The Long List: Other Outstanding 2014 Short Story Collections

We received 129 short story collections in 2014, the most ever entered for The Story Prize in a single year. Beyond the three finalists and the winner of The Story Prize Spotlight Award, here's a long list of some other collections that particularly stood out for us:

• The UnAmericans by Molly Antopol (W.W. Norton)
• The Emerald Light in the Air by Donald Antrim (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
• Pitiful Criminals by Greg Bottoms (Counterpoint)
• Man V. Nature by Diane Cook (Harper Torch)
• Can't and Won't by Lydia Davis (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
• Ecstatic Cahoots and Paper Lanterns by Stuart Dybek (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
• The Wilds by Julia Elliott (Tin House Books)
• Let Me Be Frank with You by Richard Ford (Ecco)
• American Innovations by Rivka Galchen (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
• Problems with People by David Guterson (Alfred A. Knopf)
• All the Rage by A.L. Kennedy (Little A/New Harvest)
• Redeployment by Phil Klay (Penguin Press)
• See You in Paradise by J. Robert Lennon (Graywolf Press)
• Leaving the Sea by Ben Marcus (Alfred A. Knopf)
• Funny Once by Antonya Nelson (Bloomsbury)
• The Gurkha's Daughter by Prajwal Parajuly (Quercas)
• Flings by Justin Taylor (HarperCollins)

We publish our long list after our short list of finalists because in some ways it's even more difficult to make these choices. We read many other worthwhile collections, but to keep the list at a somewhat reasonable length, we had to draw a line somewhere. Every author who published a short story collection in 2014 deserves a great deal of credit, and at least a dozen other books we read could easily have made this list. 

Other Outstanding 2013 Short Story Collections

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:

• 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.

Outstanding and Notable 2011 Collections

So many of the short story collections we read for The Story Prize in 2011 were skillful, engaging, and well-deserving of a wider readership. We could only choose three books as finalists. However, we read several other 2011 collections we considered to be worthy of attention. We found these seven books, in particular, to be outstanding:

• Steve Almond, God Bless America, Lookout Books*
• Charles Baxter, Gryphon: New and Selected Stories, Pantheon
• Siobhan Fallon, You Know When the Men Are Gone, Putnam/Amy Einhorn
• Caitlin Horrocks, This Is Not Your City, Sarabande Books 
• Maureen McHugh, After the Apocalypse, Small Beer Press
• Daniel Orozco, Orientation and Other Stories, Faber & Faber
• Jim Shepard, You Think That's Bad, Alfred A. Knopf

And we highly recommend these notable collections (though many others we read could also have been on this list):

• Alethea Black, I Knew You'd Be Lovely, Broadway Books
• Lou Beach, 420 Characters, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
• Shannon Cain, The Necessity of Certain Behaviors, Univ. of Pittsburgh Press
• Seth Fried, The Great Frustration, Counterpoint/Soft Skull
• Laura Furman, The Mother Who Stayed, Free Press
• David Galef, My Date with Neanderthal Woman, Dzanc Books
• Dagoberto Gilb, Before the End, After the Beginning, Grove Press
• Diane Goodman, Party Girl, Autumn House Press
• Alan Heathcock, Volt, Graywolf Press
• Patricia Henley, Other Heartbreaks, Engine Books
• Michael Martone, Four for a Quarter, FC2
• Ana Menendez, Adios, Happy Homeland, Black Cat
• Sabina Murray, Tales of the New World, Black Cat 
• Edna O'Brien, Saints and Sinners, Little Brown
• Miroslav Penkov, East of the West, Farrar, Straus and Giroux
• Helen Phillips, And Yet They Were Happy, Leapfrog Press
• Shann Ray, American Masculine, Graywolf Press
• Adam Ross, Ladies and Gentlemen, Alfred A. Knopf
• Elissa Schappell, Blueprints for Building Better Girls, Simon & Schuster
• Andrew Scott, Naked Summer, Press 53
• Danzy Senna, You Are Free, Riverhead Books
• Emma Straub, Other People We Married, Five Chapters/Riverhead Books
• Melanie Rae Thon, In This Light, Graywolf Press
• Lynne Tillman, Someday This Will Be Funny, Cursor/Red Lemonade
• Colm Tóibín, The Empty Family, Scribner

* [Author links are to guest posts on The Story Prize blog. 

Book links are to IndieBound or other bookselling outlets.]