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[[Category:New Reviews|Short Stories]]
[[Category:Short Stories|*]]__NOTOC__<!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Simon RichAllTomorrowsFutureCover|title=The Last Girlfriend on EarthAll Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)
|rating=5
|genre=Short StoriesScience Fiction|summary=There is more opportunity than ever these days to downsize your library. You can take all those lumpen classics to the charity shop now that they can be downloaded for free onto an e-reader. And with these couple of hundred pages you can also divest yourself of a heck of a lot ''Opening up new ways of fiction thinking about love, for this can easily replace so much you've read at greater length, with less imagination and with much less humour elsewhere. That hyperbole is only partly inspired by the style shape of the contents, for it really is that goodthings to come.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184668921X</amazonuk>}}''
{{newreview|author=Lee Child (Editor)|title=Vengeance|rating=4|genre=Crime|summary=I like short story collections. They're useful reading material when ve heard it said that 'technology' is what happens after you're eighteen. Well, I must confess that there have been more than a mum few decades of young children as you can usually manage to squeeze technology in a six page story at nap time, but youmy lifetime. I've kept up reasonably well with what're guaranteed if you try s advantageous to start that 500 page novel youme but I've been meaning to read m left with the feeling that just as it starts to get interesting your baby will wake up! This collection 's all getting away from me. Some of crime stories it is brought together under - frankly - quite frightening. Of course, I could research the possibilities and the title of probabilities and end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who knows what they'Vengeance'' so, as you'd imagine, they are all to do with revenge re talking about or the latest conspiracy theorist. I needed people I knew I could trust and people getting or trying to get their own backwho could deliver information in a way I could understand.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857899015</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Deborah LevyB0CDZRGT1M|title=Black Vodka|rating=4|genre=Short Stories|summary=''Black Vodka'' is a collection of ten previously published short pieces of writing by Deborah Levy, many first published in the early 2000s. The most recent is the piece from which this collection gains its title which has been shortlisted for the 2012 BBC International Short Story Award. As a compilation of her writing, obviously these were not written to appear together, but some clear themes emerge from the collection, namely a deeply disturbing look at the search for love, particularly amongst those on the edge of society|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1908276169</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Joyce Carol Oates|title=The Corn Maiden and Other Nightmares|rating=5|genre=Super Short Stories|summary=Many years ago, I stumbled across a Joyce Carol Oates story in a horror anthology. What I most remember about the story was how vividly the feelings the characters experienced were portrayed. Whilst the story itself was not exactly a horror story in the mould of Stephen King and James Herbert, it was very well presented. With this experience, I had high hopes of 'The Corn Maiden and Other Nightmares' a brand new collection of short stories from Oates.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1908800224</amazonuk>}} {{newreview: Flash Fiction|author=Robin Jones and Ashley Stokes (Editors)|title=Unthology: No. 3Mark C Wallfisch
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=Unthank Books have brought out their third annual short story 'unthology'. (See what they did thereGot a minute to be amused, entertained, or challenged?) The series is described as showcasing the ''unconventional, unpredictable and experimental'' which These 100 stories are super short. None is correct as far as it goesmore than 300 words. You can read one in a flash. They omit words that I personally would have included; words like 'refreshing' and 'excitingly different' because, if I needed to be convinced about Some are funny. Some are poignant. All are short stories (and, being a fan, I don.''t) they would be the clincher.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0957289707</amazonuk>}}
{{newreview|author=Tania Hershman|title=My Mother Was An Upright PianoQuestion: Fictions|rating=5|genre=Short Stories|summary=It's said how do you review flash fiction? How do you give a flavour of a fully rounded little story if that the art of short-story writing is totally different told in fewer than three hundred words? Or do you try to draw out themes from all the flash fictions in a book of them? I don't know! Perhaps we could start by explaining that there really isn't a fixed definition of novels as the writer only flash fiction but that for this collection, author Mark C Wallfisch has ten or so pages to accomplish what others do in two to gone for a three hundredword limit. Imagine, therefore, telling an entire story in prose conveying depth and meaning That's about a single page in fewer words than this review. It may be difficult but, apparently, not downright impossible as [[:Category:Tania Hershman|Tania Hershman]] has nailed it with honours. In fact her first collection [[The White Road by Tania Hershman|The White Road]] was commended by the Orange Prize judges of 2009your average paperback.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906477604</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mike HenleyRachel Harrison|title=One Dog and His ManBad Dolls
|rating=4
|genre=Pets
|summary=Oberon is a Labrador with a pedigree as long as your arm and ''One Dog and His Man'' is his story about what it's like living with the man he generously refers to as ''The Boss'', about life in general and the ways of the world. Think of him as the canine equivalent of the parliamentary sketch writer, there to highlight the idiosyncrasies of human life and bring a gentle humour to situations which might otherwise be taken far too seriously. Before you wonder how this is possible - how a dog can write a book - let me remind you that dogs are very intelligent animals. After all, dogs and their humans might go to what are laughingly called 'dog training classes', but it's the humans who are trained, not the dogs.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1471660354</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Joseph O'Connor
|title=Where Have You Been?
|rating=5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Irish novelist Joseph O'Connor has had quite a 2012. Earlier in the year he joined the ranks of such authors as Edna O'Brien, [[:Category:Roddy Doyle|Roddy Doyle]] and Seamus Heaney when he became a recipient of the PEN award for his outstanding contribution to Irish literature. What could possibly top that for a sense of achievement? Well this, his first book of short stories in 20 years, must come pretty close to at least equalling it, amply illustrating the reasons for the panel's decision.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846556899</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Anita Desai
|title=The Artist of Disappearance
|rating=4.5
|genre=Literary Fiction
|summary=Anita Desai's ''The Artist of Disappearance'' is a collection of three novellas with several satisfying unifying features. All are set in modern day India, all involve some looking back in time and all three involve some consideration of the creative art - who it is for, what happens to it once it leaves the artist's control and who 'owns' it. Most of all, each one is beautifully written, with strong characters and evocative descriptions of personal loss. In terms of length each is relatively short - around 50 pages long - but after each one you feel that you've been engrossed in the story just as much as if you had read a novel of more conventional length.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099553953</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Roddy Doyle
|title=Bullfighting
|rating=5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=It's been some time since I've often wondered what goes through an authorread any horror. I had a couple of misspent teen years reading Stephen King, borrowing the books from a boy I fancied at school and scaring myself half silly with them to the point that I couldn's mind t shut my bedroom curtains at night for fear of the next time they sit down to write after winning a major literary prize. vampires outside! Does it put undue pressure on an author, thinking Don't worry - this short story collection isn't like that they will ! It doesn't have to write something equally as good or better next time around? Some writers can wilt under the pressure those jump scares, and future offerings are derided by critics as I didn'not as good as (insert title here)'. t have to read it during daylight hours only! But some thrive under it is creepy, and I found most of that feeling came from the weight of expectation fact that these are stories about women, living normal lives, and continue that at least in part, the horrors arises from very normal situations such as a breakup, trying a new dieting app, going to write wonderful stories. 1993 Booker Prize winner [[Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha by Roddy Doyle|Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha]] falls firmly into this latter categorya hen party and a coping with grief.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>009955562X</amazonuk>1803363932
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Gerry WellsB0CCCVRSGX|title=Kicking the Hornets' NestStories 2|author=Richard F Walker|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=WWII books about the RAF and the Navy are quite commonThis is Richard F Walker's second volume of short stories. Books about Special Operations Executive and similar organisations proliferate. Stories about the army There are fewer thirteen in all and try as I might I really couldntook something from each of them. There isn't think of a single one which was other than incidentally about tank crew, so when the opportunity came I ''had'that doesn' t deserve to read 'Kicking be among the others or brings down the Hornets' Nest' particularly as it's written by an author who crewed a Sherman tank in Operation Overlord, back in June 1944overall quality. I had just a couple of nagging doubts. It's a book of can be tricky to review short stories. Would without giving too much away, so I find it easy 'll just pick two to pick up - talk about and out down again? The big worry was whether or not this was going to be I think they give a macho action story, which wouldn't really be my cup of tea at allgeneral flavour.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780881568</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Helen Simpson1739593901|title=A Bunch of Fives22 Ideas About The Future|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)
|rating=5
|genre=Short StoriesScience Fiction|summary=I ''Our future will come straight out with it at the top of this review and state that I am a big fan of Helen Simpsonbe more complex than we expected. So this book, which is a selection of five stories from each Instead of her five collectionsflying cars, is right up my street. All I’ve we got night-vision killer drones and automated elderly care with geolocation surveillance bracelets to do now is convince you that you need to read it too!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099561573</amazonuk>}}track grandma.''
{{newreview|author=Keith Gray|title=Next|rating=5|genre=Teens|summary=That Keith Gray hangs out with all the cool people, you knowI've got a couple of confessions to make. Hot I'm not keen on the heels of one fabulous anthology of short stories all about virginity, [[Losing It by Keith Gray|Losing It]], comes as I find it easy to read a few stories and then forget to return to the book. There's got to be a very compelling hook to keep me engaged. Then there'Next''. The topic this time is life after death and s science fiction: far too often it's another preoccupation for young peoplethe technology which takes centre stage along with the world-building. What It's next? What will it be like? How will those left behind manage human beings who fascinate me: the technology and cope? Each the world scape are purely incidental. So, what did I think of the cool people contributes an idea a book of what death may bringtwenty-two science fiction short stories? Well, I loved it.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849393001</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Francis BennettB09XZMCDVF|title=The Crabber Stories: 13 tantalising tales|author=Richard F Walker
|rating=4
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=John White was known to everyone as Crabber - a nickname which he once earned and which then stuck - and he grew up on ''A news vendor is crying out the headlines in the shores middle of Long Island in the nineteen-fifties. It was night; a close-knit community and wheelchair user loses touch with reality when he tries walking around in his imagination; a stickler for correct grammar goes back in time when children had more freedom than they are likely to be allowed now. We watch as Crabber grows from being correct an iconic quote; a boy still suffering from volunteer teacher proves the death of his elder brother when we first met him through ideal person to have around in a time when he's old enough to go on a hunting trip lawless village; the new boy on the mainland pub football team is very useful with a local family. He tells his own storiesfeet, as truthfully as he can and with the sort of insight which children have before life injects its cynicism.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>B00737IKIW</amazonuk>}}awfully familiar…''
{{newreview|author=Stephanie Tillotson and Penny Thomas|title=All Shall be Well|rating=4.5|genre=Anthologies|summary=Twenty five years - a quarter This collection of thirteen short stories by Richard F Walker has a century - lot to offer the eclectic reader. Tying them together is a long time. It's an incredible length of time as an independent publisherthe idea that remarkable and strange, particularly one which specialises in publishing the best in Welsh women's writingeven miraculous, but things can happen to ordinary people. And thatordinary doesn's exactly what Honno have achievedt mean boring or uninteresting. To celebrate the occasion they've published Form and tone varies so this anthology little treasury of twenty five short stories fiction is never boring and non-fiction pieces. Theyyou're never quite sure what've previously been seen in the numerous anthologies published by Honno but when combined they give an interesting and enlightening insight into the work of these great writerss coming next.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906784337</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Marshall Moore1737030942|title=The Infernal RepublicBag O'Goodies|author=Jolly Walker Bittick|rating=24|genre=Short StoriesAnthologies|summary=Sometimes, you deserve a treat and mine was Jolly Walker Bittick's ''Bag O'The Infernal RepublicGoodies'' is a collection of short stories containing . I first encountered his writing about a mixture of general fictionyear ago, horror and fantasy published when I read his [[Cape Henry House by Signal8PressJolly Walker Bittick|Cape Henry House]], an imprint a rollicking tale of author Marshall Moore's own publishing company Typhoon Media Ltdwhat happens when five young men find a base for their partying. Now normally Right now, I wouldndidn't pay much attention want a full-length novel, so I turned to who publishes the books I read, but in this case Ianthology of verse and short stories. Bittick'm making an exception because I can't honestly believe that any traditional publisher would s writing has matured - and so have put out this book in this formhis characters. The whole collection is so badly crying out for a good editor that it actually ended up making me angry in placesWell...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>9881516404</amazonuk>most of them!
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Marc Nash1529418100|title=52FFBruno's Challenge and Other Dordogne Tales|author=Martin Walker
|rating=4
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=52FF is I'm not usually a collection fan of short stories in - I find it all too easy to put the flash fiction format. If you're new book down between stories and forget to flash fiction, you should know there are various definitions pick it up again - but here, Marc Nash chooses I am a format fan of under 1,000 words. This gives him some leeway and Martin Walker's [[Martin Walker's Commissar Bruno Courreges Mysteries in Chronological Order|Bruno Courreges Mysteries]] so the pieces are in a wide variety of styles - some experimental - but all of them exploring a single central metaphor temptation to read ''Bruno's Challenge'' was hard to resist and I'm rather glad that I didn't even try. For those new to the series, there's an excellent introduction that will tell you all with a darkness you need to know about them which is sometimes explicit who's who and sometimes only emerges after you've had time the background to think and digestwhy Bruno is in St Denis. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>B005IHMZR6</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John E FlanneryB08NF79QXT|title=Our Little Secret and Other StoriesCherry Blossom Boutique|author=Brooke Adams|rating=3.5|genre=Short StoriesWomen's Fiction|summary=ItThirty-one-year old Liberty Rossini has had her shop, the Cherry Blossom Boutique, for just six months when she's over eighteen months since we first encountered John Flannery nominated for - and his debut collection of shorts stories, [[Tobywins - the Retail Best Newcomer Award. She's Little Eden by John E Flannery|Tobydelighted and the two people she's Little Eden]]brought with her to the event couldn't be more pleased. A golf course near Manchester Sonja, her mother, is an ex-model and the characters who populated it came sharply to life Brazilian: you can see where Liberty got her looks from. Jessica's thirty-four and we laughed and we smiled along with them. Things are different in Liberty's best friend: they'Our little Secret ve known each other since university and Other StoriesLiberty adores Jessica'' as we encounter violent deaths husband, suicideCharles and their four-year-old daughter, delusion and mental illnessAva. It's a good read but Life would be perfect for Liberty if itwasn's certainly not t for one thing: she misses having a comfortable oneman in her life.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>B007CKT6PG</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Etgar KeretB08KKQ85FN|title=Suddenly, a Knock on the Door But Never For Lunch|author=Sandra Aragona
|rating=4
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=In ''If a woman approaching the opening, titular story, Keret is forced by several people menopause can be likened to create, and altera Rottweiler in lipstick, an Ambassador nearing retirement resembles a short short story. It's a plain metaphor for pampered peacock about to be released into the history company of Israelcarrion crows or, but it proves that this modern Scheherazade is not too far removed geographically from more to the original. And what follows are probably point, about to discover the sort real world of short, tantalising, open-ended, rough-round-the-edges bus timetables and surreal results of being compelled to carry on telling tall tales on a nightly basispaying his own gas bills.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0701186674</amazonuk>}}''
{{newreview|author=Ray Fawkes|title=One Soul|rating=4.5|genre=Graphic Novels|summary=When reading this it soon becomes very clear weYou don're reading not one, but nineteent get many better opening sentences than that, stories. do you? With each page divided into a regular 3x3 grid there are eighteen images on each double page spread, We first met His Excellency and every one shows an episode, or a beat, of a different characterThe Ambassador's life Wife in turn, from being a babe-[[Sorting the Priorities: Ambassadress and Beagle Survive Diplomacy by Sandra Aragona|Sorting the Priorities]] and we learned what it was like to be moved around countries like accompanying baggage by the Italian Government but the time has come for HE to retires and for Sandra Aragona to become The Wife of Former Ambassador... They have left The Career and settled in-arms to deathRome. HoweverWell 'settled' rather overstates the situation and their dog, the way they join up - everyone's figurative moment comes at onceBeagle, at times the artist's heavy black ink makes all eighteen images coincide into one image - proves there is a separatehas no intention of slowing down any time soon, individual tale around despite being sixteen and behind the others, one which will end with the most delightful moral - that the ability to be anything one imagines is in our DNAdeaf.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1934964662</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Angela CarterB08CHJLNBS|title=Burning Your BoatsCapturing Emilia|author=Brooke Adams|rating=53|genre=Short StoriesWomen's Fiction|summary='Burning your Boats' brings together CarterHe's early works Charles Devereaux, thirty-eight and her uncollected short storiesa partner at Wickham Jones, alongside the collections Mayfair letting agents. She'Fireworkss Emilia, twenty-nine, librarian and archivist in the heritage library next door. Emilia has read [[The Secret by Rhonda Byrne|The Secret]] but she's moved on from new age books like that, which leave you dependent on someone else'The Bloody Chambers philosophies, to something a little deeper. Charles is more of a [[Personal by Lee Child|Jack Reacher]] man himself, but, above all, he', s shocked that Emilia reads 'Black Venus' and The Guardian'American Ghosts'. CarterThey're obviously not at all compatible, so why can Charles not get this woman out of his mind? She's not his usual type at all: it's ability obvious to take the everyday and transform it into the fantastic is evident in stories his friends. And given that range from a cautionary tale of a musician in love with his instrument Emilia regularly feels repulsed by Charles's superficiality, why does she feel drawn to him? The relationship's obviously a lost motorist whose journey ends in nightmarish circumstances in the Snow Pavilion.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099592916</amazonuk>non-starter, isn't it?
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Anita Anand, Julian Barnes, Bella Bathurst, Alan Bennett Marie O'Regan and othersPaul Kane (editors)|title=The Library BookCursed: An Anthology of Dark Fairy Tales
|rating=4.5
|genre=LifestyleFantasy|summary=I had better begin by saying Curses. They're there throughout tales of faery and other fantastical folk – people being cursed to do this, or not to be able to do that I had a vested interest . Children can be cursed, as can princesses on the verge of marrying, and older people too. It seems in liking this book since I am a chartered librarian myself and so am wholeheartedly in support of saving our nationway there's public librariesno escaping it. But you don't need to be Which is why the theme of this book of short stories is such a librarian standout – we may well think we know all there is to enjoy know about this bookaccursed character, that demonised place, and that other bewitched person. It is rich with anecdotes from some wonderful writers and makes a pleasant read whether youWe're keen to save libraries or notd be very wrong.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1781250057</amazonuk>1789091500
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Alexander MacLeodStibbe_Xmas|title=Light LiftingAn Almost Perfect Christmas|author=Nina Stibbe
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short StoriesHumour|summary=Short stories may not be everyoneChristmas – the time of traditional trauma. You only 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's all having to make sure it's cup of teasuitably free-range and organic – but not too organic that you can go and visit it, and get too friendly with it to want to eat it. SometimesChristmas, particularly with first time authorsthough, there is an annoying tendency to be overly experimentalof course also a time of great boons. Not so with Alexander MacLeodIt's stunningly assured debut. True he has genetic 'form' cash in hand for a lot of plump people who can hire red suits and beards, it was always a godsend for postmen with all the thank-you letters to aunties you saw twice a decade that he is your parents made you write out in long-hand as a child, and as for the son makers of novelist Meltis Newberry Fruits – well, did they even try and short story writer [[:Category:Alistair MacLeodsell them any other time of the year?}}{{Frontpage|isbn=0954899520|title=A Winter Book|author=Tove Jansson|Alistair MacLeod]], but even sorating=5|genre=Literary Fiction|summary=Tove Jansson's worldwide fame lasts on the Moomin books, written in the quality 1940s and later becoming television characters of this collectionthe simplicity, naivety and sheer 'goodness' that would later produce flowerpot men or teletubbies. Simple drawings, simple stories, simple goodness. What is remarkable. The collection often forgotten outside of seven stories 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 overly themed, although certain issues and concerns do reappear, only informed those child-like trolls but what binds went far beyond any fantasy of how the stories together is a very human approach to adversityworld might be.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224093940</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Peter O'Donnell1911115847|title=Modesty Blaise: Live BaitNights of the Creaking Bed|author=Toni Kan
|rating=4
|genre=Graphic NovelsLiterary Fiction|summary=We're back in 'Nights of the gritty yet glamorous world Creaking Bed'' is a collection of short stories by Toni Kan. The series of stories tell of Modesty Blaise - at least, as gritty the lives and glamorous as you could get lusts of an assortment of characters living in the Evening Standard daily comic strip and around Lagos, Nigeria. Nigeria, in this collection, is imbued with its very own heart of darkness. Danger stalks the late 1980sshadows and people are killed for nothing more than a wrong look. Titan have had Kan writes with a mammoth undertaking to reproduce all the original strips in handy large-format graphic novel compendia, vitality and this latest covers three passion that allows these cynical stories, all to achieve a glimmer of which I consider greater in depth than those in the other volume I've reviewed - [[Modesty Blaise: Sweet Caroline by Neville Colvin and Peter O'Donnell|Sweet Caroline]]hope.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857686682</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jon McGregor1529014484|title=This Isn't the Sort of Thing That Happens to Someone Like YouExhalation |author=Ted Chiang|rating=4.5|genre=Literary Science Fiction|summary=The clue is in Over the Christopher Brookmyrepast twenty-styled title. If the eventseight years, Ted Chiang has published fifteen science fiction short stories, characters and circumstances in these magnificent stories have won twenty-seven major science fiction awards so if you are known to you, then a science fiction fan it is likely that you have my sympathies. A man causes an embarrassment trying to watch his daughter's first school nativity play. Another has a phobia already come across some of eggs containing an avian foetus when he puts knife and fork to themthe work by Ted Chiang. ThereIf you haven's a car crash here - and there, a drowning, some arson, some theft... and a lot of clues that point t then take this opportunity to some national disasterdo so now. Take all those clues as one and you eventually see this is more than just a collection of disparate short stories, but a very fractured, obfuscated novelTrust me; your imagination will be grateful.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408809265</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Tessa Hadley1794467440|title=Married LoveWatchwords |author=Philip Neal|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=Married Love is Tessa Hadley’s second This satisfying collection, containing twelve of short stories looking has a provenance at (mostly) modern relationships and family dynamics – many are about parents and their grown up children and in-laws, others are about couples. Flicking through least as beguiling as the book to choose some provenance of the best and/or most interesting stories to mention, I have found a difficulty. Almost all of these incisive, witty stories reveal an interesting group of characters I would like to know more about after the end, sometimes from several different viewpoints, and antique watches that inspired it is hard to pick out just a few. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224096427</amazonuk>}}
{{newreview|author=Adam Ross|title=Ladies and Gentlemen|rating=4Philip Neal lost a watch.5|genre=Short Stories|summary=Adam Ross's characters are driven - but I mean that in the wrong way. They're not the ones riding on It was a crest watch he was fond of and had been told was like a wave 1930s Cartier. Instead of motivationmourning its loss, steering their course through life. No, instead they are passengers, and who or whatever is at the wheel seems he began to have lost the satnavcollect vintage watches that resembled it. So, in And that'Futures', s how he became a middle-aged unemployed man finds himself giving life lessons and a kick up watch collector. An eBay purchase led him to the backside to Antique Watch Company watch repairers in Clerkenwell. The eBay purchase was a teenaged neighbour just as his own career seems about to enter its nth phasefake, with an airy-fairy psychic-oriented company but the friendship that won't ever go as far as telling him what his job might be. A professor who has to settle temporarily where his work takes him grew between the buyer and the repairer of watches was not where he would like, has to wonder what to do when told of and the action-packed adventures seed of an idea for a devil-may-care, come-what-may mechanicbook was born.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224087746</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Javier Marias1529006031|title=While the Women are SleepingReturn to Wonderland|author=Various Authors
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=The first thing In following a young girl called Alice down the trivially minded will note is that this is not rabbit hole a few years ago, when the complete edition first book she was in [[Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (150th Anniversary Edition) by Lewis Carroll and Anthony Browne|hit 150 years of While the Women are Sleepingage]], I found that I didn't really find too much favour with it. The wacky-for -the-sake-of-it did not all gel, and I don't remember loving it more as a child. But I would suggest I am the perfect audience for this book. I had every chance to enjoy these short stories in that come at the core from a tangent, that show the benefits of the original Spanish volume are hereoblique glance. You might think that I've always preferred coming to an author's because some have been hived off for a future output through their least obvious, allegedly throw-away pieces, and it'best ofs the same with franchises – I' compilation. But if this isnd more likely go for Bree Tanner't s short novella than the best whole Twilight saga (although that remains just a hunch, for obvious reasons). For another thing, there was every reason to expect some kind of Javier Mariasgreatness here – with Carroll much loved by millions, then I don't know what is. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099553929</amazonuk>surely pieces written with that love in mind could only provide for success after success?
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stella Gibbons1846974658|title=Christmas at Cold Comfort FarmThe Long Path To Wisdom|author=Jan-Philipp Sendker|rating=3.54
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=First things first. There's only one story On my travels around the world, I have a tendency to end up in this collection about Cold Comfort Farm. This any bookshop that is a story about selling English-language books, and while I buy as many second-hand escapist tales as the farm before Flora Poste arrivesnext person, a what I'm really looking for is the 'prequellocal' if you like. It features the Starkadder family at Christmascookbook maybe, with a dispute over a coffin-nail and it did make me smile. I suspect it is one for fansthe maps definitely, howeverbut above all: the folk tales. For instanceIf I ever get to Burma, the appearance of a teenage Dick Hawk-MonitorI won't need to hunt, already in love with Elfine, shoots a knowing wink at the devoted but would leave most readers coldI can read before I go. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099528673</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Michael MorpurgoB077969HN8|title=War: Stories 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 a different angle and this ensures that even though there are a good number of short stories in the book, you will never feel as if it is becoming repetitive or dull. The stories do a good job of conveying just how multi-faceted and complex the concept of war is.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1447205014</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewAlternative Medicine|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 person in the bank must give him the item of most sentimental value that they have 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 souls, and it is up to the victims to find the way to get their souls back, or to die trying.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007429258</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Ludwig Bechstein, Axel Sceffler and Julia Donaldson|title=The Gloomster|rating=4.5|genre=General Fiction|summary=We've all been there. Finding fault with everything around us, and perhaps picking on one particular irritant that gets us so rattled, tetchy and narked all we can do is invoke "Hell and damnation!" down on all creation - including, of course, ourselves. After all, our lot is so bad it won't make anything much worse.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571274242</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Lloyd Jones|title=The Man in the ShedLaura Solomon
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=The title is certainly attention-grabbing and I hoped that Laura Solomon's publisher describes the book would live up to my expectations. It did. The man short stories in 'The Man in the Shed' is not blessed Alternative Medicine'' as ''black comedy with a nametwist of surrealism''. His name (whatever it is) is not important or relevant to the tale. ItI'm rather glad that I didn's all about t see this until ''whyafter'' heI's in the shed in the first place. This particular shedd finished reading as I's in m not normally a garden fan of a house inhabited by a family which includes either, but I've come to two conclusions about the book: what the young narratorpublisher says is correct - and I really enjoyed it. It The comedy is not ''too''s pretty clear that black and the marriage surrealism is going through gentle and perhaps best described as a rocky patch right nowtwist or flick of reality when you were least expecting it. So who, you could reasonably wonder, is the odd one out here - the husband or the man Your comfort zones are going to be invaded in the shed. Jones tells us in his own nicest possible 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>
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 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Judith Hermann9386897504|title=AliceTales of Love and Disability|author=Laura Solomon
|rating=4
|genre=Literary FictionShort Stories|summary=I''Alice'' is ve always believed that less-able writers produce longer books: it takes a great deal of skill and talent to write a collection short story which holds the reader and keeps them coming back for more. There are far too many collections of five short stories, linked thematically since they which are all deal with the subject too easy to put down and forget after you've read a couple of death, but they are also linked because the central character, Alice, is the same in each storypieces. So rather than feeling like short stories the book has I've recently read a hint couple of the novel to it, yet the stories are never completed or fully told so itnovellas by Laura Solomon - [[Marsha's a novel where youDeal by Laura Solomon|Marsha're not always sure whats Deal]] and [[Hell's going on.Unveiling by Laura Solomon|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184668529X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jamil Ahmad|title=The Wandering Falcon|rating=4|genre=Literary Fiction|summary="In the tangle of crumbling, weather-beaten and broken hills, where the borders of Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan meet, is a military outpost…" Thus begins the tale of Tor Baz, the Black Falcon. To this desolate place come two wanderers, a man Hell's Unveiling]] and a woman seeking refuge.  Refuge is denied enjoyed them, since it places duties that the fort commander cannot accept, but instead he offers them shelter from the wind of a hundred and twenty days. For as long as they want it. Shelter, and foodso I was intrigued to see what she could do with an even shorter form.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241145155</amazonuk>
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 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Cees Nooteboom and Ina Rilke (Translator)1986586898|title=Going To The Foxes Come At Night And Other Last: Short StoriesAbout Horse Racing|author=K D Knight
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=There's a bold statement on In the front cover fromopening story, as it happens, one of my favourite authors, [[:Category:a man whose wife has deserted him visits Sandown with little money but comes away with cash in his pocket - and his wife. In ''A S Byatt|A S Byatt]] saying that Nooteboom is Grey Day''one an owner struggles with the problem of whether or not to run his horse in the greatest modern novelistsGold Cup when the ground is against him. My favourite was '' so I thought that I was in for a treat. But I didnThe Story of H''t enjoy , the first short story. Not the greatest of startsFoinavon. I was disappointed H is depicted as a kind horse who only wanted to say the least and was wondering what all the fuss was aboutplease people. Then I started After changing hands on various occasions he came to read the story entitled ''Thunderstorm'' and things started to pick upyard of John Kempton. I appreciated H (or Foinavon) was entered in the sparse Grand National and elegant languageconsidered a no-hoper. Lines such as 'Five people at an outdoor cafe: two women ... In one of the most dramatic runnings of the race, a solitary black man ... a couple pile-up occurred at a table nearbythe 23rd fence. Enough for a film.' How lovely Foinavon, who had been many lengths adrift, cleared the fence and evocative is that last galloped to the line, I'm thinking. I read it twice as it was so goodwinning the race at odds of 100/1.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0857050230</amazonuk>
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 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sue Gee9386897296|title=Last FlingHell's Unveiling|author=Laura Solomon|rating=43.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=Sue Gee is well known for her novelsA 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 devil in ''Marsha's Deal'', but this the devil is her first collection not one to take defeat lying down. He's out to wage war on Planet Earth and particularly on Marsha (who's thought of short storiesas a 'goody two shoes' in Hell). Short story collections Although a strong person, she's vulnerable where her foster children are not concerned. Daniel is framed for everyonea crime he didn't commit and sent to juvenile detention and refused permission to return to live with Marsha. I've always enjoyed them since they fit easily into a busy lifeThen, of course, leaving you feeling as if youthere are all the other children who are not only targeted but - worst of all - subverted to the devil've lived through a whole story in just a short space of times evil ends. ItHe's easier out to find prey on their fears and weaknesses and as with many foster children, their self-esteem is very fragile. This is no small-scale operation, either - the time for devil has set up a quick story sometimes than training complex on earth, complete with an elevator to sit down with a four hundred page novel!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907773061</amazonuk>Hell.
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{{newreview|author=Helen Simpson|title=In-Flight Entertainment|rating=5|genre=Short Stories|summary=I am always thrilled Move to see that Helen Simpson has brought out a new book. I am a big fan of her crisp, funny, observant short stories. So I picked up 'In Flight Entertainment' with some anticipation. I was not disappointed.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099546124</amazonuk>}}[[Newest Spirituality and Religion Reviews]]

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