5/28/14

Armchair BEA-- my favorite books of short stories

The thing about short stories is that they are short, and so for those of us who are fast readers desperately trying to escape reality with full-blown immersion in text they sometimes you get to the end just as the edges of life are starting to blur and you are no longer worrying about the cat's overdue vet appointment etc., and this can be frustrating.

That being said, there are three authors whose short stories I return to time after time for my re-reading pleasure (possibly because some of their short stories verge on novellas....)

The first of these is Ursula Le Guin.   Her stories, of which I feel there are hundreds, encompass  science fiction, fantasy, speculative fiction, and historical fiction, and they are twisty, thoughtful, beautiful, disturbing, and above all, memorable.   (Shakes self away from mental wandering through story after story....I have read them so often that I can go into a fugue state where they scroll through my mind).   Happily, her stories have recently been anthologized in two volumes--The Unreal and the Real, from Small Beer Press (2012).   If you are a speculative fiction fan, I'd actually start with Vol. 2, set in various places far beyond earth.  

I don't often say this, but I think reading Ursula Le Guin has made me a better person (or at least someone who tries to be a better person).  She is my favorite author of all, and the most thrilling moment of my blogging career was when she put a link to my review of  her novel, Lavinia up on her webpage.


I have been rereading the same Joan Aiken anthologies since I was nine, and they are pretty much on their last legs.   Some of her stories I wish I hadn't read, because they tip over into horror (at least from the point of view of a kid).   But others have become treasures in the storehouse of my mind.  A good place to start (especially if you are a kid!)  is The Serial Garden--these are all about the same family, and they are funny and magical as all get out (here's my review).   The title story is one of my favorite pieces of short fiction ever.  If  you are a grown-up who likes the darker side of things, you could try to posthumous anthology, The Monkey's Wedding and Other Stories. (both of these are also from Small Beer Press).


Finally, I'd like to share my love for the short stories of Robin McKinley.  My third favorite piece of her writing (after The Blue Sword and Beauty), is the title story of the anthology A Knot in the Grain.  It is the story of a girl whose family relocates to a big old house in the country...and the loneliness of her first summer there, her tentative progress into new friendship, and the old magic she finds in the hidden attic above the attic are beautifully described.  I aso very much enjoy her stories in Water and Fire, although some of these you can feel desperatly straining to become novels of their own....as happens a lot to Robin McKinley, which is why she wasn't able to write short stories for the other elements (Pegasus, for instance, was supposed to be an air short story.....)

19 comments:

  1. I didn't know that Ursula Le Guin is your favorite author of all! Now I want to revisit her. Maybe I will start with the short stories....

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    1. I guess I don't talk about her much becausse she is a pre-blogging author! But her books have the best piece of shelf real estate in my bedroom...

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  2. I don't think I've read any of Ursula K. LeGuin's short stories, which is a major oversight given how much I love her novels.

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    1. Oh, you are in for a treat! Multiple treats, in fact!

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  3. Alcott, knitting, and hot tea
    We're the class of eighty...

    Wait. Wrong kind of cheer leading? I was so happy you showed up in the 50s I was supposed to comment on. I've seen the Aiken book a couple of times now-- I'll have to hunt down a copy.

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    1. It isn't exactly one I'd rush to press into your hands, but it is fun, and old-fashioned-ish, so you may well enjoy it!

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  4. WOW, we are three-for-three. LOVE all of these, and ... okay, I know we come at these things from slightly different directions, but I TOTALLY take your meaning about being a better person. Between Granny Weatherwax and the short stories of Ursula LeGuin, I, too, have found a small and new place to strive...

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    1. Yes, I am glad to have met Granny Weatherwax, and wish I had sooner!

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  5. Oh wow, three of my favorites! I picked The Serial Garden for my list too. I avoided The Monkey's Wedding for a long time because I thought it would be VERY dark, but it isn't really. I actually wrote to Small Beer Press to see if they would consider doing another volume of the best of Aiken's fairy tales, and they said they were thinking about it but nothing was concrete yet. She wrote so many stories, it would be a massive job to go through and select them.
    You can see my post @ Emerald City Book Review 

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    1. I still have all my old anthologies....I tried to get the boys interested in the non Serial Garden ones, but to my regret, they didn't take to them....

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  6. I just heard about Ursula for the first time a few months ago and I'm super interested. Maybe Ill start with her short stories!

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    1. Oh, I hope you try her and like her! I wrote a post a while back on which of her books to read first--here it is -- http://charlotteslibrary.blogspot.com/2009/04/which-ursula-le-guin-to-read-first-plus.html

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  7. Well all three of these are new authors for me. Isn't that one of the pleasures of reading other blogs, that you discover new authors. I don't read much in the short story category, maybe because I suffer the same feeling that you do that just when it's getting interesting the darn thing ends

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    1. And then once you have discovered new blogs and new authors, the piles just keep growing and growning! Madness!

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  8. Ooh I haven't read any of the ones you shared. I'm not big on short stories though.

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  9. Man, I am going to have to check out the LeGuin and McKinley collections ASAP - two of my favorite authors! Great suggestions!

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  10. I haven't tried short stories by any of these authors, but I love the fantasy/sci-fi short stories by Ted Chiang, so I should try these out!

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  11. I hadn't thought about Le Guin for short stories but that could work for me. Thanks!

    Joy's Book Blog

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  12. I have not heard of any of these before! The last one sounds really interesting as it brings about a lot of experiences that come about with moving to a new place.

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