There are two Granta American short fiction collections, both of which were selected by Richard Ford, roughly fifteen years apart, and they reflect a development in the American short story, as well as in Richard Ford becoming a monumental asshole. As a result, the first collection is a marginally better selection of stories, and contains a much, much better introduction. Ford seems to have really tried to reconcile the classic American short story - with a straightforward plot and characters, t...

Best ones in this collection are :The Babysitter by Robert Coover Well, Coover wrote metafiction with a very high boredom content most of the time (see Pricksongs and Descants for my rant) but this story is a total delight. A teenage girl is babysitting and some lads are going to break in to the house where they know she is. So, the situation is one of menace and dread, and a standard one in most slasher flicks. Coover writes the whole story, with some alternative scenes, then slices everything...

Borrowed from my sister Tracy in Worcester over the weekend. I'll read this alongside "Lust For Life". This edition is blue and hardcover. Edited/curated by Richard Ford. 7/9... I finished another mediocre Joyce Carol Oates novel. I've read some of her s.stories and I think I like those better. There's one in here. Starting tonight...I finally did get started Saturday night and read the first two stories. Are the two Bowles related? The story by Paul is a shocker and very strange. Seems like I m...

I generally get the feeling that I'm wrong in all of my opinions of literature and story-telling because it just is not copacetic with what smart guys like Ford say. Did that sound sarcastic? Man, even without inflection I sound like a jackass.But really, most American authors have a propensity towards the modern or post-modern form of writing - slice of life or stream of consciousness if you like, since these are often the same. Richard Ford, who I do respect as an author and a writer very much...

Ford has selected 43 wonderful and diverse stories, far too many to comment on, except to note that he should have included one of his own, so I will instead comment on his fabulous introduction, which, like his introduction to the Chekov collection he edited, is full of wisdom about what good stories are or should be; and it is written in a penetrating, yet wandering Fordian style, with lots of long complex sentences which I am trying to imitate with this one. For example, literature is “freque...

Well, took me an age, but I guess the joy of a short story collection is to pick up and put down at will. Overall a quality selection of short stories. You're never going to love every one, but again, the joy is that if you don't like this one, you're only a few pages from the next. An interesting choice to compile them straightforwardly in date order, rather than try and balance them thematically or group them - but that gives you more room to take each one at face value. Definitely introduced

A very enjoyable collection of short stories, introduced with a stimulating essay on this art form by editor Richard Ford.I’ve read quite a few short-fiction anthologies of late, and while this one contained some of the usual standards (e.g. Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” and Tim O’Brien’s “The Things They Carried), it also presented some impressive new stories by authors both new and familiar to me. These included: “A Distant Episode” by Paul Bowles, "In the Heart of the Heart of the Country"

I got this book (1992 edition) because I wanted to read James Baldwin's "Sonny's Blues" (1957)and confess that I only read one other story in the collection. (Can't remeber the title, but the author was Wm. Kotzwinkle of E.T. fame) This book is worth revisiting, again and again. It has short works by some of my favorites,Jamaica Kinkaid, Eudora Welty, Wallace Stegner, Lorrie Moore and John Cheever , to name just a few. I'm sure I will return to it, as well as the more recent Granta collections.

REQ'd 7/22 - found in card catalog while looking for Shirley Jackson. Checked out 27 Jul; started 4 Aug 2008; took back to lib 19 Aug. Skimmed thru the intro essay - jumped around/skipped thru this gigantic tome - took it back to the library after getting about 2/3 of the way through it. Some really good stuff (whose titles I have failed to recall), but too much all at once, especially combined with a Shirley Jackson short story collection.

Fairly comprehensive look at post-war American fiction.

I used this book as an introduction to new/unfamiliar writers and as such was not disappointed.

"A Distant Episode" by Paul Bowles was absolutely haunting.

To learn to write short stories, analyzing the way the writer graps the readers' attention.

Took me a while but I read every story in this excellent collection. Amazing breadth of stories here. Starting the second volume soon enough...

I just couldn't get into this book at all. Impenetrable. And I tried hard and read several stories.

A great collection. Not all the stories/novellas were great, but most were pretty good, and several were amazing. Ford's intro is interesting if you're interested in novellas and what makes a novella, though in the end he doesn't really answer this question -- not that there's an answer anyway. He brings up some great points along the way, provides some nice history, I'll read it again and again. The only shocking exclusion from the anthology was Jim Harrison. Harrison has to be the country's mo...

I'm done reading Long Stories. I guess maybe I don't like Long Stories very much or I don't like Richard Ford's taste in Long Stories very much, because these Long Stories were mostly very much a disappointment. Full standings, with detail:June Recital (Eudora Whitely): 5/10. Her prose makes me feel like I have dyslexia. Also longer than it needed to be. The Long March (William Stryon): 7/10. Fine, but not anything great. Just solid, basic, typical american short/long story writing.Goodbye, Colu...

Pretty good set of 11 Long Stories.William Styron - The Long March. Having march in the same NC as depicted by Styron, I think he captures the essence of NC, and also that friction between the inefficiency of the military, and the benefits to the training to force the soldiers to overcome and endure that inefficiency in order to prepare to fight. - Lt. Culver fought in WWII in Okinawa, and now is somewhat unexpectedly called out of his comfortable civilian life for Korea - "months later at camp,...

I've only gotten to a handful of these but so far the Eudora Welty, which made me feel silly for ever trying to write, blows them all away.