KimElliott.net

Considered an unprofitable venture by publishers and a dying discipline by many writers, shorts seems to have been condemned to the pages of literary magazines or the odd fiction website.

When well written, a short story can be the exact break from reality most of us could use. It’s like a weekend away breathing in the fresh air of the countryside instead of a fortnight sweltering in Greece.

If you’re willing to take the chance with a collection of short stories, these are the ones I’d recommend.

In the order I discovered them:

Alice Walker’s You Can’t Keep a Good Woman Down (1982)

Start by reading Porn or The Abortion and if you don’t find it’s for you after those, stop.

Jeanette Winterson’s The World and Other Places (1998)

Disappearance II made me realise I wanted to be a writer and I once typed out Lives of Saints on an old Corona for a friend.

Michael Marshall Smith’s What You Make It (1999)

I wish MMS hadn’t turned commercial with his pulp horror. More Tomorrow, is my favourite in this collection.

Brett Easton Ellis’ The Informers (1994)

A series of interconnected shorts. Discovering Japan can be bough separately and fits in your back pocket. Size but not content recommended for a bus ride,

Susan Perabo’s Explaining Death to the Dog (1999)

The strongest short stories I’ve ever read. If this collection were an album, it’d be full of hit singles.

Graham Greene’s Twenty-One Stories (1955)

I’m going to admit I bought this for The Destructors, after it being referenced in Donnie Darko.

Mary Gaitskill’s Because They Wanted To (1997)

A debate on The Girl On The Plane prompted me to track down this collection. The title story is also heart-wrenching,

Christopher Isherwood’s Goodbye to Berlin (1939)

A collection of observational stories about the population of pre-Nazi Berlin.

A.M. Homes’ Things You Should Know (2002)

The Former First Lady and the Football Hero is painful and beautiful.

Miranda July’s No One Belongs Here More Than You (2007)

Her short stories seem a bit of a one trick pony, but it’s a fucking awesome trick.