I’m a sucker for this series. Every fall I start itching for the arrival of the latest Best American Short Stories with its brightly colored cover and guest writer/editor. Series editor Katrina Kenison culls through thousands of short stories to deliver 120 to the guest editor, who then chooses 20 for publication. The outcome, of course, is dependent on the quality of fiction published during the year, and there have been years where the pickings were slim. This year’s edition, selected by Walter Mosley, does not disappoint; it must have been a good year for short stories.
Published in publications as large and grandiose as The New Yorker or as trendy as Zoetrope and Tin House, the stories include pieces by well-established authors such as E.L. Doctorow and Louise Erdrich, but also by writers in the early stages of their careers, such as Ryan Harty and Dean Paschal.
The highlights of this diverse collection, for me, were Ryan Harty’s “Why the Sky Turns Red When the Sun Goes Down,” a haunting and eerie story of the father of a robot child who is having seizures, and Kevin Brockmeier’s heartbreaking “Space” (included in his amazing collection, Things That Fall From the Sky), in which a father and son struggle to come to terms with the death of their wife and mother. Adam Haslett’s story, “Devotion,” is quiet but powerful (and can be found in his collection, You Are Not a Stranger Here) as it examines the results of a long-ago decision made by a brother on behalf of his sister. ZZ Packer’s contribution, “Every Tongue Shall Confess” (included in her collection, Drinking Coffee Elsewhere) is a riotous but humane look at an evangelical women’s faith and loneliness, a topic which could have been clichéd or condescending in less capable hands than Packer’s. Dean Paschal’s “Moriya” follows a mechanically minded boy as he learns the deepest secrets of a robotic doll.
And now that I’ve read them, some of them more than once, I have little choice but to wait for 2004’s edition. Of course, as noted above, most of these stories have appeared or are set to appear in future collections by the individual authors. Looks like I’ll have plenty of choice reading material for the winter ahead.
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