist The Priory School Black Peter Charles Augustus Milverton The Six Napoleons The Three Students The Golden Pince-Nez The Missing Three-Quarter The Abbey Grange The Second Stain Explanatory Notes

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Book Synopsis'Heart of Darkness' is Conrad's finest tale and tells of Marlow's journey up the Congo River to meet Mr Kurtz. This volume also includes 'An Outpost of Progress', 'Karain', and 'Youth' in a revised edition using the English first edition texts and with new chronology and bibliography.Table of ContentsAn Outpost of Progress ; Karain: A Memory ; Youth: A Narrative ; Heart of Darkness

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Book SynopsisHoffmann is among the greatest and most popular of the German Romantics. This selection, while stressing the variety of his work, puts in the foreground those tales in which the real and the supernatural are brought into contact and conflict. The humour of these tales is a result of the incongruity of supernatural beings at large in an ostentatiously everyday world. They include The Golden Pot, recognized as Hoffmann''s masterpiece by himself and posterity; its spine-chilling companion tale, The Sandman, which Offenbach drew on for his opera Tales of Hoffmann, and which Freud examines in his essay `The Uncanny''; two longer and more elaborate fantasies, set respectively in Germany and Italy; and the late story, My Cousin''s Corner Window, which shows the powers of the imagination being applied to everyday urban life, and marks a transition in European literature generally from Romanticism to Realism.Ritchie Robertson''s detailed introduction places the stories in their intellectual andTable of ContentsThe Golden Pot ; The Sandman ; Princess Brambilla ; Master Flea ; My Cousin's Corner Window

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Book SynopsisIn The Sketch-Book Washington Irving explores the uneasy relationship of an American writer to English literary traditions. He sketches a series of encounters with the cultural shrines of the parent nation, and in two brilliant experiments with tales transplanted from Europe creates the first classic American short stories, `Rip Van Winkle' and `The Legend of the Sleepy Hollow'.

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Book Synopsis''Askildsen''s dry, absurd humour is not unlike that of Beckett... His short stories are packed with irony, and the dialogue is sharp and expressive'' TLSSpare, taut and told with flashes of pitch-black humour, the short stories of Norwegian master Kjell Askildsen capture all the strangeness of modern existence. In this selection of tales, spanning the whole of his brilliant career, unnerving encounters occur, lonely individuals try to connect, families and relationships are fractured, and we are confronted by the fragility and absurdity of life.''Full of compelling strangeness. Lives surge through a few brittle pages, suppressed loves and resentments threaten to erupt'' IndependentTrade ReviewAskildsen's dry, absurd humour is not unlike that of Beckett... His short stories are packed with irony, and the dialogue is sharp and expressive * TLS *Offers stark portraits of male sexuality and familial dysfunction that are full of compelling strangeness. Lives surge through a few brittle pages, suppressed loves and resentments threaten to erupt. Characters are rarely isolated but their loneliness is palpable as they steal time in the shadows. Names recur throughout the book so the reader tries to connect people with events, but it's the loose ends which draw you back to these taut dramas * Independent *Kjell Askildsen has a completely unique ability to write low-key tension between people, razor-sharp and often chamber-like stories that hit you with relentless certainty. -- Sindre Hovdenakk * Verdens Gang, Norway *Askildsen, who has translated works by Brecht, similarly shines a spotlight on his characters, and that light is alienating and unforgiving, illuminating selfishness and stagnant relationships. -- LiterateurA master of the short story, Kjell Askildsen's unadorned style is not so much concerned with the manipulation of plotlines as with the manipulation of the reader's feelings and allegiances, with the presentation of characters as people, real people, people so like us that it's creepy, uncanny. -- Becky McMullan * Electric Literature *Reading Askildsen is like falling in love with someone you know will hurt you ... hypnotically alluring * Expressen, Sweden *One of the great storytellers of the human soul * ABC, Spain *Stark, minimalist stories, translated from Norwegian, about characters hungry for more than life has delivered * The New York Times *Relentlessly weird in the best possible way -- Zakia Uddin * The White Review *

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Book SynopsisLittle Clothbound Classics: irresistible, mini editions of short stories, novellas and essays from the world''s greatest writers, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith.Dorothy Parker was the most talked-about woman of the decadent 1920s, notorious as a hard-drinking bad girl with a talent for endlessly quotable one-liners. In the stories collected here, she brilliantly captures the spirit of the decadent Jazz Age in New York, exposing both the dazzle and the darkness. This selection includes among others ''The Standard of Living'', ''Mr Durant'' and her masterpiece, ''Big Blonde''.''She has fascinated generations with her wit, flair and talent'' The New York Review of Books

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Book SynopsisIntroducing Little Clothbound Classics: irresistible, mini editions of short stories, novellas and essays from the world''s greatest writers, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith.Celebrating the range and diversity of Penguin Classics, they take us from snowy Japan to springtime Vienna, from haunted New England to a sun-drenched Mediterranean island, and from a game of chess on the ocean to a love story on the moon. Beautifully designed and printed, these collectible editions are bound in colourful, tactile cloth and stamped with foil.Sam Selvon is now widely considered to be one of the greatest chroniclers of the West Indian emigrant experience. His evocation of voice, of place, of longing, defined for many the experience of a generation. Describing life in the Caribbean and day-to-day adventures in London, this collection features many his most acclaimed stories, including ''The Village Washer'', ''A Drink of Water'' and ''The Cricket Match''

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Book SynopsisMagic. It can get a guy killed. Return to the world of the Dresden Files with Harry Dresden (the only wizard in the Chicago phone book) and friends as they solve supernatural mysteries, protect the helpless, and fight evil.Brief Cases is a new collection of Dresden Files stories which will include an original novella, from international bestseller Jim Butcher.Stories included in this collection: ''Curses'', ''AAAA Wizardry'', ''Even Hand'', ''B is for Bigfoot'', ''I was a Teenage Bigfoot'', ''Bigfoot on Campus'', ''Bombshells'', ''Jury Duty'', ''Cold Case'', ''Day One'', ''A Fistful of Warlocks'', ''Zoo Day'' (original novella taking place between Skin Game and Peace Talks)Trade ReviewThe Dresden files is my favourite series everDresden has a vitality that few urban fantasy heroes can matchButcher's storytelling is satisfying on a level that's bone-deepAn intensely enjoyable series

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Book SynopsisHis words appear modest, but they have huge scope.'Wim WendersThis volume is the first collection of Sam Shepard's autobiographical fiction and poetry.It inspired the award-winning film, Paris, Texas.'Sam Shepard is the greatest U.S. playwright of his generation.

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Book SynopsisBringing together novelist Osamu Dazai's best autobiographical shorts in a single, slim volume, Self-Portraits shows the legendary writer at his best—and his worstTrade Review"Dazai was an aristocratic tramp, a self-described delinquent, yet he wrote with the forbearance of a fasting scribe." -- Patti Smith"What I despise about Dazai is that he exposes precisely those things in myself that I most want to hide." -- Yukio Mishima

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Book SynopsisAfter a Dance is the compiled collection of short stories from acclaimed writer Bridget O''Connor, with an exclusive preface from the author''s daughter, Constance Straughan.''These are some of the wildest, arresting, just plain brilliant short stories I''ve read in a long time.'' - Roddy Doyle, author of The Woman Who Walked Into DoorsBridget O''Connor was one of the great short story writers of her generation. She had a voice that was viscerally funny and an eye for both the glaring reality and the absurdity of the everyday.In After A Dance, we meet a selection of O''Connor''s most memorable characters often living on the margin of their own lives: from the anonymous thief set on an unusual prize to the hungover best man clinging to what he''s lost, to the unrepentant gold-digger who always comes out on top. From unravelling narcissists to melancholy romantics all human life is here - at its best and at its delightful worsTrade ReviewTo call [these stories] characterful is to undersell these Technicolor prose screams, these screeching narrative sprints, this filthy feast of stories. Think Irvine Welsh meets Edna O’Brien . . . pure, delicious naughty fun. * The Times *These are some of the wildest, arresting, just plain brilliant short stories I've read in a long time. -- Roddy DoyleA storytelling genius before her time * The Irish Times *Wickedly funny, stylishly written, I relished each and every one of these stories * Patrick McCable *Every O’Connor story is a performance, a live fight with time and decay, disgust and the human body. She wrote intensely from her time and place; to read her now is to be catapulted back to 1990s London. Yet the voice, the themes are more relevant than ever. No wonder she was so preoccupied with temporality: she was before her time. -- Martina Evans * The Irish Times *'[Bridget O'Connor] was an incredible short story writer . . . hilarious, tragic, shuddering -- Laura Hackett * The Times *'Mostly brief, sometimes brutal, always funny . . . a master of the [short story]. The results are both vivacious and vicious. But even at their most painful, they sing * The Herald *

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Book SynopsisFirst published in 1914, Dubliners depicts middle-class Catholic life in Dublin at the start of the twentieth century. Themes within the stories include the disappointments of childhood, the frustrations of adolescence, and the importance of sexual awakening. James Joyce was twenty-five years old when he wrote this collection of short stories, among which 'The Dead' is probably the most famous. Considered at the time as a literary experiment, Dubliners contains moments of joy, fear, grief, love and loss, which combine to form one of the most complete depictions of a city ever written, and the stories remain as refreshingly original and surprising in this century as they did in the last.This Macmillan Collector's Library edition of Dubliners features an afterword by dramatist Peter Harness.Designed to appeal to the booklover, the Macmillan Collector's Library is a series of beautiful gift editions of much loved classic titles. Macmillan Collector's Library are books to love and treasure.

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Book SynopsisFrom the author of Annihilation, now a major motion picture on Netflix.From Jeff VanderMeer, an author praised by writers such as Laren Beukes, China Miéville and Michael Moorcock, City of Saints and Madmen is by turns sensuous and terrifying. This collection of four linked novellas is the perfect introduction to VanderMeer's vividly imagined world.In the city of Ambergris, a would-be suitor discovers a sunlit street can become a killing ground in the blink of an eye. An artist receives an invitation to a beheading and finds himself enchanted. And a patient in a mental institution is convinced he's imagined a city called Ambergris, invented its every last detail, and that he's really from a place called Chicago. Ambergris is a cruelly beautiful metropolis a haven for artists and thieves, for composers and murderers. And once there, anything can happen.These tales of Ambergris include the World Fantasy Award-winning novella, The Transformation of Martin Lake.

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Book SynopsisCats, be they much loved pets or inscrutable creatures, lend themselves to stories and literary invention. Part of the Macmillan Collector’s Library; a series of stunning pocket size classics. These beautiful books make perfect gifts or a treat for any book lover. This edition is edited by anthologist, editor and literary agent Becky Brown.Classic Cat Stories is a beautiful anthology that includes fairy tales and fables from the likes of Rudyard Kipling and Charles Perrault as well as comic tales from Saki and E. F. Benson. Cats, of course, have always had a dark and mysterious side which is explored to chilling effect by the likes of Edgar Allan Poe in The Black Cat and H. P. Lovecraft in The Cats of Ulthar. But above all, we love them and you’ll find here stories about all kinds of cats that tug at the heartstrings and which celebrate their curious ways.

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Book Synopsis'Mesmerising and utterly absorbing' New York Times'A magnificent storyteller' Der Spiegel A retired small-town doctor takes a garden axe to his cruel wife.A woman laces her brother's food with barbiturates.Two men steal a priceless Japanese tea bowl with brutal consequences.What drives a person to commit a crime?Our narrator knows that behind every misdeed is a story waiting to be told. In this collection of chilling cases, a nameless lawyer recounts the love, obsession, selfishness and despair that influenced his clients' irrevocable choices. Drawn from Ferdinand von Schirach's eminent career as a criminal defence lawyer, Crime blends fiction with real life, each story a revealing, unsettling insight into what may compel a person to act beyond the law.Trade ReviewMesmerizing . . . a slim, utterly absorbing collection of 11 stories plucked from [von Schirach's] legal career and told in a cool, patient voice that immediately draws the reader in -- Olen Steinhauer * New York Times *Praise for Ferdinand von Schirach * - *Addictive . . . fascinating * The Spectator *Ice-cool, effortlessly classy prose * Observer *Tantalising and disturbing in equal measure -- Laura Wilson * Guardian *An exceptional prose stylist * New York Times *A magnificent storyteller * Der Spiegel *Psychologically raw . . . delivered in a crisp translation by Katharina Hall, his unfussy prose is icily effective . . . it suggests that all justice systems are flawed, that they are all just processes. And, with immense empathy, von Schirach's stories show what happens to people when they are processed. -- Christian House * Financial Times *The stories are cool, meticulously crafted, pithy and mordantly amusing . . . this is an unsettling, affecting, extremely powerful book. Highly recommended -- Declan Hughes * Irish Times *An impressive page-turner with substance and bite * Bookmunch *Thrilling and edgy, often carrying a twist in the tale -- To the Ends of the Word blog

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Book SynopsisIn crisp, unembellished prose, Choi Eunyoung paints intimate portraits of the lives of young women in South Korea, balancing the personal with the political. In the title story, a fraught friendship between an exchange student and her host sister follows them from adolescence to adulthood. In 'A Song from Afar', a young woman grapples with the death of her lover, travelling to Russia to search for information about the deceased. In 'Secret', the parents of a teacher killed in the Sewol ferry sinking hide the news of her death from her grandmother. In the tradition of Sally Rooney, Banana Yoshimoto, and Marilynne Robinson - writers from different cultures who all take an unvarnished look at human relationships and the female experience - Choi Eunyoung is a writer to watch.Trade ReviewInsightful and deeply felt * New York Times Book Review *Written with sober detail, filmic precision and absolute control . . . an incredibly impressive collection told with realism, seriousness and moral integrity * Observer *Gentle yet elucidating . . . Shoko's Smile is the most beautiful book I've come across this year * Sisain *Shoko's Smile is the outcome of Choi's quite triumphant attempt to invent her own way to talk about dark facets of our reality . . . And her way at first comes across as bright and lighthearted. Of course, misleadingly so . . . Choi invents the narratives of today's real people who have not surrendered or become oppressors themselves, and who have survived nonetheless * GQ *Eunyoung's engaging debut collection examines her protagonists' interior lives in moments of longing, connection, and familial rift . . . Eunyoung's lyrical prose and complex characters will captivate readers * Publishers Weekly *

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Book SynopsisThe first complete collection of Vonnegut's 97 short stories, including 5 which have never been published before.

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Book SynopsisThis is a collection resplendent with longing. In these compact pages, people meet without actually connecting, travellers set off but never seem to find home. We meet them on the fjords of Norway, in the bustle of Los Angeles, and among the lights of Copenhagen. Outsiders yearn to be on the inside, insiders are desperate to be free. A writer befriends an ex-lover's mother. An elderly man offers his body to aging women. A woman's childhood memories of wild swimming draw her back to the water. In prose that is both elegantly spare and saturated with emotion, Dorthe Nors shines a light into forgotten corners and conjures darkness where it's least expected. Her characteristic sharpness and sense of humour is ever-present, catching us when the melancholy threatens to come too close. Love, cruelty, friendship, and loneliness are all here, in these stories that brim with life.

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Book SynopsisA dazzling, smart and razor-sharp story collection by Curtis Sittenfeld, Sunday Times bestselling author of Rodham and American Wife.The theme that unites these stories is how even the cleverest people tend to misread others, and how much we all deceive ourselves. Sharp and tender, funny and wise, they show Sittenfeld's knack for creating real, believable characters that spring off the page, while also skewering contemporary mores with brilliant dry wit.'DO-OVER', ONE OF THE STORIES IN THIS COLLECTION, WAS SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2018 SUNDAY TIMES EFG SHORT STORY AWARD.

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Book SynopsisRevisit the haunting debut short story collection from the Booker-shortlisted author of Everything Under.'Full of unabashedly, refreshingly angry women... In a year that made me furious, Daisy Johnson’s Fen was a howl I didn’t know I needed' Celeste NgThe Fen is a liminal land. Real people live their lives here. They wrestle with sex and desire, with everyday routine. But the wild is always close at hand, ready to erupt.This is a place where animals and people commingle and fuse, where curious metamorphoses take place, where myth and dark magic still linger. So here a teenager may starve herself into the shape of an eel. A house might fall in love with a girl. A woman might give birth to a, well, what? 'Instant classic...a bold, take-no-prisoners collection situated somewhere between Angela Carter and Deborah Levy' Jeff VanderMeerTrade ReviewDaisy Johnson’s story collection Fen was unanimously beloved... firmly situating her among the UK’s most exciting new voices. -- Marta Bausells * Elle *Just finished rereading Daisy Johnson’s story collection Fen. Just as powerful and beautiful and dark and strange as the first time. One of my favourite books of all time. -- Jeff VandermeerJohnson's heady broth of folklore, female sexuality and fenland landscape reads like a mix of Graham Swift and Angela Carter… For atmosphere, originality and plain chutzpah, this is an impressive first collection. -- Sarah Crown * Guardian *Poetic, risky… Johnson’s slippery and sensual stories-cum-chapters have an amphibious elemental quality and a contemporary provincial witchiness of their own. -- Phil Baker * Sunday Times *There is big, dangerous vitality herein - this book marks the emergence of a great, stomping, wall-knocking talent. -- Kevin BarryReading the stories brought the sense of being trapped in a room slowly, but very surely, filling up with water. You think: this can't be happening. Meanwhile, hold your breath against the certainty it surely is. -- Cynan Jones, author of The Dig

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Book SynopsisAs Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect.The Metamorphosis - the masterpiece of Franz Kafka -was first published in 1915 and is one of the seminal works of fiction of the twentiethcentury. The novel iscited as a key influence for many of today's leading authors; as Auden wrote:"Kafka is important to us because his predicament is the predicament of modern man".Traveling salesman, Gregor Samsa, wakes to find himself transformed into a large, monstrous insect-like creature. The cause of Gregor''s transformation is never revealed, and as he attempts to adjust to his new condition he becomes a burden to his parents and sister, who are repelled by the horrible, verminous creature Gregor has become.A harrowing, yet strangely comic, meditation on human feelings of inadequacy, guilt, and isolation,The Metamorphosishas taken its place as one of the most widely read and influential works of twentieth-century fiction.The Legend Classics series:Around the World in Eighty DaysThe Adventures of Huckleberry FinnThe Importance of Being EarnestAlice''s Adventures in WonderlandThe MetamorphosisThe Railway ChildrenThe Hound of the BaskervillesFrankensteinWuthering HeightsThree Men in a BoatThe Time MachineLittle WomenAnne of Green GablesThe Jungle BookThe Yellow Wallpaper and Other StoriesDraculaA Study in ScarletLeaves of GrassThe Secret GardenThe War of the WorldsA Christmas CarolStrange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr HydeHeart of DarknessThe Scarlet LetterThis Side of ParadiseOliver TwistThe Picture of Dorian GrayTreasure IslandThe Turn of the ScrewThe Adventures of Tom SawyerEmmaThe TrialA Selection of Short Stories by Edgar Allan PoeGrimm Fairy TalesThe AwakeningMrs DallowayGulliver's TravelsThe Castle of OtrantoSilas MarnerHard Times

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Book SynopsisA WALL STREET JOURNAL BEST BOOK OF THE YEARForty years after John Edgar Wideman's first book of stories, comes this stunning collection that is vital reading for anyone interested in the state of America today. Its subjects range from Michael Jordan to Emmett Till, from distrust of authority to everyday grief, from childhood memories to the final day in a prison cell.A boy stands alone in his grandmother's house, unable to enter the room in which his grandfather's coffin lies, afraid the dead man may speak, afraid he won't speak. Freddie Jackson's song 'You Are My Lady' plays on the car radio as a son is brought to a prison cell in Arizona. A narrator contemplates the Atlanta child murders from 1979.Never satisfied to simply tell a story, Wideman continues to push form, with stories within stories, sentences that rise like a jazz solo with every connecting clause, voices that reflect who he is and where he's from, and an exploration of time that entangles past and present. Whether historical or contemporary, intimate or expansive, the stories here represent a pioneering American writer whose innovation and imagination know no bounds.Trade ReviewThis is truly inimitable storytelling. No one writes an American horror story like John Edgar Wideman * * Observer * *Master of language . . . Wideman has always been less interested in what a story tells than how it gets told, how the telling shapes our perception of our world. In works that erode the boundaries between fiction, memoir and essay, Wideman explores the impulses that drive storytelling itself, returning to some enduring themes and formal devices * * New York Times Book Review * *Wideman is one of the great tragedians of American literature . . . This collection, Wideman's artistic consummation, is also the site of his unravelling, and there are moments of unbearable vulnerability when the author puts aside his great gifts to lie down in the rag and bone shop of the heart * * Wall Street Journal * *Philosophical, ruminative and alive with wordplay . . . In each story, Wideman illustrates just how intricately the past is interwoven with the present, and there is plenty here to satisfy fans of captivating literary storytelling * * Booklist (starred review) * *A book that demands and deserves attention * * Scotsman * *Look for Me and I'll Be Gone, a short-story collection that draws fluidly from his personal life, is John Edgar Wideman's extended farewell to outrage . . . The book's style is so deceptively modest it stares you down and waits for you to realise it's cut your heart out while you coasted along on the calm surface of the syntax into a seething indictment of every aspect of society * * 4Columns * *Wideman's stories have a wary, brooding spirit, a lonely intelligence. They carry a real but atrophied affection for America. He airs the problems of consciousness, including the fragile contingency of our existence -- Dwight Garner * * New York Times on You Made Me Love You * *Praise for American Histories: The stories in American Histories read like an immense jazz riff . . . The acutely immersive world of American Histories is irresistible, and these profoundly moving stories will haunt you long after you've finished reading * * Guardian * *Wideman's rage against American injustice and racial prejudice burns magma-hot in his latest short stories . . . Immensely powerful . . . Challenging, animating, enlivening and electrifying; it does what literature should do. It's a bruising experience that leaves you feeling vulnerable and excited and alive * * Spectator * *Wideman's stories range widely over experiences from slavery to the present day . . . All are illumined by a searching intelligence and a willingness to test the boundaries of the short story form * * New York Times * *

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Book Synopsisp-Included here are famous tales like 'Sound of Thunder', in which the carelessness of a group of time-travellers leads to disastrous consequences, and 'The Veldt', in which two seemingly innocent young children transform their nursery into a lethal trap. Here are the Martian stories, tales that vividly animate the red planet with its brittle cities and double-mooned sky. Here are stories which speak of a special nostalgia for Green Town, Illinois, the perfect setting for a seemingly cloudless childhood - except for the unknown terror lurking in the ravine. Here are the Irish stories and the Mexican stories, linked across their separate geographies by Bradbury's astonishing inventiveness. Here, too, are thrilling, terrifying stories such as 'The Fog Horn' - perfect for reading under the covers.Read for the first time, these stories are a feast for the imagination; read again - and again - they reveal new, dazzling facets of a master storyteller's extraordinary art.

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Book SynopsisThis generous collection of fifty-two stories selected from across her prolific career by the author, is preceded by a preface in which she discusses the sources of her art.With irony and an unfailing eye for the telling detail, Gallant weaves stories of spare complexity, often pushing the boundaries of the form in boldly unconventional directions. The settings in the COLLECTED STORIES range from Paris to Berlin to Switzerland, from the Riviera to the Côte d'Azur, and her characters are almost all exiles of one sort or another, as she herself was the most of her expatriate life. The wit and precision of her prose, combined with her expansive view of humanity, provide a rare and deep reading pleasure. With breathtaking control and compression, Gallant delivers a whole life, a whole world, in each story.Trade ReviewOne of the most brilliant story writers in the language. * The New Yorker *Gallant's talent is as versatile and witty as it is somber and empathetic. -- John UpdikeFunny, exacting, and stern... Gallant's chronicles of internal and external exile are a fitting tribute to a diasporic century. * The Guardian *

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Book SynopsisScottish Stories is a treasury of great writing from a richly literary land, where the short story has flourished for over two centuries. Here are chilling supernatural stories from Robert Louis Stevenson, Eric Linklater and Dorothy K. Haynes; side-splittingly funny stories from Alasdair Gray and Irvine Welsh; a stylish offering from urban realist William McIlvanney. Iain Crichton Smith evokes the Gaelic-speaking highlands, George Mackay-Brown the Orkney islands, Andrew O'Hagan working-class Glasgow; while Leila Aboulela, originally from Sudan, ponders the relations between colonizers and colonized from her home in Aberdeen. Though there is no one 'Scottishness' that binds the authors together, writes editor Gerard Carruthers, each has a Scottish footprint or accent. And perhaps more importantly, all are masters of their form.

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Book SynopsisWhen her wealthy family prepares to host a lavish summer party, the young, hitherto sheltered Laura Sheridan suddenly feels a kinship with the staff and the helpers hired to set up the venue for the festivities. As she learns of the death of one of their working-class neighbours, this burgeoning sense of class consciousness is heightened by a realization of her own mortality. Published in 1922, at the height of literary Modernism, `The Garden Party' is now considered one of the key texts of that movement. This volume, which also includes all of Katherine Mansfi eld's other published short stories, is an invaluable resource for anyone wishing to discover one of the early twentieth century's finest writers.Trade ReviewIt is necessary to read no more than two or three of Miss Mansfield's stories before discovering that she has great talent. And after reading all of them, including her first volume, Bliss, there is no doubt at all that this talent amounts to the rare thing which a lack of a juster word to express our enthusiasms we call genius, and that her name must be added to that small company of the living... who really have something to say, and can say it uncommonly well. -- Robert Littell * New Republic * I was jealous of her writing - the only writing I have ever been jealous of. -- Virginia WoolfTable of ContentsContains: Prelude, Je ne parle pas français, Bliss, The Wind Blows, Psychology, Pictures, The Man without a Temperament, Mr Reginald Peacock's Day, Sun and Moon, Feuille d'album, A Dill Pickle, The Little Governess, Revelations, The Escape, The Garden Party, The Daughters of the Late Colonel, The Doll's House, The Fly, Germans at Meat, The Baron, The Sister of the Baroness, Frau Fischer, Frau Brechenmacher Attends a Wedding, The Modern Soul, At Lehmann's, The Luftbad, A Birthday, The Child-Who-Was-Tired, The Advanced Lady, The Swing of the Pendulum, A Blaze.

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Book SynopsisAn instant classic, The Long Gaze Back, edited by Sinéad Gleeson, is an exhilarating anthology of thirty short stories by some of the most gifted women writers this island has ever produced. Featuring: Niamh Boyce, Elizabeth Bowen, Maeve Brennan, Mary Costello, June Caldwell, Lucy Caldwell, Evelyn Conlon, Anne Devlin, Maria Edgeworth, Anne Enright, Christine Dwyer Hickey, Norah Hoult, Mary Lavin, Eimear McBride, Molly McCloskey, Bernie McGill, Lisa McInerney, Belinda McKeon, Siobhán Mannion, Lia Mills, Nuala Ní Chonchúir, Éilís Ní Dhuibhne, Kate O’Brien, Roisín O’Donnell, E. M. Reapy, Charlotte Riddell, Eimear Ryan, Anakana Schofield, Somerville & Ross, Susan Stairs. Taken together, the collected works of these writers reveal an enrapturing, unnerving, and piercingly beautiful mosaic of a lively literary landscape. Spanning four centuries, The Long Gaze Back features 8 rare stories from deceased luminaries and forerunners, and 22 new stories by some of the most talented Irish women writers working today. The anthology presents an inclusive and celebratory portrait of the high calibre of contemporary literature in Ireland. These stories run the gamut from heartbreaking to humorous, but each leaves a lasting impression. They chart the passions, obligations, trials and tribulations of a variety of vividly-drawn characters with unflinching honesty and relentless compassion. These are stories to savour.

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Book SynopsisHerman Melville (1819-91) brought as much genius to the smaller-scale literary forms as he did to the full-blown novel: his poems and the short stories and novellas collected in this volume reveal a deftness and a delicacy of touch that is in some ways even more impressive than the massive, tectonic passions of Moby-Dick. In a story like “Bartleby, the Scrivener” — one of the very few perfect representatives of the form in the English language — he displayed an unflinching precision and insight and empathy in his depiction of the drastically alienated inner life of the title character. In “Benito Cereno,” he addressed the great racial dilemmas of the nineteenth century with a profound, almost surreal imaginative clarity. And in Billy, Budd, Sailor, the masterpiece of his last years, he fused the knowledge and craft gained from a lifetime’s magnificent work into a pure, stark, flawlessly composed tale of innocence betrayed and destroyed. Melville is justly honored for the epic sweep of his mind, but his lyricism, his skill in rendering the minute, the particular, the local, was equally sublime.SEE LESS

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Book Synopsis

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