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[[Category:New Reviews|Short Stories]]
[[Category:Short Stories|*]]__NOTOC__{{newreview|author=Etgar Keret|title=Suddenly, a Knock on the Door |rating=4|genre=Short Stories|summary=In the opening, titular story, Keret is forced by several people to create, and alter, a short short story. It's a plain metaphor for the history of Israel, but it proves that this modern Scheherazade is not too far removed geographically from the original. And what follows are probably the sort of short, tantalising, open<!-ended, rough-roundRemove -the-edges and surreal results of being compelled to carry on telling tall tales on a nightly basis.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701186674</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ray FawkesAllTomorrowsFutureCover|title=One Soul|rating=4.5|genre=Graphic Novels|summary=When reading this it soon becomes very clear we're reading not one, but nineteen, stories. With each page divided into a regular 3x3 grid there are eighteen images on each double page spread, and every one shows an episode, or a beat, of a different characterAll Tomorrow's life in turn, from being a babe-in-arms to death. However, the way they join up - everyone's figurative moment comes at once, at times the artist's heavy black ink makes all eighteen images coincide into one image - proves there is a separate, individual tale around and behind the others, one which will end with the most delightful moral - Futures: Fictions that the ability to be anything one imagines is in our DNA.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1934964662</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewDisrupt|author=Angela Carter|title=Burning Your BoatsBenjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)
|rating=5
|genre=Short StoriesScience Fiction|summary='Burning your Boats' brings together Carter's early works and her uncollected short stories, alongside the collections 'Fireworks', 'The Bloody Chamber', 'Black Venus' and 'American Ghosts'. Carter's ability to take the everyday and transform it into Opening up new ways of thinking about the fantastic is evident in stories that range from a cautionary tale shape of a musician in love with his instrument things to a lost motorist whose journey ends in nightmarish circumstances in the Snow Pavilioncome.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099592916</amazonuk>}}''
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Alexander MacLeodB0CDZRGT1M|title=Light LiftingSuper Short Stories: Flash Fiction|author=Mark C Wallfisch
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=Short stories may not ''Got a minute to be everyoneamused, entertained, or challenged?'s cup of tea'''These 100 stories are super short. Sometimes, particularly with first time authors, there None is an annoying tendency to be overly experimentalmore than 300 words. You can read one in a flash. Not so with Alexander MacLeod's stunningly assured debut'''Some are funny. Some are poignant. All are short. True he has genetic 'form' in Question: how do you review flash fiction? How do you give a flavour of a fully rounded little story if that he story is told in fewer than three hundred words? Or do you try to draw out themes from all the son flash fictions in a book of novelist and short story writer [[:Category:Alistair MacLeod|Alistair MacLeod]], them? I don't know! Perhaps we could start by explaining that there really isn't a fixed definition of flash fiction but even so, the quality of that for this collection, is remarkableauthor Mark C Wallfisch has gone for a three hundred word limit. The collection of seven stories is not overly themed, although certain issues and concerns do reappear, but what binds the stories together is That's about a very human approach to adversitysingle page in your average paperback.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224093940</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Peter O'DonnellRachel Harrison|title=Modesty Blaise: Live BaitBad Dolls
|rating=4
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=Married Love is Tessa Hadley’s second collectionIt's been some time since I've read any horror. I had a couple of misspent teen years reading Stephen King, containing twelve short stories looking borrowing the books from a boy I fancied at (mostly) modern relationships school and family dynamics – many are about parents and their grown up children and in-laws, others are about couples. Flicking through scaring myself half silly with them to the book to choose some point that I couldn't shut my bedroom curtains at night for fear of the best vampires outside! Don't worry - this short story collection isn't like that! It doesn't have those jump scares, and/or most interesting stories I didn't have to mentionread it during daylight hours only! But it is creepy, and I have found a difficulty. Almost all most of that feeling came from the fact that these incisive, witty are stories reveal an interesting group of characters I would like to know more about after women, living normal lives, and that at least in part, the endhorrors arises from very normal situations such as a breakup, sometimes from several different viewpointstrying a new dieting app, going to a hen party and it is hard to pick out just a fewcoping with grief. |amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0224096427</amazonuk>1803363932
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Adam RossB0CCCVRSGX|title=Ladies and GentlemenStories 2|author=Richard F Walker|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=Adam RossThis is Richard F Walker's characters are driven - but I mean that in the wrong way. They're not the ones riding on a crest of a wave second volume of motivation, steering their course through lifeshort stories. No, instead they There are passengers, thirteen in all and who or whatever is at the wheel seems to have lost the satnavI took something from each of them. So, in There isn'Futures', a middle-aged unemployed man finds himself giving life lessons and a kick up the backside to t a teenaged neighbour just as his own career seems about to enter its nth phase, with an airy-fairy psychic-oriented company single one that wondoesn't ever go as far as telling him what his job might deserve to beamong the others or brings down the overall quality. A professor who has It can be tricky to settle temporarily where his work takes him and not where he would likereview short stories without giving too much away, has so I'll just pick two to wonder what to do when told of the action-packed adventures of talk about and I think they give a devil-may-care, come-what-may mechanicgeneral flavour.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224087746</amazonuk>
}}
{{Frontpage
|isbn=1739593901
|title=22 Ideas About The Future
|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)
|rating=5
|genre=Science Fiction
|summary=''Our future will be more complex than we expected. Instead of flying cars, we got night-vision killer drones and automated elderly care with geolocation surveillance bracelets to track grandma.''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stella GibbonsB09XZMCDVF|title=Christmas at Cold Comfort FarmStories: 13 tantalising tales|author=Richard F Walker|rating=3.54
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=First things first. There's only one story in this collection about Cold Comfort Farm. This is a story about the farm before Flora Poste arrives, a 'prequel' if you like. It features the Starkadder family at Christmas, with a dispute over a coffin-nail and it did make me smile. I suspect it A news vendor is one for fans, however. For instance, crying out the appearance of a teenage Dick Hawk-Monitor, already headlines in love with Elfine, shoots a knowing wink at the devoted but would leave most readers cold. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099528673</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Michael Morpurgo|title=War: Stories middle of Conflict|rating=4|genre=Confident Readers|summary=Throughout history, war has blighted society and had long lasting impacts on not only those directly involved but the innocent bystanders too. This collection of stories, edited by the magnificent Michael Morpurgo himself, looks to explore the impacts of war on individual soldiers, families and especially children. Every story approaches conflicts from night; a different angle and this ensures that even though there are wheelchair user loses touch with reality when he tries walking around in his imagination; a good number of short stories stickler for correct grammar goes back in the book, you will never feel as if it is becoming repetitive or dull. The stories do time to correct an iconic quote; a good job of conveying just how multi-faceted and complex volunteer teacher proves the concept of war is.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1447205014</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Andrew Kaufman|title=The Tiny Wife|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=It all begins with a bank robbery. Only this isn't your typical sort of bank robbery since the robber demands not money but instead each ideal person to have around in a lawless village; the bank must give him new boy on the item of most sentimental value that they have pub football team is very useful with them. These range from photographs and a key through to a calculator...and on taking these items he says he is also taking fifty percent of their soulshis feet, and it is up to the victims to find the way to get their souls back, or to die trying.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007429258</amazonuk>}}awfully familiar…''
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Lloyd Jones1737030942|title=The Man in the Shed|rating=4.5|genre=Short Stories|summary=The title is certainly attention-grabbing and I hoped that the book would live up to my expectations. It did. The man in 'The Man in the Shed' is not blessed with a name. His name (whatever it is) is not important or relevant to the tale. It's all about ''why'Bag O' he's in the shed in the first place. This particular shed's in a garden of a house inhabited by a family which includes the young narrator. It's pretty clear that the marriage is going through a rocky patch right now. So who, you could reasonably wonder, is the odd one out here - the husband or the man in the shed. Jones tells us in his own way. He's a writer who catches your attention early, or he did in my case. No fancy statements or lazy cliches but good old plain English but with flair.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848544820</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewGoodies|author=Judith Hermann|title=AliceJolly Walker Bittick
|rating=4
|genre=Literary FictionAnthologies|summary=Sometimes, you deserve a treat and mine was Jolly Walker Bittick's 'Alice'Bag O' is Goodies''. I first encountered his writing about a year ago, when I read his [[Cape Henry House by Jolly Walker Bittick|Cape Henry House]], a collection rollicking tale of what happens when five short stories, linked thematically since they all deal with the subject of death, but they are also linked because the central character, Alice, is the same in each storyyoung men find a base for their partying. So rather than feeling like short stories the book has Right now, I didn't want a hint of the full-length novel , so I turned to it, yet the this anthology of verse and short stories are never completed or fully told so it. Bittick's a novel where you're not always sure what's going onwriting has matured - and so have his characters. Well...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184668529X</amazonuk>most of them!
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jamil Ahmad1529418100|title=The Wandering FalconBruno's Challenge and Other Dordogne Tales|author=Martin Walker
|rating=4
|genre=Literary FictionShort Stories|summary="In the tangle I'm not usually a fan of crumbling, weathershort stories -beaten and broken hills, where I find it all too easy to put the borders of Iran, Pakistan book down between stories and Afghanistan meet, is forget to pick it up again - but I am a military outpost…" Thus begins the tale fan of Tor Baz, Martin Walker's [[Martin Walker's Commissar Bruno Courreges Mysteries in Chronological Order|Bruno Courreges Mysteries]] so the Black Falcon. To this desolate place come two wanderers, a man temptation to read ''Bruno's Challenge'' was hard to resist and a woman seeking refuge. Refuge is denied them, since it places duties I'm rather glad that the fort commander cannot accept, but instead he offers them shelter from the wind of a hundred and twenty daysI didn't even try. For as long as they want it. Shelterthose new to the series, there's an excellent introduction that will tell you all you need to know about who's who and foodthe background to why Bruno is in St Denis.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241145155</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Cees Nooteboom and Ina Rilke (Translator)B08NF79QXT|title=The Foxes Come At Night And Other StoriesCherry Blossom Boutique|author=Brooke Adams|rating=4.53|genre=Short StoriesWomen's Fiction|summary=There's a bold statement on the front cover from, as it happens, Thirty-one of my favourite authors-year old Liberty Rossini has had her shop, [[:Category:A S Byatt|A S Byatt]] saying that Nooteboom is ''one of the greatest modern novelistsCherry Blossom Boutique, for just six months when she'' so I thought that I was in s nominated for a treat- and wins - the Retail Best Newcomer Award. But I didnShe't enjoy s delighted and the first short story. Not two people she's brought with her to the greatest of startsevent couldn't be more pleased. I was disappointed to say the least Sonja, her mother, is an ex-model and was wondering what all the fuss was aboutBrazilian: you can see where Liberty got her looks from. Then I started to read the story entitled Jessica's thirty-four and Liberty'Thunderstorms best friend: they've known each other since university and Liberty adores Jessica' s husband, Charles and things started to pick uptheir four-year-old daughter, Ava. I appreciated the sparse and elegant language. Lines such as Life would be perfect for Liberty if it wasn'Five people at an outdoor cafet for one thing: two women ... she misses having a solitary black man in her life... a couple at a table nearby. Enough for a film.' How lovely and evocative is that last line, I'm thinking. I read it twice as it was so good.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857050230</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sue GeeB08KKQ85FN|title=Last FlingBut Never For Lunch|author=Sandra Aragona
|rating=4
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=Sue Gee is well known for her novels, but this is her first collection of short stories. Short story collections are not for everyone. I've always enjoyed them since they fit easily into 'If a busy life, leaving you feeling as if you've lived through woman approaching the menopause can be likened to a whole story Rottweiler in just lipstick, an Ambassador nearing retirement resembles a short space pampered peacock about to be released into the company of time. It's easier carrion crows or, more to find the time for a quick story sometimes than point, about to sit down with a four hundred page novel!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907773061</amazonuk>}}discover the real world of bus timetables and paying his own gas bills.''
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John E FlanneryB08CHJLNBS|title=Toby's Little EdenCapturing Emilia|author=Brooke Adams|rating=3.5|genre=Short StoriesWomen's Fiction|summary=John E FlanneryHe's debut collection contains four short stories (although one is more of a novella) Charles Devereaux, thirty-eight and a series of amusing sketches about partner at Wickham Jones, the ground staff at a new Golf Course Mayfair letting agents. She's Emilia, twenty-nine, librarian and archivist in north Manchesterthe heritage library next door. TheyEmilia has read [[The Secret by Rhonda Byrne|The Secret]] but she're more varied than they might appear at first glance and demonstrate Flannerys moved on from new age books like that, which leave you dependent on someone else's ability philosophies, to get straight to the heart something a little deeper. Charles is more of the story without wasting words and to develop character as economically as possiblea [[Personal by Lee Child|Jack Reacher]] man himself, but, above all, whilst still holding the readerhe's imagination. I knew as soon as I began shocked that Emilia reads ''The GhostwriterGuardian'' that I wasn. They't going to be disappointed as a man who has written successful thrillers is possessed by the spirit re obviously not at all compatible, so why can Charles not get this woman out of Charles Dickens. his mind? ItShe's a neat riff on John Brainenot his usual type at all: it's idea obvious to his friends. And given that novelist wait for an idea Emilia regularly feels repulsed by Charles's superficiality, why does she feel drawn to descend on them and Graham Greenehim? The relationship's belief that novelists are like mediums.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1445777940</amazonuk>obviously a non-starter, isn't it?
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Dorothy ParkerMarie O'Regan and Paul Kane (editors)|title=The SexesCursed: An Anthology of Dark Fairy Tales|rating=4.5|genre=Short StoriesFantasy|summary=From the young woman who examined her handkerchief in minute detail, to the soldierCurses. They's leave which didn't live up re there throughout tales of faery and other fantastical folk – people being cursed to expectationdo this, through the thoughts of the early hours of the morning or not to the actress who proved a disappointment be able to her fan and do that. Children can be cursed, as can princesses on to the glorious culmination verge of the child who should never have been called Lolita we have five wonderful short storiesmarrying, and older people too. They're It seems in a book thatway there's no bigger than most escaping it. Which is why the theme of this book of short stories but buy it is such a standout – we may well think we know all there is to know about this accursed character, that demonised place, and it could well that other bewitched person. We'd be the best buy that you make this yearvery wrong.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>014119619X</amazonuk>1789091500
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Aidan ChambersStibbe_Xmas|title=The Kissing GameAn Almost Perfect Christmas|author=Nina Stibbe
|rating=4.5
|genre=TeensHumour|summary=Christmas – the time of traditional trauma. You dononly have to think about the turkey for that – once upon a time it was leaving it sat on the downstairs loo to defrost overnight, and if that failed the hair-dryer shoved inside it treatment was your next best bet. Nowadays it't see s all having to make sure it's suitably free-range and organic – but not too organic that many short story collections in YA circlesyou can go and visit it, and get too friendly with it to want to eat it. But when they do appearChristmas, though, you often wonder why there arenis of course also a time of great boons. It't more s cash in hand for a lot of them. And this is absolutely plump people who can hire red suits and beards, it was always a godsend for postmen with all the case with The Kissing Game. Ranging from short pieces of flash fiction thank-you letters to "proper" short storiesaunties you saw twice a decade that your parents made you write out in long-hand as a child, each one will inciteand as for the makers of Meltis Newberry Fruits – well, surprise did they even try and stimulate. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0370331974</amazonuk>sell them any other time of the year?
}}
{{Frontpage|isbn=0954899520|title=A Winter Book|author=Tove Jansson|rating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Tove Jansson's worldwide fame lasts on the Moomin books, written in the 1940s and later becoming television characters of the simplicity, naivety and sheer 'goodness' that would later produce flowerpot men or teletubbies. Simple drawings, simple stories, simple goodness. What is often forgotten outside of her native Finland is that she was a serious writer…that she wrote for adults as well as children…and that she had a feeling for the natural world and the simple life that not only informed those child-like trolls but went far beyond any fantasy of how the world might be.}}{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=William Styron1911115847|title=The Suicide RunNights of the Creaking Bed|author=Toni Kan
|rating=4
|genre=Short StoriesLiterary Fiction|summary=A WW2 naval soldier''Nights of the Creaking Bed'' is a collection of short stories by Toni Kan. The series of stories tell of the lives and lusts of an assortment of characters living in and around Lagos, guarding a prison island for those found guilty at courtmartialsNigeria. Nigeria, in this collection, is forced to wonder if he is winning his imbued with its very own battles against those arriving and leavingheart of darkness. A soldier remembers calming memories, Danger stalks the shadows and those causing tension, as he rests up before actionpeople are killed for nothing more than a wrong look. And for Kan writes with a highly-charged young man, there may be too much risk vitality and passion that allows these cynical stories to be found in his high-octane downtimeachieve a glimmer of hope.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099532220</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John Saunders1529014484|title=The Vernham ChroniclesExhalation |author=Ted Chiang|rating=45|genre=HumourScience Fiction|summary=Set amidst Over the rolling British countryside around Vernbury Vale is the little village of Vernham. Anyone who lives in a village will recognise it immediatelypast twenty-eight years, with its cobbled streets and Tudor buildings. There was some damage during the war (which mightTed Chiang has published fifteen science fiction short stories, or might not these magnificent stories have been down to won twenty-seven major science fiction awards so if you are a lighthouse folly constructed by a local landowner on his lake) but the gaps science fiction fan it is likely that you have been filled with already come across some beautiful, er, mock Tudor buildingsof the work by Ted Chiang. Almost unique and nearly beautiful as the village is, itIf you haven's not the star of The Vernham Chroniclest then take this opportunity to do so now. The stars are the people who live in VernhamTrust me; your imagination will be grateful.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907499598</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John H Watson, Tony Reynolds and Chris Coady1794467440|title=The Lost Stories of Sherlock HolmesWatchwords |author=Philip Neal
|rating=4
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=It is This satisfying collection of short stories has a truth universally acknowledged that a successful detective character will have far too many cases in his career for it to be provenance at all realistic. The worst case in point are least as beguiling as the provenance of the Hardy Boys, who have had two hundred or more adventures and are still not 20. Slightly more literary, but no less busy antique watches that inspired it can seem, was Sherlock Holmes, for Watson declaimed many times that he did not write down all that man's exploits. Tony Reynolds here gives us eight more cases, making Holmes' workload even more impressive.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907685618</amazonuk>}}
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Shena Mackay1529006031|title=The Atmospheric Railway: New and Selected StoriesReturn to Wonderland|author=Various Authors
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=This volume of short storiesIn following a young girl called Alice down the rabbit hole a few years ago, when the first published book she was in 2008 but new [[Alice's Adventures in paperbackWonderland (150th Anniversary Edition) by Lewis Carroll and Anthony Browne|hit 150 years of age]], I found that I didn't really find too much favour with it. The wacky-for-the-sake-of-it did not gel, has and I don't remember loving it more as a lot child. But I would suggest I am the perfect audience for this book. I had every chance to offer those familiar with Shena Mackayenjoy these short stories that come at the core from a tangent, that show the benefits of the oblique glance. I's previous work and readers ve always preferred coming to her stories for the first timean author's output through their least obvious, with a generous thirty six stories allegedly throw- thirteen recent stories collected in book form for away pieces, and it's the first time are combined same with twenty three from Shena Mackayfranchises – I'd more likely go for Bree Tanner's previous collectionsshort novella than the whole Twilight saga (although that remains just a hunch, for obvious reasons).|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099469677</amazonuk> For another thing, there was every reason to expect some kind of greatness here – with Carroll much loved by millions, surely pieces written with that love in mind could only provide for success after success?
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sheila O'Flanagan1846974658|title=A Season to Remember|rating=4|genre=General Fiction|summary=We first meet the Lodge owners, a likable couple. They find running their upmarket country house type hotel both exhilarating and exhausting. The novel is bang up to date so O'Flanagan gets in the whole recession/banker-bashing thing early on. As the festive season looms, the unthinkable has happened. Empty rooms. They're not used to empty rooms, at any time of the year. Normally the Lodge is a full house. But then a slow and steady trickle starts as our characters book in - and the story starts proper, so to speak.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755375157</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewLong Path To Wisdom|author=John Mortimer|title=Rumpole at ChristmasJan-Philipp Sendker
|rating=4
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=This book On my travels around the world, I have a tendency to end up in any bookshop that is selling English-language books, and while I buy as slim many second-hand escapist tales as one of Rumpolethe next person, what I's beloved packets of cigars and it can also be read in m really looking for is the 'local' – the time it takes an average turkey to cook in cookbook maybe, the oven on Christmas Day. A handful of festivemaps definitely, short stories is covered in this book with its appealing front coverbut above all: the folk tales. Most of the stories have been previously published elsewhereIf I ever get to Burma, mainly in I won'The Strand Magazine' but also in some of the national newspaperst need to hunt, I can read before I go.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141039779</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Raymond CarverB077969HN8|title=BeginnersAlternative Medicine|author=Laura Solomon
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary= One thing you soon surmise from reading Raymond Carver is that he was an alcoholic. CarverLaura Solomon's characters tend to drink excessively, and his publisher describes the short stories often examine the negative impact in ''Alternative Medicine'' as ''black comedy with a twist of drinking on his central charactersurrealism''s relationships. But nowadays I'm rather glad that I didn't see this until ''after'' I'd finished reading as I'm not normally a fan of either, but I've come to two conclusions about the book: what we talk about when we talk about Carver the publisher says is correct - and I really enjoyed it. The comedy is not ''too'' black and the role surrealism is gentle and perhaps best described as a twist or flick of his editor, Gordon Lishreality when you were least expecting it. Your comfort zones are going to be invaded in the nicest possible way.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099540320</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Colm Toibin9386897504|title=The Empty Family|rating=4.5|genre=Short Stories|summary=In his first book since the pitch-perfect [[Brooklyn by Colm Toibin|Brooklyn]], Colm Toibin once more examines the great Irish theme Tales of exile Love and homecoming in his new collection of short stories, 'The Empty Family'. As the title suggests, many of the stories also revolve around family relationships, and their sweet and sour Nature.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670918172</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewDisability|author=Kurt Vonnegut|title=Look at the BirdieLaura Solomon
|rating=4
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=Kurt Vonnegut died I've always believed that less-able writers produce longer books: it takes a couple great deal of years ago after skill and talent to write a sci fi writing career spanning over fifty years; he was well-known short story which holds the reader and keeps them coming back for his humanist viewsmore. This collection There are far too many collections of unpublished short stories shows Vonnegut at his dark best, his theme, individuals out for themselves in an uncaring societywhich are all too easy to put down and forget after you've read a couple of pieces. A colleague at The Bookbag I've recently read a couple of novellas by Laura Solomon - [[Armageddon in Retrospect Marsha's Deal by Kurt VonnegutLaura Solomon|recently wroteMarsha's Deal]] that Kurt Vonnegutand [[Hell's Unveiling by Laura Solomon|Hell's early writing is his strongest. If that is Unveiling]] and enjoyed them, so, then this collection, illustrated I was intrigued to see what she could do with cartoons by the author, will be good news for his many fansan even shorter form.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099548852</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ryunosuke Akutagawa1986586898|title=Going To The Beautiful and the GrotesqueLast: Short Stories About Horse Racing|author=K D Knight|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=The author, In the tongue-twisting Akutagawa is 'hailed as one of the greatest short opening story writers , a man whose wife has deserted him visits Sandown with little money but comes away with cash in world literature' says the back book cover. I was truly impressed his pocket - and very keen to get readinghis wife. The front cover is both eye-catching and colourful, thereIn ''A Grey Day''s no doubt that this book an owner struggles with the problem of whether or not to run his horse in the Gold Cup when the ground is about Japanagainst him. There is a comprehensive Introduction with its lovely title My favourite was ''A Sprig Of Wild OrangeThe Story of H'' written by , the translatorstory of Foinavon. And straight away I got H is depicted as a strong sense kind horse who only wanted to please people. After changing hands on various occasions he came to the yard of his enthusiasm for the short stories to followJohn Kempton. It is H (or Foinavon) was entered in the Grand National and considered a good leadno-in as it informs hoper. In one of the reader most dramatic runnings of the gulf which exists between Western and Japanese values (race, a gulf as big as it getspile-up occurred at the 23rd fence. Foinavon, who had been many lengths adrift, apparently) cleared the fence and of galloped to the line, winning the conservative nature race at odds of the Japanese people100/1.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0871401924</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Lydia Davis9386897296|title=The Collected Short Stories of Lydia DavisHell's Unveiling|author=Laura Solomon|rating=3.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=As you might expect with short storiesA little while ago I really enjoyed [[Marsha's Deal by Laura Solomon|Marsha's Deal]] and I was delighted by the opportunity to read the sequel, ''Hell's Unveiling''. It's probably not much of a spoiler to say that Marsha bested the themes are as varied as devil in ''Marsha's Deal'The Fears of Mrs Orlando' , but the devil is not one to take defeat lying down. He'Motherss out to wage war on Planet Earth and particularly on Marsha (who' and s thought of course, I have my own particular favouritesas a 'goody two shoes' in Hell). Most of these short stories cover Although a couple of pagesstrong person, but others she's vulnerable where her foster children are merely concerned. Daniel is framed for a sentence or twocrime he didn't commit and sent to juvenile detention and refused permission to return to live with Marsha. AndThen, for meof course, there are all the other children who are not only targeted but - worst of all - subverted to the less devil's evil ends. He's out to prey on the pagetheir fears and weaknesses and as with many foster children, the more impart the words usually havetheir self-esteem is very fragile. In short (This is no pun intended) there would seem small-scale operation, either - the devil has set up a training complex on earth, complete with an elevator to be something for everyone in these 700+ pagesHell.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>024114504X</amazonuk>
}}
