We received 96 short story collections in 2013, many of them well worth reading. Beyond the three finalists and the winner of The Story Prize Spotlight Award, here is a long list of other collections that particularly stood out for us:
Keeping our long list to a reasonable length—14 books this time around—entailed drawing a somewhat arbitrary line that leaves out quite a few exceptional short story collections that might be on many other readers' lists. In the end, such choices are to a large degree personal and subjective.
Writing a story collection and seeing it through to publication is an immense accomplishment, and every author of every book we read in 2013 truly deserves to take a bow. We hope readers will explore the books on and beyond this list—along with the many fine short story collections that no doubt will be coming out this year.
* Titles link to IndieBound listings, author names to guest posts on this blog.
- A Permanent Member of the Family by Russell Banks (HarperCollins)*
- Stay Up with Me by Tom Barbash (Ecco)
- Amor and Psycho by Carolyn Cooke (Alfred A. Knopf)
- Claire of the Sea Light by Edwidge Danticat (Alfred A. Knopf)
- Dirty Love by Andre Dubus III (W.W. Norton)
- Middle Men by Jim Gavin (Simon & Schuster)
- The Miniature Wife by Manuel Gonzales (Riverhead Books)
- This Close by Jessica Francis Kane (Graywolf Press)
- Brief Encounters with the Enemy by Saïd Sayrafiezadeh (The Dial Press)
- Jewelry Box by Aurelie Sheehan (BOA Editions)
- Fools by Joan Silber (W.W. Norton)
- The House at Belle Fontaine by Lily Tuck (Grove/Atlantic)
- The Isle of Youth by Laura van den Berg (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
- Godforsaken Idaho by Shawn Vestal (New Harvest/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
Keeping our long list to a reasonable length—14 books this time around—entailed drawing a somewhat arbitrary line that leaves out quite a few exceptional short story collections that might be on many other readers' lists. In the end, such choices are to a large degree personal and subjective.
Writing a story collection and seeing it through to publication is an immense accomplishment, and every author of every book we read in 2013 truly deserves to take a bow. We hope readers will explore the books on and beyond this list—along with the many fine short story collections that no doubt will be coming out this year.
* Titles link to IndieBound listings, author names to guest posts on this blog.
