Anthologies & Short Stories

Book SynopsisA teenage son shoots himself under his parents'' bed. They sleep that night unaware he is lying dead beneath them.A stranger turns up at a man''s door to persude him that they must get rid of his ageing mother in order to sell the house.An old man grumbles to his daughter about the unexplained digging and banging he hears under the house at night. As each story unfolds, Amos Oz, builds a portrait of a village in Israel. It is a surreal and unsettling place. Each villager is searching for something, and behind each episode is another, hidden story. In this powerful, hynotic work Amos Oz peers into the darkness of our lives and gives us a glimpse of what goes on beneath the surface of everyday existence.By the winner of the 2013 Franz Kafka Prize, previous winners of which include Philip Roth, Ivan Klima, Elfriede Jelinek, Harold Pinter and John Banville.Trade ReviewThis is a dark book, with a dark vision of contemporary Israel… The whole, rich, disturbing mixture makes one feel as if something dark is digging away at the foundations, something unnameable ready to emerge. It is one of the most powerful books you will read about present-day Israel. -- David Herman * Jewish Chronicle *These stories have both force and mystery, and they cast a quiet spell * Scotland on Sunday *A powerfully bleak portrait of loneliness, confusion and cracked bonds * The Times *These stories, in their humanity, may do more for Israel than any of the decisions we have been led to expect of its leaders in the months to come * New Statesman *I enjoyed Amos Oz's Scenes From Village Life a great deal... it explores what is universal, what is entirely idiosyncratic, about daily life in Israel away from the obvious conflicts -- Kate Kellaway * Observer *

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Book SynopsisEtgar Keret is an ingenious and original master of the short story. Radical, witty and always unusual, declared a ''genius'' by the New York Times, Keret brings all of his prodigious talent to bear in this bestselling collection.A man barges into a writer''s house and, holding a gun to his head, demands that he tell him a story, something to take him away from the real world. A pathological liar discovers one day that all the lies he tells come true. A young woman finds a zip in her boyfriend''s mouth, and when she opens it he unfolds to reveal a completely different man inside. Suddenly, a Knock on the Door is at once Keret''s most mature and most playful work yet, and establishes him as one of the great international writers of our time.Trade ReviewEtgar Keret has written several great books, but this is his greatest. These stories are the most funny, dark and poignant I've read in a long time. It's tempting to say they are his most Kafkaesque, but in fact they are his most Keretesque * Jonathan Safran Foer *Distinctive, understated and very funny... If you read only one book of short stories this year, it should be this one * Daily Mail *Etgar Keret is a great short story writer whose work is all the greater because it’s funny...The stories are all thought-experiments. What if, they ask. Why not? And, what the heck? Like all art, they are highly patterned, highly charged, refracted reflections on the chaos and randomness of everyday existence * Guardian *A maddening, abruptly moving and effortlessly funny collection ... Clever, relevant and oddly resonant, Suddenly a Knock on the Door is Keret’s best, most mature work and the perfect introduction to his sad, strange and moving fiction * Independent *At once sophisticated and anti-literary, extremely funny and slyly serious. While invariably set in contemporary Israel, and full of sex and violence, they also hark back to older storytelling traditions such as the parable, the folk tale and the absurdist fiction of Gogol and Kafka * Observer *

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Book SynopsisFrom the author of the beloved novel The Giant''s House - finalist for the National Book Award - comes a beautiful new story collection, her first in twenty years. Laced through with humour, empathy, and rare and magical descriptive powers these nine vibrant stories navigate the fragile space between love and loneliness. In ''Property'', a young scholar, grieving the sudden death of his wife, decides to refurbish the Maine rental house they were to share together by removing his landlord''s possessions. In ''Peter Elroy: A Documentary by Ian Casey'', the household of a successful filmmaker is visited years later by his famous first subject, whose trust he betrayed. And in the unforgettable title story, a family makes a quixotic decision to flee to Paris for a summer, only to find their lives altered in an unimaginable way by their teenage daughter''s risky behaviour.In Elizabeth McCracken''s universe, heartache is always interwoven with strange, charmed moments of joyTrade ReviewThese nine stories are filled with longing, guilt and violence. * New York Times *Jewelled and barbed with the beauty and brutality of real life, these are sentences of perfect weight and understanding. There are no fillers here, no stories that disappoint: the nine coalesce into something rare and understatedly breathtaking. Like the missing who haunt these stories, Thunderstruck is unforgettable. -- Stuart Evers * Observer *Wonderful, moving tales. -- Erica Wagner * Financial Times *An electric blend of hilarity and despair. -- Bonnie Jo Campbell * O, The Oprah Magazine *[A] powerful collection. -- John Self * Independent on Sunday *

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Book SynopsisContains diverse writing from the Spanish-speaking world. This book explores stylistic contrasts and gives an insight into the cultural and social milieu of the Spanish-speaking world. It includes notes on unusual Spanish words and phrases and is suitable for English students of the language as well as Spanish-speaking students of English.Table of ContentsThe man who repented, Ana Maria Matute; after the procession, Jorge Edwards; Amalia, Mario Vargas Llosa; the thunderbox, Jorge Onetti; the cost of living, Carlos Fuentes; Capitan Descalzo, Norberto Fuentes; share and share alike, Norberto Fuentes; Balthazar's marvellous afternoon, Gabriel Garcia Marquez; the disued door, Julio Cortazar.

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Book SynopsisThe eight stories in this volume offer a varied and representative collection of twentieth century German authors from a range of political and cultural backgrounds. Styles include the non-fictional manner of Kluge''s montage technique and the contrasting classical storytelling of Penzoldt.With reading notes and parallel texts in German and English, this anthology is valuable to the German student of English as well as the English student of German. Reflecting trends in German literature, the stories have been selected for their quality as well as their readability, and will enhance the appreciation of both languages.Table of ContentsThe dolphin, Ernst Penzoldt; Jennifer's dreams, Marie Luise Kaschnitz; Fedezeen, Gunter de Bruyn; the renunciation, Siegfried Lenz; the dogs, Ingeborg Bachmann; lobellen grove, Johannes Bobrowski; Anita G., Alexander Kluge; the joiner, Thomas Bernhard.

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Book SynopsisGeorge Willard is a young reporter on the Winesburg Eagle to whom, one by one, the inhabitants of Winesburg, Ohio, confide their hopes, their dreams, and their fears. This town of friendly but solitary people comes to life as Anderson's special talent exposes the emotional undercurrents that bind its people together. In this timeless cycle of short stories, he lays bare the life of a small town in the American Midwest.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.Trade Review"When he calls himself a 'poor scribbler' don't believe him. He is not a poor scribbler . . . he is a very great writer."--Ernest Hemingway"Winesburg, Ohio, when it first appeared, kept me up a whole night in a steady crescendo of emotion."--Hart Crane"As a rule, first books show more bravado than anything else, unless it be tediousness. But there is neither of these qualities in Winesburg, Ohio. . . . These people live and breathe: they are beautiful."--E. M. Forster"Winesburg, Ohio is an extraordinarily good book. But it is not fiction. It is poetry."--Rebecca West

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Book SynopsisCollected with a dozen wonderful stories, all set in classic Updike territory, the short novel ''RABBIT REMEMBERED'' is a major work in its own right - a riveting return to Updike''s most celebrated fictional world. Janice and Nelson Angstrom, plus several other survivors of the irreducible Rabbit, fitfully entertain his memory while pursuing their own happiness over the edge of the millennium, as a number of old strands come together in entirely unexpected ways.

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Book SynopsisPassionate and perceptive, the three short novels that make up Balzac''s History of the Thirteen are concerned in part with the activities of a rich, powerful, sinister and unscrupulous secret society in nineteenth-century France. While the deeds of ''The Thirteen'' remain frequently in the background, however, the individual novels are concerned with exploring various forms of desire. A tragic love story, Ferragus depicts a marriage destroyed by suspicion, revelation and misunderstanding. The Duchess de Langeais explores the anguish that results when a society coquette tries to seduce a heroic ex-soldier, while The Girl with the Golden Eyes offers a frank consideration of desire and sexuality. Together, these works provide a firm and fascinating foundation for Balzac''s many later portrayals of Parisian life in his great novel-cycle The Human Comedy.

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Book SynopsisGerard de Nerval (1805-55) was an inveterate traveller, and made many contributions of travel literature to various periodicals. He was also a prolific poet and wrote many tales including 'Sylvie' (1853), his most read work.Richard Sieburth is Professor of French at New York University. He has translated Walter Benjamin's 'Moscow Diary' and Michel Leiris' 'Nights as Day/Days as Night'.

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Book SynopsisPoet, novelist, painter and musician, Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941) is the grand master of Bengali culture. Written during the 1890s, the stories in this selection brilliantly recreate vivid images of Bengali life and landscapes in their depiction of peasantry and gentry, casteism, corrupt officialdom and dehumanizing poverty. Yet Tagore is first and foremost India''s supreme Romantic poet, and in these stories he can be seen reaching beyond mere documentary realism towards his own profoundly original vision.

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Book SynopsisIn the captivating stories that make up The Empty Family Colm Tóibín delineates with a tender and unique sensibility lives of unspoken or unconscious longing, of individuals, often willingly, cast adrift from their history. ''I imagined lamplight, shadows, soft voices, clothes put away, the low sound of late news on the radio. And I thought as I crossed the bridge at Baggot Street to face the last stretch of my own journey home that no matter what I had done, I had not done that.''From the young Pakistani immigrant who seeks some kind of permanence in a strange town to the Irish woman reluctantly returning to Dublin and discovering a city that refuses to acknowledge her long absence each of Tóibín''s stories manage to contain whole worlds: stories of fleeing the past and returning home, of family threads lost and ultimately regained.''Exquisite . . . The chief reason to read these stories is the peculiar power of Colm Tóibín''s prose'' TelegrTrade ReviewColm Tóibín's new collection is the work of an author at the peak of his writing powers * The Times *Always deeply moving, the stories here - like the surf-washed pebbles on that Wexford beach - will be read for meaning and enjoyed for their shape and sound for ages to come * Tribune *It's a collection that will only further fuel Tóibín's ascent through English fiction * Independent on Sunday *Exquisite . . . The chief reason to read these stories is the peculiar power of Colm Tóibín's prose * Telegraph *Astonishingly precise, depicting complex and conflicted states of mind with rare clarity * Observer *Beautifully observed * Sunday Times *Tóibín's deceptively straightforward style continues to manage somehow to encompass both lucidity and ambiguity, precision and poetry * Irish Times *Exquisite * Metro, Fiction of the Week *These stories are always intensely interesting and sometimes profoundly provocative * Irish Independent *Perfect; and as good as the best of William Trevor, than which there can be no higher praise * Scotsman *

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Book SynopsisThese pieces show the range of Waugh''s skills: Mr Loveday''s Little Outing; Cruise; Period Piece; On Guard; An Englishman''s Home; Excursion in Reality; Bella Fleace Gave a Party; Winner Takes All; Work Suspended; Scott-King''s Modern Europe; Basil Seal Rides Again; and Charles Ryder''s Schooldays.

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Book SynopsisAlthough he is best known for his exquisite novels, E.M. Forster also wrote remarkable short stories. He referred to his stories as fantasies' and his attraction to myth and magic is apparent in many of them. Like his novels, the stories whether they are set in Italy, Greece, India, and other places Forster visited, or in England itself contrast the freedom of paganism with the restraints of English civilization, the personal, sensual delights of the body with the impersonal, inhibiting rules imposed by society. Rich in irony and alive with sharp observations on the surprises life holds, the stories often feature violent events, discomforting coincidences, and other disruptive happenings that throw the characters' perceptions and beliefs off balance. This volume includes all twelve stories published during Forster's lifetime.Table of ContentsIntroduction by David Leavitt and Mark MitchellSuggestions for Further ReadingA Note on the TextSELECTED STORIESThe Story of a PanicThe Other Side of the HedgeThe Celestial OmnibusOther KingdomThe Curate's FriendThe Road from ColonusThe Machine StopsThe Point of ItMr AndrewsCo-ordinationThe Story of the SirenThe Eternal MomentExplanatory Notes

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Book SynopsisF. Scott Fitzgerald was born in 1896 in St Paul, Minnesota, and went to Princeton University which he left in 1917 to join the army. Fitzgerald was said to have epitomised the Jazz Age, an age inhabited by a generation he defined as 'grown up to find all Gods dead, all wars fought, all faiths in man shaken'. In 1920 he married Zelda Sayre. Their destructive relationship and her subsequent mental breakdowns became a major influence on his writing. Among his publications were five novels, This Side of Paradise, The Great Gatsby, The Beautiful and Damned, Tender is the Night and The Love of the Last Tycoon. Fitzgerald died suddenly in 1940.

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Book SynopsisGyula Krúdy (1878-1933) is a much-loved and admired Hungarian writer. He spent much of his life in Budapest and wrote many stories about the alcoholic and erotic possibilities of the city in its heyday, possibilities which he himself lived to the full. His most famous books in English are The Adventures of Sindbad and Life is a Dream.Trade ReviewKrudy writes of imaginary people, of imaginary events, in dream-like settings; but the spiritual essence of his persons and of their places is stunningly real * The New Yorker *Marvellously quirky -- CJ Schüler * Independent on Sunday *This [series] is a wonderful idea ... They are absurdist parables, by turns hilarious, unsettling and enigmatic. -- Nicholas Lezard * Guardian *[The series] sheds remarkable light on the literature, culture and politics of the region...anyone coming fresh to the field will be captivated by the richness, variety, humour and pathos of a classic literature that, through a shared historical experience, transcends national and linguistic boundaries. -- CJ Schüler * Independent on Sunday *I urge you to go and read them. -- Adam Thirlwell * New Statesman *This new series of Central European Classics is important well beyond simply providing 'good reads'. -- Stephen Vizinczey * Daily Telegraph *The Hungarian Proust -- Charles Champlin * New York Times *

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Book SynopsisThe short story is one of the most varied and exciting genres in American literature. This collection brings together many of its finest examples from the early nineteenth century to the present. It contains a richly diverse cast of characters, including convicts, artists, farm labourers, slaves, soldiers and salesmen, witches and ghosts, families and lovers. Their stories are told by some of America''s most celebrated writers (Nathaniel Hawthorne, Edith Wharton, Raymond Carver) and a few, like Fanny Fern or Charles W. Chestnutt, who may be less familiar. The collection offers a stimulating combination of acknowledged classics, including Mark Twain''s hilarious ''Jim Smiley''s Jumping Frog'' and Edgar Allan Poe''s chilling ''The Tell-Tale Heart'', and some remarkable pieces that deserve a wider audience, such as Ernest Hemingway''s story of miscommunication, ''Out of Season'', or Lorrie Moore''s tale of modern love and wit, ''Starving Again''.Kasia Boddy''s introduction trac

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Book SynopsisThe short stories of Kingsley Amis - the great master of post-war comic prose - are dark, playful, moving, surprising and extremely funny. This definitive collection gathers all Amis''s short fiction in a single volume for the first time and encompasses five decades of storytelling. In ''The 2003 Claret'', written in 1958, a time machine is invented for the weighty task of sending a man to 2010 to discover what the booze will taste like. In ''Boris and the Colonel'' a Cambridge spy is unearthed in the sleepy English countryside with the help of a plucky horse, while In ''Mason''s Life'' two men meet inside their respective dreams. The collection spans many genres, offering ingenious alternative histories, mystery and horror, satirical reflections and a devilishly funny attacks. Amis''s stories reveal the scope of his imagination and the warmth beneath his acerbic humour, and they all share the unmistakable style and wit of one of Britain''s best loved writers.Kingsley Amis''Trade ReviewA key figure in postwar British culture, whose importance and influence cannot be measured ... distinctive and original -- David Lodge'Among the English comic masters of the twentieth century' * Guardian *A ceaselessly fresh and adorable body of work ... exasperation made poetry -- Julie BurchillKingsley Amis was a big, humane novelist, interested in all manner of people very unlike himself -- Philip Hensher

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Book SynopsisHere are attempts at human connection, both depraved and sublime, and the grinding struggle to survive against the crushing realities of the Soviet system: in Among Friends, a doting mother commits an atrocious act against her beloved son in an attempt to secure his future; The Time: Night examines the suicide of the great Russian poetess Anna Andreevna with heartbreaking clarity; while in Chocolates with Liqueur the struggle for ownership of an apartment between a nurse and a madman turns murderous. With the satirical eye of Cindy Sherman, the psychological perceptiveness of Dostoevsky, and the bleak absurdities of Beckett, Petrushevskaya blends macabre spectacle with transformative moments of grace and shows just why she is Russia''s preeminent contemporary fiction writer.One of Russia''s best living writers ... her tales inhabit a borderline between this world and the next - The New York Times Ludmilla Petrushevskaya was born in Moscow Trade ReviewOne of Russia's best living writers ... her tales inhabit a borderline between this world and the next * The New York Times *

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Book SynopsisAs children, Charles and Mary Lamb took great delight in exploring their benefactor''s extensive library; as adults they began writing children''s books together that also appealed to all generations. In Tales of Shakespeare they wished to bring their favourite plays to life for children too young to read and appreciate Shakespeare''s work. This collection of twenty of Shakespeare''s stories begins with The Tempest, which explores themes of magic, power and reconciliation, and ends with Pericles, Prince of Tyre, an exotic play of love, loss and family ties. Between these two tales are twelve romances and comedies, all written by Mary, and six tragedies, all written by Charles. Each tale is told chronologically and retains much of Shakespeare''s lyricism, phrasing and rhythm. Together, they form a captivating and accessible introduction to the Bard''s work.

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Book SynopsisThe three works collected in this volume, all written in 1924, explore the profound effects on protagonists who embark on psychological voyages of liberation. In St Mawr, Lou Witt buys a beautiful, untamable bay stallion and discovers an intense affinity with the horse that she cannot feel with her husband. This superb novella displays Lawrence''s mastery of satirical comedy in a scathing depiction of London''s fashionable horse riding set. ''The Princess'' portrays the intimacy between an aloof woman and her male guide as she travels through New Mexico in search of new experiences, while in ''The Woman who Rode Away'' a woman''s religious quest in Mexico brings great danger - and astonishing self-discovery.

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Book SynopsisPlunged into the nightmarish brutality of war, Henry Fleming, a young Union soldier, must struggle with the principles of courage, patriotism, and survival in The Red Badge of Courage, in a collection that also includes The Open Boat, The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky, and The Blue Hotel, among other works. Reissue.

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Book SynopsisThe Caribbean is the source of one of the richest, most accessible, and yet technically adventurous traditions of contemporary world literature. This collection of Caribbean short stories is pan-Caribbean, including stories from the four main languages of the region: English, Spanish, French, and Dutch. Stories by major figures in the English language tradition such as V. S. Naipaul, Sam Sevlon, and Jean Rhys are set alongside their Spanish- and French-speaking contemporaries like Alejo Carpentier, Jan Bosh, and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Their work, in all its diversity of style, theme, and linguistic energy, provides a context for the work of an exciting new generation of Caribbean writers like Edwidge Danticat, Robert Antoni, Astrid Roemer, and Jamaica Kincaid.A celebration of regional creativity, the collection contains sufficient surprises to keep even the most avid student of West Indian writing turning the pages, while reminding readers that the Caribbean is a multilingual, multicultural space.Trade ReviewReview from previous edition 'Part of what distinguishes the Oxford Book of Caribbean Short Stories from the Penguin anthology of 1996 is the fact that it contains more stories which were created will away from this anglophone turf...It is a measure of the collective talent of these writers, and of the editors' judiciousness, that the book's egalitarian, inclusive aim does not diminish the quality of its contents. For the most part, both students and the general rfeader will find an array of gelaming starting points for further exploration.' * Bill Broun, TLS *Table of ContentsAVAILABLE UPON REQUEST

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Book SynopsisParis Street Tales is the third volume of a trilogy of translated stories set in Paris. The previous two are Paris Tales, in which each story is associated with one of the twenty arrondissements, and Paris Metro Tales, in which the twenty-two stories are related to a trip round the Paris Metro. This new volume contains eighteen newly translated stories related to particular streets in Paris, and one newly written tale of the city.The stories range from the nineteenth century to the present day, and include tales by well-known writers such as Colette, Maupassant, Didier Daeninckx, and Simenon, and less familiar names such as Francis Carco, Aurélie Filipetti, and Arnaud Baignot. They present a vivid picture of Paris streets in a variety of literary styles and tones. Simenon''s Maigret is called upon to solve a mystery on the Boulevard Beaumarchais; a flâneur learns some French history through second-hand objects retrieved from the Seine; a nineteenth-century affair in the Rue de MiromesnTrade Reviewthis lovely collection will give you a real sense of the city's character, and I defy anyone to read it without a great longing to get there and explore. * Shiny New Books *Often moody and always eccentric, the collectiondedicated to the memory of Parisians killed in recent attacks at Charlie Hebdo and the Bataclanuncovers the dark and light corners hidden in a city of interesting characters and exuberant history. * Publishers Weekly *If you can't make it to the capital in person this October, sitting in a café with a glass of French wine and reading this book about Paris's streets and faces is the next best thing. * Living France *A captivating read for all those who want to get a taste of classic French literature and love to lose themselves in the streets of Paris. * French Property News *I enjoy short fiction as much as anything I read today, and this Oxford University Press publication reminds me why that is. * BookChase *Table of Contents1: Didier Daeninckx: Rue des Degrés 2: Jean Follain: Streets 3: Guy de Maupassant: The Rendezvous 4: Octave Mirbeau: Tableau Parisien 5: Arnaud Baignot: Rue de la Tacherie 6: Émile Zola: Old Iron 7: Marcel Aymé: Rue Saint Sulpice 8: Jacques Réda: The Freedom of the Streets 9: Frédéric H. Fajardie: A Rapist's Shout One Night in Montparanasse 10: Julien Green: Lost Street Cries 11: Joris-Karl Huysmans: Rue de la Chine 12: Georges Simenon: The Affair in the Boulevard Beaumarchais 13: Roland Dorgelès: Rooftop over the Champs Elysées 14: Vincent Ravalec: The pigeon who shat on people 15: Aurélie Filipetti: The Street is not enough 16: Francis Carco: Rue Pigalle 17: Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette: The hold-up in the Rue Ordener 18: Gisèle Prassinos: The Tree with three branches 19: David Constantine: Rue de la Vieille Lanterne

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Book Synopsis''Lie to me by the moonlight. Do a fabulous story.''F. Scott Fitzgerald''s first story collection, Flappers and Philosophers, appeared in 1920 on the heels of his debut novel, This Side of Paradise, and immediately established him as a master of popular fiction. Love stories such as ''The Offshore Pirate'' and ''Head and Shoulders'' capture the spectacle and fantasy of the Jazz Age, celebrating that modern icon of feminine self-possession, the flapper, while comedies of manner like ''Bernice Bobs Her Hair'' and ''The Ice Palace'' showcase Fitzgerald''s eye for humour. In addition to these four classic tales, which first appeared in The Saturday Evening Post , this edition highlights the author''s proficiency with other crowd-pleasing story types: from Gothic fiction (''The Cut-Glass Bowl'') to didactic moral stories (''The Four Fists''), from satire (''Dalyrimple Goes Wrong'') to spiritual quests (''Benediction''), Fitzgerald tried his hand at many genres---and succeeded at all.

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Book SynopsisThis selection of twenty-seven stories shows Maupassant at his comic, cruel, and brilliant best. In addition to the poignant title story, it includes one of the most famous tales ever written, The Necklace , and Le Horla, an account of a disintegrating personality that chillingly parallels the author''s own decline into madness. All the stories demonstrate his genius for invention and his ability to write unblinkingly about the absurdity of the human condition, supporting Henry James'' claim that in the annals of story-telling, Maupassant stands `like a lion in the path''. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.Trade Review'excellent' Birmingham PostTable of ContentsIncludes: Out on the River; Family Life; A Farm Girl's Story; Country Living; Riding Out; A Railway Story; Old Milon; A Coup d'État; The Christening; Coco; A Coward; The Patron; The Umbrella; The Necklace; Strolling; Bed 29; The Gamekeeper; Mademoiselle Pearl; Rosalie; Prudent; Our Spot; Clochette; La Horla

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Book SynopsisFrom tales of the supernatural to pungent social realism, and from the humorous to the disturbing, whether rural or urban, this anthology shows the vitality of the Scottish short story.Douglas Dunn''s eclectic selection displays the marvellous range of Scottish story-telling, beginning with three early traditional tales, and including a wealth of writers from the last three centuries: amongst them Sir Walter Scott, Robert Louis Stevenson, J. M. Barrie, Violet Jacob, Neil Gunn, Eric Linklater, Alasdair Gray, James Kelman, and younger talents such as Ronald Frame, Janice Galloway, and A. L. Kennedy.Trade ReviewReview from previous edition Review from previous edition This is the most substantial anthology of short stories from Scotland to appear in some years, and as such should be welcomed ... a comprehensive overview of the development of the short story in Scotland. * The List *Every story here, without exception, contains the verb to say. These stories embody the "speak" of those places which help to comprise the small but complex, multifarious nation we call ours. In this way they embellish the term Scottish in the volume's title, and help subtly to define it. * Stewart Conn, Scotland on Sunday *It is a thorough, bread-and-butter summation of the best and the wisest, the most famous and the more cobwebbed exponents of the form. * Bella Bathurst, The Scotsman *This enthralling anthology features Dunn's favourites and a fine lot they are. * Alan Bold, The Herald *The great value of this anthology is that it shows us what we have been missing ... [Dunn's] introduction is fascinating and informative ... OUP has produced several anthologies of short stories based around culture or nationhood. This is a welcome and worthy addition to that series. * Sunderland Echo *the rollcall of names in this collection is impressive * The Irish Times *

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Book SynopsisThis collection of French short stories in translation expands our idea of French writing by including new stories by women writers and by authors of Francophone origin. Spanning the centuries from the late eighteenth to the late twentieth, the collection opens with a rumbustious tale from the Marquis de Sade, takes in the masters of the nineteenth century, from Stendhal and Balzac to Maupassant, and reaches to Quebec, Africa, and the French Caribbean in the twentieth century. Women writers include relatively well known figures such as Renee Vivien, Colette, and Beauvoir, and newer writers such as Assia Djebar, Christiane Baroche, and Annie Saumont. The French short story is a rich and diverse medium, but all the stories selected share a common characteristic: they make exciting reading.Trade ReviewReview from previous edition This is a delightful collection, ideal either for Tube reading or for savouring at greater length * Daily Telegraph 18/5/02 *wide-ranging collection . . . All the greats are here . . . * Sunday Telegraph 19/05/2002 *The anthology takes a tour through the high spots of French nineteenth-century literature * Katy Emck, Times Literary Supplement *Table of ContentsIntroduction ; The husband who said mass ; Vanina Vanini ; The coffee pot ; The message ; The Venus of Ille ; Story of a Madman ; The last lesson ; A Simple Heart ; The Necklace ; At Sea ; Gloomy Tale, Gloomier Teller ; Knapsack at the ready ; The Lady with the She-Wolf ; The Walking Stick ; Gribiche ; The Wall ; The man in the street ; An Errand ; The Guest ; Monologue ; The Lily of the Valley Lay-by ; Do you remember the rue d'Orchampt? ; The checkup ; There is No Exile ; The Negro with the White Shadow ; The Underwear of the Woman Up Above ; The Finest Stroy in the World ; Public Transit

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Book SynopsisExploring the many moods of the Danish capital.From the narrow twisting streets of the old town centre to the shady docklands, this rich anthology captures the essence of Copenhagen and its many faces. Through seventeen tales by some of the very best of Denmark''s writers past and present, we travel the length and breadth of the Danish capital examining famous sights from unique perspectives. A guide book usefully informs a new visitor to Copenhagen but these stories allow the reader to experience the city and its history from the inside.Trade ReviewThis collection is a splendid celebration of Copenhagen. It is beautifully produced with an abundance of illustrations, many of them archival photographs, and it contains helpful introductions, notes and an indispensible map. * Times Literary Supplement, Paul Binding *This collection is a splendid celebration of Copenhagen. It is beautifully produced with an abundance of illustrations, many of them archival photographs, and it contains helpful introductions, notes and an indispensable map. * Paul Binding, The Times Literary Supplement *Sensitively edited by Helen Constantine and beautifully translated by Lotte Shankland, this eclectic anthology touches on mad kings, deliverance from enemy occupation, and the lot of Jewish-Danish immigrants in the city. * Good Book Guide *Table of ContentsThe Water Drop ; Twice Met ; A Tricky Moment ; To Catch A Dane ; Willasden ; Eggnog ; The Maids ; The Bra ; The Naughty Boy ; Is There Life After Love? ; A Bench in Tivoli ; As the Angels Fly ; The Trousers ; Nightingale ; Amelie's Eyes ; Conversation One Night in Copenhagen ; The Night of Great Shared Happiness

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Book SynopsisOn the shrouded corpse hung a tablet of green topaz with the inscription: ''I am Shaddad the Great. I conquered a thousand cities; a thousand white elephants were collected for me; I lived for a thousand years and my kingdom covered both east and west, but when death came to me nothing of all that I had gathered was of any avail. You who see me take heed: for Time is not to be trusted.'' Dating from at least a millennium ago, these are the earliest known Arabic short stories, surviving in a single, ragged manuscript in a library in Istanbul. Some found their way into The Arabian Nights but most have never been read in English before. Tales of the Marvellous and News of the Strange has monsters, lost princes, jewels beyond price, a princess turned into a gazelle, sword-wielding statues and shocking reversals of fortune.Trade ReviewSuperb, a revelation - a real classic of popular literature . . . endlessly diverting and inventive, (giving) a unique insight into a now-lost elegant, courtly and tolerant Arab world -- William Dalrymple * Sunday Times *Offers a gateway to a different world of language and ideas, florid, wildly descriptive and are a powerful reminder of the human need for story . . . irresistible * Independent *This book is an astonishment . . . a profound oddity, but an absolutely intriguing one * Scotland on Sunday *Instantly appealing (with) headlong narrative drive . . . like a Medieval Fifty Shades of Grey . . . above all, fun * Guardian *

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Book Synopsis''What use to a being that lives beneath a sun are jewels of gas and silver stars of ice?''From a giant of twentieth-century science fiction, these four miniature space epics feature crazy inventors, surreal worlds, robot kings and madcap machines.Penguin Modern: fifty new books celebrating the pioneering spirit of the iconic Penguin Modern Classics series, with each one offering a concentrated hit of its contemporary, international flavour. Here are authors ranging from Kathy Acker to James Baldwin, Truman Capote to Stanislaw Lem and George Orwell to Shirley Jackson; essays radical and inspiring; poems moving and disturbing; stories surreal and fabulous; taking us from the deep South to modern Japan, New York''s underground scene to the farthest reaches of outer space.

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Book SynopsisPaul Theroux has written many works of fiction and travel writing, including the modern classics The Great Railway Bazaar, The Old Patagonian Express, My Secret History and The Mosquito Coast. He won the Edward Stanford Award for Outstanding Contribution to Travel Writing 2020. Paul Theroux divides his time between Cape Cod and the Hawaiian islands.

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Book Synopsis''Do the Irish have, in relation to anybody else, any special capacity for the short story?''In this collection of thirty-eight short stories covering many generations and moods of Irish writing, this question is emphatically answered in the affirmative. These mercurial, intoxicating, witty and sometimes sad stories range from Lady Gregory''s moving retelling of an ancient love story through to the extraordinary and prolific William Trevor.

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Book Synopsis''It is my hope that the Wales of the past and present is well represented in this volume, together with the world of work and workmen in some of our more ravaged terrains.''In twenty-four short stories, written by Welsh men and women, for the most part about Welsh people, we are treated to depictions of valley and mountain, country and town, as well as offered powerful and moving insights into the nature of the people.

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Book Synopsis''Snow was general all over Ireland. It was falling on every part of the dark central plain, on the treeless hills, falling softly upon the Bog of Allen and, farther westward, softly falling into the dark mutinous Shannon waves.''From a child grappling with the death of a fallen priest, to a young woman''s dilemma over whether to elope to Argentina with her lover, to the dance party at which a man discovers just how little he really knows about his wife, these fifteen stories bring the gritty realism of existence in Joyce''s native Dublin to life.Trade ReviewJoyce's early stories remain undimmed in their brilliance * Sunday Times *Joyce celebrates the lives of ordinary men and women -- Anthony Burgess * Observer *In Joyce's eyes Dublin is the whole world -- J.G. Ballard

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Book SynopsisFascination is master storyteller William Boyd''s third volume of short storiesDescribed as the finest storyteller of his generation, and following his acclaimed collections On the Yankee Station and The Destiny of Nathalie X, in Fascination Boyd shows his brilliance of the form as these stories range widely through time and space. In a dazzling array of styles and narratives we move from 1930s Germany to Los Angeles in the Second World War, from contemporary Oxford to 19th century Russia. Whether in London or Amsterdam. Eastbourne or a Normandy village these stories explore and expose the fraught, funny, absurd, poignant and lovelorn lives of their many and varied characters.Fascination will be loved by fans of Any Human Heart, as well as readers of William Trevor, Sebastian Faulks, Nick Hornby and Hilary Mantel.''The stories here are perfect . . . suffused with an understanding of love, desire and eTrade ReviewThe stories here are perfect . . . suffused with an understanding of love, desire and emotional incompetence * Guardian *Perfectly formed snapshots of life at its most mystifying * Daily Mail *Consistently entertaining * Literary Review *Boyd achieves his best writing, observing tiny moments of love, lust and epiphany with extraordinary sensitivity * Spectator *

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Book Synopsis''Lively remains a sublime storyteller'' Guardian on How It All Began''More stylish than many writers half her age . . . Lively knows a thing of two about storytelling.'' The Times on How It All Began A dream house that is hiding something sinister; two women having lunch who share a husband; an old woman doing her weekly supermarket shop with a secret past that no one could guess; a couple who don''t know each other at all even after fifteen years together; and, in the story from which this collection takes its name, a bird and a servant girl in ancient Pompeii who cannot converse, but share a perfect understanding. In this new and varied collection of short stories, Penelope Lively shows that she remains a master of her craft, and one of our finest English writers.Trade ReviewCarefully thought-out stories. . . Patterns of interaction between past and present are sounded out to good effect. * Sunday Times *Lively has guts and style. . . You are in the hands of a master * Daily Mail *Her new collection of short stories is perfect. It is a very wide range of short stories and each one has an unexpected twist in the tale. * Kirsty Lang *Thoughtful, intelligent and light of touch . . . Lively has the gift, rare and wonderful, of being able to peel back the layers one by one and set them before us, translucent and gleaming. * Sunday Telegraph *Spry and world-wise, The Purple Swamp Hen is an enchanting story that sets the tone for the rest of this stellar collection. * Observer *More stylish than many writers half her age . . . Lively knows a thing or two about storytelling. * The Times on How It All Began *Lively is now nearly 80 but, as How It All Began shows, there is no diminution of her skills . . . Lively is a writer of craft and sagacity and such old fashioned virtues trump the chic but meretricious every time. * Financial Times on How It All Began *Penelope Lively at her best, sharp-eyed but sympathetic, deftly steering the reader from one point of view to another. This novel should delight her regular readers and ensnare new ones. * Evening Standard on Family Album *Lively skilfully mingles past and present, as she peels away the layers to uncover a family secret of which no one speaks...Lively's astute skewering of family relations reverberates in the mind long afterwards. * Daily Mail on Family Album *Gorgeous * David Vann on Family Album, Guardian Books of the Year *Sensuous and beautiful prose...proof that the best novelists change and grow. * The Times on Consequences *Neatly constructed, lucidly written and full of admirable sentiments. * Sunday Times on Consequences *Masterful. Transforms the every day into something rich. * Time Out on Consequences *

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Book SynopsisOpening with ‘Hors d’oeuvres’ and closing with a ‘Feast’, the stories in Cravings pulse with longing, missed opportunities, recriminations, and joy. Garnett Kilberg Cohen leads readers through acutely crafted explorations of the way events shape and change our lives, sometimes for the better and sometimes in ways that haunt us forever.Trade ReviewThe characters in Cravings demanded my full attention and my full empathy. Cohen crafts their circumstances brilliantly, revealing the moments around which the rest of their lives are tangled. Each yearns for something different, but as I turned the last page, I knew what I wanted: one more story." - Jeff Hoffmann, author of Other People's Children"Each story in Garnett Kilberg Cohen’s gorgeous new collection is a tour de force in subtlety and indirection. Everyday narratives become profound meditations upon how we process trauma, the indelible imprint of past experience upon the present, and the paradoxically fixed and fluid nature of memory. Philosophical, reflective, and attuned to the human spirit, these powerful tales will win your heart, and then ask you to wonder why." - Elizabeth Kadetsky, author of The Memory EatersTable of Contents Hors d’oeuvres Slow Dance Ogden, Ohio NoirHer Life in Parties Wheels Breaking News Maternal Instinct Jump My Practice Life The Goodbye Party Feast Acknowledgments

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Book SynopsisLaugh till you cry in this new collection of stories from the award-winning Serena Williams of humor writing (New York Times Book Review) about raising babies and trying not to be one.Called a comedic Godsend by Conan O''Brien and the Stephen King of comedy writing by John Mulaney, Simon Rich is back with New Teeth, his funniest and most personal collection yet.Two murderous pirates find a child stowaway on board and attempt to balance pillaging with co-parenting. A woman raised by wolves prepares for her parents'' annual Thanksgiving visit. An aging mutant superhero is forced to learn humility when the mayor kicks him upstairs to a desk job. And in the hard-boiled caper The Big Nap, a weary two-year-old detective struggles to make sense of a world gone mad.Equal parts silly and sincere, New Teeth is an ode to growing up, growing older, and what it means to make a family.

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Book SynopsisJackie Kay was born in Edinburgh. She is a poet, novelist and writer of short stories and has enjoyed great acclaim for her work for both adults and children. Her novel Trumpet won the Guardian Fiction Prize and is a modern classic. As well as Why Don't You Stop Talking she has published a further collection of stories, Wish I Was Here, and most recently her memoir, Red Dust Road. She teaches at Newcastle University, and lives in Manchester.

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Book Synopsis''Fascinating . . . a poignant book . . . an unusual and absolutely authentic view of those convulsive years'' OBSERVER ''Each story in Wave Me Goodbye is a relic of the Second World War'' SUNDAY TIMES ''This is as stark and acidic a collection of war stories as you will read . . . Stripped bare of the sentimentalism attached to love in wartime'' SCOTSMAN This collection of wartime stories includes some of the finest writers of a generation. War had traditionally been seen as a masculine occupation, but these stories show how women were equal if different participants. Here, war is less about progress on the frontline of battle than about the daily struggle to keep homes, families and relationships alive; to snatch pleasure from danger, and strength from shared experience. The stories are about saying goodbye to husbands, lovers, brothers and sons - and sometimes years later trying to remake their livesTrade ReviewFascinating ... a poignant book ... an unusual and absolutely authentic view of those convulsive years - ObserverThis is as stark and acidic a collection of war stories as you will read ... Stripped bare of the sentimentalism attached to love in wartime, writers such as Elizabeth Bowen, Jean Rhys, Beryl Bainbridge and Dorothy Parker provide poignant, wry, subversive tales ... Revelatory reading - ScotsmanEach voice is individual and unsentimental ... Molly Lefebure and Margery Sharp write succinctly of the Blitz, while in Miss Anstruther's Letters, Rose Macaulay brilliantly paints spiritual as well as material devastation - Daily TelegraphEach story in Wave Me Goodbye is a relic of the Second World War - Sunday TimesWritten in and about the decade 1939-1949, the stories in this high caliber anthology are the work of women, chiefly English (five Americans are represented), who were actively engaged in the war effort on the home front. The experience of war--the London blitz, evacuation, the fronts in Europe and Africa--become personalized in stories from Barbara Pym, Rosamond Lehmann, Sylvia Townsend Warner, and others as notable ... the stories poignantly illuminate the ''second war'' behind the frontlines. - Publishers WeeklyWritten in and about the decade 1939-1949, the stories in this high caliber anthology are the work of women, chiefly English (five Americans are represented), who were actively engaged in the war effort on the home front. The experience of war--the London blitz, evacuation, the fronts in Europe and Africa--become personalized in stories from Barbara Pym, Rosamond Lehmann, Sylvia Townsend Warner, and others as notable ... the stories poignantly illuminate the ''second war'' behind the frontlines. - Publishers WeeklyThis is as stark and acidic a collection of war stories as you will read ... Stripped bare of the sentimentalism attached to love in wartime, writers such as Elizabeth Bowen, Jean Rhys, Beryl Bainbridge and Dorothy Parker provide poignant, wry, subversive tales ... Revelatory reading - Scotsman

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Book SynopsisJane Austen''s love life- long the subject of speculation- is finally, delightfully dealt with in the title story of this collection. Many of the other stories, like ''The Sidmouth Letters,'' bring together past and present- with sometimes hilarious, sometimes disturbing, often intensely moving results.With quiet elegance and devastating accuracy, Jane Gardam probes many and varied lives. We meet a trio of Kensington widows, mean-spirited and middle-aged, paying improbable tribute to a long exploited nanny; we await- with dread- a stranger to tea in an Engliish home; we witness the mercurial changes that take place in young love, and we watch as a bohemian, passionate past returns to tempt domestic bliss.Trade ReviewA fresh and huge delight... deliciously barbed. * GUARDIAN *The economical exactitude of her observation makes each of these eleven stories a keen pleasure. * DAILY TELEGRAPH *Brilliantly observed... moving. * THE TIMES *... combines an extraordinary vivid imagination with a felicity of expression, a hugely developed sense of the absurd, and the ability to involve a reader's emotions with her characters in a few pages. * EVENING STANDARD *She does fiction as it should be done, with confidence and insight -- Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie * Observer *

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Book Synopsis“Filled with passion, curiosity, empathy, as well as mischief—definitely mischief.”—Azar NafisiTrade Review"Carries the flavor of the old world..." -- The Washington Post

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Book SynopsisAward-winning graphic novelist Peter Kuper presents a mesmerising interpretation of fourteen iconic Kafka short stories.Trade Review"For tips on graphic novel adaptations, publishers would be well-served to look at Peter Kuper's Kafkaesque. The renderings of fourteen Franz Kafka short fictions remain true, but not slavishly devoted, to the originals and the final product gives us new perspectives on classic stories. It certainly helps that Kafka's work is opaque and ripe for reinterpretation, but it is Kuper's art that makes it so fresh." -- Times Literary Supplement"Kafkaesque is a stout, enchanting exploration of Kafka’s work. Illuminating his curious character with such incomparable art galvanises the comic’s content, making each individual story land with dramatic flair... It's not only a startlingly robust testament to the power of Kafka’s literary prowess, but also a splendid showcase for Kuper’s manic artwork." -- Starburst"… fans of enigmatic pessimism can allow themselves a shudder of delight." -- Strong Words"Brilliant... The Kafkaesque humor is intact, even enhanced." -- The Wall Street Journal

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Book SynopsisFour stories—two set on stormy seas, two on calm seas, all four based on the same incident—that speak to each other in interesting ways.

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Book SynopsisSelections by masters of the form from all over world include Edgar Allan Poe, Jack London, Nikolai Gogol, Guy de Maupassant, Charles Dickens, Anton Chekhov, Rudyard Kipling, Saki, and Henry James.

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Book SynopsisChosen by Paul Auster out of the four thousand stories submitted to his radio programme on National Public Radio, these 180 stories provide a wonderful portrait of America in the twentieth century. The requirement for selection was that each of the stories should be true, and each of the writers should not have been previously published. The collection that has emerged provides a richly varied and authentic voice for the American people, whose lives, loves, griefs, regrets, joys and sense of humour are vividly and honestly recounted throughout, and adeptly organised by Auster into themed sections. The section composed of war stories stretches as far back as the Civil War, still the defining moment in American history; while the sequence of ''Meditations'' conclude the volume with a true and abiding sense of transcendence.The resultant anthology is both an enduring hymn to the strange everyday of contemporary American life and a masterclass in the art of storytelling.Trade Review'It is difficult to think of another book published this year, and probably any book to be published next year, that is so simple and so obvious, so excellent in intention and so elegant in its execution, and which displays such wisdom and such knowledge of human life in all its varieties.' Ian Sansom, Guardian; 'Fantastic... Glows with the truth of shared human experience.' The Face; 'Astonishing... This is writing at its very finest.' Independent

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