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[[Category:New Reviews|Short Stories]]
[[Category:Short Stories|*]] __NOTOC__<!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=AllTomorrowsFutureCover|title=All Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt|author=Elizabeth HaynesBenjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)|rating=5|genre=Science Fiction|summary=''Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to come.'' I've heard it said that 'technology' is what happens after you're eighteen. Well, I must confess that there have been more than a few decades of technology in my lifetime. I've kept up reasonably well with what's advantageous to me but I'm left with the feeling that it's all getting away from me. Some of it is - frankly - quite frightening. Of course, I could research the possibilities and the probabilities and end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who knows what they're talking about or the latest conspiracy theorist. I needed people I knew I could trust and who could deliver information in a way I could understand.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=B0CDZRGT1M|title=Promises to KeepSuper Short Stories: A Short StoryFlash Fiction|author=Mark C Wallfisch|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=Jo is haunted by the death of ''Got a teenage asylum seeker whilst in police custody and she only hangs on minute to her fragile sanity by running. Whilst shebe amused, entertained, or challenged?''s out in the woods (where she'd been warned that she 'These 100 stories are super short. None is more than 300 words. You can read one in a flash.'really'' shouldn't go) she discovered a young boy living rough and she knew that she had to do everything in her power to keep him safeSome are funny. There were complicationsSome are poignant. Her partner was DS Sam Hollands who had a direct involvement with asylum seekers - and the boy living rough in the woods was the younger brother of the dead teenagerAll are short. Sam wanted to get her relationship with Jo back onto an even keel, but one night she returned from work to find a stranger in her house.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>B00I9GXP2M</amazonuk>}}''
{{newreview|title=The Rental Heart and other Fairytales|author=Kirsty Logan|rating=3.5|genre=Short Stories|summary=To start with, are these stories strictly fairytalesQuestion: how do you review flash fiction? On the evidence How do you give a flavour of this collection, it is at times a distinction fully rounded little story if that seems open story is told in fewer than three hundred words? Or do you try to debate, a category that lies waiting for definition. But at draw out themes from all the same time, such is the genre-switching (and at times gender-switching), that it is flash fictions in a subtitle book of them? I don't know! Perhaps we could start by explaining that serves better than most. The title story examines a lifethere really isn's romantic history via t a twist on the idea fixed definition of flash fiction but that we give our heart away to every lover – what do we have when they are for this collection, author Mark C Wallfisch has gone and a new one takes their place? Elsewhere, a landed lady takes advantage of her servant, and another cultured madam hires for a clockwork companion to shrug off the suitors, with obvious, narratively logical resultsthree hundred word limit. A medical worker and her pregnant partner share That's about a caravan together, all the while knowing a different circumstance might be closer than first thought. We have the beginnings of love lives, the end of hatred, and the end of the world single page in these pagesyour average paperback.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907773754</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=Further Encounters of Sherlock HolmesRachel Harrison|authortitle=George Mann (Editor)Bad Dolls
|rating=4
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=Hot on the heels of [[Encounters of Sherlock Holmes by George Mann (Editor)|Encounters of Sherlock Holmes]] comes another collection of brand-new tales written by It's been some time since I've read any horror. I had a couple of misspent teen years reading Stephen King, borrowing the brightest creative minds books from a boy I fancied at school and scaring myself half silly with them to the genres point that I couldn't shut my bedroom curtains at night for fear of science fiction the vampires outside! Don't worry - this short story collection isn't like that! It doesn't have those jump scares, and crime. In this anthologyI didn't have to read it during daylight hours only! But it is creepy, Holmes and Watson I found most of that feeling came from the fact that these are pitched headlong into twelve different mysterious scenarios stories about women, living normal lives, and invited to unravel secrets and unmask villains that at least in part, the horrors arises from very normal situations such as only they know how. During their adventures they come face to face with a mountain monsterbreakup, take trying a murderous boat tripnew dieting app, meet Moriarty’s siblings going to a hen party and even indulge in a little space travelcoping with grief. The game is afoot!|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>178116004X</amazonuk>1803363932
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=David Rose (writer of short stories)B0CCCVRSGX|title=Posthumous Stories2|author=Richard F Walker|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=These sixteen This is Richard F Walker's second volume of short stories have one thing . There are thirteen in common: lives, all and plenty I took something from each of them. We jump from the earthy banter of a road crew building speed humps to an interview pre-broadcast of a classical piece where the interviewer There isn't getting the kind of answers for which he hopes. On the way we meet the least-mentioned Beatle, visit a world where people are paid to read for the many single one that dondoesn't and deserve to be among the others or brings down the man trying overall quality. It can be tricky to remember his father through art review short stories without giving too much away, so I'll just pick two to name but talk about and I think they give a few. For good measure there are a couple of Kafka-esque experiments that also work as ripping good yarnsgeneral flavour.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907773576</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.''
{{newreview|title=Doctor Who: 11 Doctors, 11 Stories|author=Eoin Colfer, Michael Scott and others|rating=5|genre=Confident Readers|summary=ItI's basic knowledge that Doctor Who has changed ve got a lot since first being seen fifty years ago – and couple of confessions to make. I don't mean m not keen on short stories as I find it easy to read a few stories and then forget to return to the title character, but the nature of the programmebook. It has gone from black and white, and cheaply produced, and declared disposable, There's got to be a very compelling hook to being an essential part of keep me engaged. Then there's science fiction: far too often it's the technology which takes centre stage along with the BBC, fullworld-gloss digital, and accessed in all manner of waysbuilding. So with It's human beings who fascinate me: the celebratory programme still ringing in our ears, technology and leaving people pressing a red button to see a programme about three Doctors, er, pressing a red button, we turn to other aspects of the birthday bonanzaworld scape are purely incidental. Such as this bookSo, which has also mutated in its much shorter lifespan, from being what did I think of a loose collection book of eleven twenty-two science fiction short e-book novellas written by the blazing lights of YA writingstories? Well, to a huge and brilliant paperback collecting everything within one set of coversI loved it.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141348941</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=B09XZMCDVF|title=Of Lions and UnicornsStories: A Lifetime of Tales from the Master Storyteller13 tantalising tales|author=Michael MorpurgoRichard F Walker
|rating=4
|genre=Confident Readers
|summary=''Of Lions and Unicorns'' is a collection of short stories and extracts from Morpurgo’s most popular books. The book is split into five sections, which focus on recurring themes in his writing.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0007395353</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|title=Rags and Bones
|author=Melissa Marr and Tim Pratt (Editors)
|rating=4.5
|genre=Anthologies
|summary=Some of today's top authors have come together to retell classic tales - from fairy stories to Victorian-era fiction. As usual with this kind of anthology, it's a fairly hit-or-miss affair, but the hits here are so strong that they're well worth picking up the book for.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1472210522</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|title=The Science of Herself
|author=Karen Joy Fowler
|rating=3
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=I've said it before, and I'll say it again. The most fun when facing a new author, especially a big name one, A news vendor is to come through crying out the underground, tackling headlines in the smaller works, middle of the quirkier output, the less representative sections of her or night; a wheelchair user loses touch with reality when he tries walking around in his oeuvre. And imagination; a stickler for those who correct grammar goes back in time to correct an iconic quote; a volunteer teacher proves the ideal person to have or haven't read ''The Jane Austen Book Club'', there is plenty of potential for that with around in a lawless village; the rest of [[The Case of new boy on the Imaginary Detective by Karen Joy Fowler|Karen Joy Fowler]], for her output includes almost as many selections of short stories as it does pub football team is very successful novelsuseful with his feet, and whatawfully familiar…'s more they carry the science fictional banner. A long time ago there was a teenage me very happy to be reading ''Lord of the Flies'' and writing an essay about how sci-fi it was, and I do relish the mainstream author entering a genre, or the inverse of that. But boy, I normally come away a lot happier than I did here.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1604868252</amazonuk>}}
{{newreview|author=Kate Mosse|title=The Mistletoe Bride and Other Haunting Tales|rating=4.5|genre=Short Stories|summary=This book collection of 14 thirteen short stories and by Richard F Walker has a short play is based on lot to offer the ideaof hauntingeclectic reader. Sometimes the haunting Tying them together is the ghostly kind idea that remarkable and sometimessomething psychologically deeper and more primal. All the stories drift tous from different erasstrange, both past and recenteven miraculous, but all have one thing incommon: they centre on a troubled person. For instance we meet Gaston, aFrench child who witnesses an odd event on the beach just after losing hisparentsthings can happen to ordinary people. In the inevitably touching but beautiful ''Red Letter Day'And that ordinary doesn' wetravel to a French castle with a woman who has an appointment with the pastt mean boring or uninteresting.If Form and tone varies so this little treasury of short fiction is never boring and you want something completely different, there're never quite sure what's ''The Duet'' which drawsus into a fascinating dialogue and then hits us with a stingcoming next.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1409148041</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1737030942|title=The Time TravellerBag O's AlmanacGoodies|author=Anne VanderMeer and Jeff VanderMeerJolly Walker Bittick
|rating=4
|genre=Anthologies|summary=From H.G Wells to Sometimes, you deserve a treat and mine was Jolly Walker Bittick's ''Bag O'Doctor WhoGoodies''. I first encountered his writing about a year ago, when I read his [[Cape Henry House by Jolly Walker Bittick|Cape Henry House]], there is something about a good time-travel story that has the power to ignite the imagination in rollicking tale of what happens when five young men find a way unique to the genrebase for their partying. Perhaps it is due Right now, I didn't want a full-length novel, so I turned to the fact that when dealing with the subject this anthology of time travel, literally ''anything is possible'verse and short stories. Bittick's writing has matured - and so have his characters. Well, almost anything...apart from going back in time and killing your Grandfather, which we know would cause an almighty paradox and probably destroy the universe.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781853908</amazonuk>most of them!
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Diana Wells1529418100|title=Odes Bruno's Challenge and Prose for Older WomenOther Dordogne Tales|author=Martin Walker
|rating=4
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=I am, 'm not usually a fan of course, not an older woman and nether is Diana Wells. We were born in short stories - I find it all too easy to put the same year book down between stories and we are what is best described as forget to pick it up again - but I am a fan of Martin Walker'upper middle ageds [[Martin Walker', but - perhaps s Commissar Bruno Courreges Mysteries in anticipation of what is Chronological Order|Bruno Courreges Mysteries]] so the temptation to come - Diana has collected together her writings on the subject and I read through them in two sittings (the break ''Bruno's Challenge'' was enforced) hard to resist and I laughed and cried'm rather glad that I didn't even try. For those new to the series, but the wry smile of recognition never left my face from beginning there's an excellent introduction that will tell you all you need to end. There are know about eighty five short stories who's who and odes - with none more than a few pages long - written, we are told, from observation, experience or imagination and I can only conclude that Wells has led a very rich lifethe background to why Bruno is in St Denis.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780356838</amazonuk>
}}
{{Frontpage|isbn=B08NF79QXT|title=Cherry Blossom Boutique|author=Brooke Adams|rating=3|genre=Women's Fiction|summary=Thirty-one-year old Liberty Rossini has had her shop, the Cherry Blossom Boutique, for just six months when she's nominated for - and wins - the Retail Best Newcomer Award. She's delighted and the two people she's brought with her to the event couldn't be more pleased. Sonja, her mother, is an ex-model and Brazilian: you can see where Liberty got her looks from. Jessica's thirty-four and Liberty's best friend: they've known each other since university and Liberty adores Jessica's husband, Charles and their four-year-old daughter, Ava. Life would be perfect for Liberty if it wasn't for one thing: she misses having a man in her life.}}{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=B08KKQ85FN|title=Sad MonstersBut Never For Lunch|author=Frank LesserSandra Aragona
|rating=4
|genre=Humour
|summary=
If you thought you had it bad… Here is the chupacabra writing to the newspapers for better press – notices that don't universally mention his goat-sucking habits before his chess-playing, dancing or debating record. Here is a banshee struggling with high school life, knowing the end of everyone that comes across her path. Here is King Kong, being defended in court by a lawyer with a revelation to the jury about his bipolarity and how wrong it was to get his hopes up with a Broadway show in a strange city. Did you honestly think Godzilla enjoyed the way his life ended up?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0285642324</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|title=Dear Life
|author=Alice Munro
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=Alice Munro has made an art form of short story writing. ''Dear Life'' is If a woman approaching the menopause can be likened to a collection of truly beautiful short stories, perfectly crafted Rottweiler in a way that leaves no wanting feelinglipstick, as is often an issue with short stories. Each Ambassador nearing retirement resembles a pampered peacock about to be released into the company of carrion crows or, more to the 14 stories contained within point, about to discover the collection is just real world of bus timetables and paying his own gas bills.'' You don't get many better opening sentences than that; a story , do you? We first met His Excellency and The Ambassador's Wife in its own right[[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... There is no getting caught up They have left The Career and lost settled in style Rome. Well 'settled' rather overstates the situation and literary flaretheir dog, but a cool proseBeagle, a calmness has no intention of tone slowing down any time soon, despite being sixteen and good strong storiesdeaf.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099578638</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=B08CHJLNBS|title=The Complete Short Stories: Volume TwoCapturing Emilia|author=Roald DahlBrooke Adams|rating=53|genre=Short StoriesWomen's Fiction|summary=Having only recently read the first volume of this collection of all of Roald Dahl’s short stories I couldn’t help but think of the phrase He''too much of s Charles Devereaux, thirty-eight and a good thingpartner at Wickham Jones, the Mayfair letting agents. She's Emilia, twenty-nine, librarian and archivist in the heritage library next door. Emilia has read [[The Secret by Rhonda Byrne|The Secret]] but she' although I have never really agreed with the phrase (I could happily gorge s moved on chocolate or whisky for days without the slightest regret) I am still pleased from new age books like that this book provides yet , which leave you dependent on someone else's philosophies, to something a little deeper. Charles is more evidence of the inaccuracy of the expression. With stories as diverse as a butler getting revenge on his employer and a baby being brought up on royal jelly [[Personal by a fanatical bee loverLee Child|Jack Reacher]] man himself, these are tales of horrorbut, humourabove all, adventurehe's shocked that Emilia reads ''The Guardian''. They're obviously not at all compatible, love and so why can Charles not get this woman out of his mind? She's not his usual type at all out weirdness: it's obvious to his friends.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405910119</amazonuk> And given that Emilia regularly feels repulsed by Charles's superficiality, why does she feel drawn to him? The relationship's obviously a non-starter, isn't it?
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=Tales from the Dead of Night: Thirteen Classic Ghost StoriesMarie O'Regan and Paul Kane (editors)|authortitle=Cecily Gayford (editor)Cursed: An Anthology of Dark Fairy Tales
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short StoriesFantasy|summary=This collection Curses. They're there throughout tales of classic ghost stories covers all kinds of chilling talesfaery and other fantastical folk – people being cursed to do this, or not to be able to do that. There are physical ghostsChildren can be cursed, emotional ghosts, ghosts that are never seen but merely sensedas can princesses on the verge of marrying, and even the odd entity that just older people too. It seems ghostly, even though in a way there's no escaping it might be an ordinary everyday thing - but still makes you feel as if you’ve, well, seen a ghost. Each story Which is preceded with some information on why the author. The theme of this book of short stories are from are from several different periods is such a standout – we may well think we know all there is to know about this accursed character, that demonised place, and the settings range from winter nights in England to sultry summers in Indiathat other bewitched person. This combines to make for an excellent overview of all kinds of spooky sagasWe'd be very wrong.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1781250944</amazonuk>1789091500
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Aimee BenderStibbe_Xmas|title=The Color MasterAn Almost Perfect Christmas|author=Nina Stibbe
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short StoriesHumour|summary=Another parade of fascinating, unusual personalities and oddevents from Christmas – the author time of [[Willful Creatures by Aimee Bender|WillfulCreatures]]traditional trauma. This You only have to think about the turkey for that – once upon a time out [[:Category:Aimee Bender|Aimee]]introduces us it was leaving it sat on the downstairs loo to people like Hans defrost overnight, and if that failed the fake Nazi, young William to whomhair-dryer shoved inside it treatment was your next best bet. Nowadays it's all people look the same and Janet who decides having to spice up herlovemake sure it's suitably free-life range and organic – but not too organic that you can go and visit it, and get too friendly with detrimental resultsit to want to eat it. Among other things we Christmas, though, is of course alsowitness a lesstime of great boons. It's 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-thanyou letters to aunties you saw twice a decade that your parents made you write out in long-altruistic anti-war demonstration hand as a child, and as for the makers of Meltis Newberry Fruits – well, did they even try and an oddoccurrence in an orchard showing how odd an apple-only diet could makeus.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0091953898</amazonuk>sell them any other time of the year?
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=0954899520|title=The Complete Short Stories: Volume OneA Winter Book|author=Roald DahlTove Jansson|rating=4.5|genre=Short StoriesLiterary Fiction|summary=Roald Dahl’s name Tove Jansson's worldwide fame lasts on a book has for me always meant I was the Moomin books, written in for a fun and imaginative read. His children’s books are the pinnacle of children’s literature 1940s and combine fantastic ideas with wordplay and some later becoming television characters of the most amusing characters simplicity, naivety and situationssheer 'goodness' that would later produce flowerpot men or teletubbies. The 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 younger audience always managed to thrill and entertain both adult feeling for the natural world and the simple life that not only informed those child and reading them aloud is a joy. In short I believe Roald Dahl was a true master -like trolls but went far beyond any fantasy of storytellinghow the world might be. I have however only actually read one of his adult books before reading this collection of short stories.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405910100</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1911115847|title=The Dinner Club and Other StoriesNights of the Creaking Bed|author=Rob KeeleyToni Kan
|rating=4
|genre=Confident ReadersLiterary Fiction|summary=''Being on home dinners gives Aidan Nights of the chance to make some money...Creaking Bed''<br>''A bridesmaid and is a page chase a runaway wedding cakecollection of short stories by Toni Kan...''<br>''Mia The series of stories tell of the lives and her Dad turn detective...'' These are just a few lusts of an assortment of the premises you can try out for size characters living in Rob Keeley's third book of short stories for middle grade readersand around Lagos, Nigeria. He's really having some fun Nigeria, in this collection, is imbued with this formatits very own heart of darkness. I approve. We need Danger stalks the shadows and people are killed for nothing more short story collections for this age groupthan a wrong look. They're entertaining Kan writes with a vitality and they appeal particularly passion that allows these cynical stories to reluctant readers. Short stories like this can act as achieve a springboard to full-length novelsglimmer of hope.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1783060603</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1529014484|title=Beyond Rue Morgue: Further Tales of Edgar Allan Poe's 1st DetectiveExhalation |author=Paul Kane and Charles Prepolec (Editors)Ted Chiang|rating=3.5|genre=AnthologiesScience Fiction|summary=C. Auguste Dupin is often regarded as Over the first fictional detective and at the very least Edgar Allan Poe’s character was the blueprint for many sleuths to comepast twenty-eight years, Ted Chiang has published fifteen science fiction short stories, most notably Sherlock Holmes. Dupin these magnificent stories have won twenty-seven major science fiction awards so if you are a science fiction fan it is an eccentric genius from Paris whose use likely that you have already come across some of logic and deduction aid the police on their most baffling caseswork by Ted Chiang. The characters literary debut was in the short story If you haven''The Murders in the Rue Morgue'' in 1841 and between 1842 and 1844 Poe wrote two more short stories about Dupin and his exploits. ''Beyond Rue Morgue'' contains nine stories (in addition t then take this opportunity to the original Poe tale) by various authors and gives many different takes on the same character or influenced by himdo so now. From samurai assassins and the apocalypse to an agoraphobic distant relative of Dupin attempting to solve a murder without even leaving her homeTrust me; the different writers all take the intriguing character to places we wouldn’t expect and the creativity of all keeps the character fresh from story to storyyour imagination will be grateful.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781161755</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1794467440|title=Russian StoriesWatchwords |author=Francesc SeresPhilip Neal|rating=54
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=This brilliant and varied satisfying collection of short stories is the product of has a current academic interest in cross-cultural translation. Francisco Guillen Serés is a Catalan professor of Art History from Aragon. A Russophile, he has travelled widely to collect stories from those writing during the past hundred years of Russian history. These have been translated into Catalan and then into English. These unusual and delightful stories, some twenty one of them written by five writers read fluently and engagingly. They form an informative tapestry of Soviet and post-Soviet life, moving back in time with the older, earlier writers like Bergchenko, who died in the siege of Stalingrad, provenance at least as beguiling as the end. Ranging over mythic and symbolic tales to realistic portrayals of personal relationships; love trysts in St Petersburg, ferocious bears in the deep heart provenance of the Taiga to the perils of becoming lost in continuous orbit in space. All aspects are impressively recountedantique watches that inspired it.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>085705158X</amazonuk>}}
{{newreview|title=Best British Short Stories 2013|author=Nicholas Royle (editor)|rating=5|genre=Short Stories|summary=Expect to read some quality work in ''Best British Short Stories 2013'', sourced from Philip Neal lost a watch. It was a number watch he was fond of short story magazines; 'Granta', 'Shadows and Tall Trees'had been told was like a 1930s Cartier. Instead of mourning its loss, he began to collect vintage watches that resembled it. And that'Unthology' and 'The Edinburgh Review' are just some of s how he became a watch collector. An eBay purchase led him to the publications Antique Watch Company watch repairers in which these pieces were to be seen firstClerkenwell. If asked to identify The eBay purchase was a red thread between fake, but the components of Nicholas Royle’s anthology, I would say friendship that in each short story, everything is left to simmer under grew between the surface. There is a frustration brought about by buyer and the lack repairer of clarity in every short story, which to me is a reflection of just how unclear watches was not and the most seismic seed of situations may be to any individual involvedan idea for a book was born.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907773479</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1529006031|title=This CloseReturn to Wonderland|author=Jessica Francis KaneVarious Authors|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary='This Close' is In following a young girl called Alice down the rabbit hole a sensitively written collection of short stories exploring few years ago, when the fragile nature first book she was in [[Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (150th Anniversary Edition) by Lewis Carroll and Anthony Browne|hit 150 years of the bonds connecting friendsage]], neighbours and familyI found that I didn't really find too much favour with it. As The wacky-for-the title suggests, most -sake-of the stories contain pivotal moments where a missed opportunity-it did not gel, fleeting and I don't remember loving it more as it may be, can propel a person along a path culminating in regret or losschild. Each story is poignantly written and perceptively observed But I would suggest I am the perfect audience for this book. As I had every chance to enjoy these short stories that come at the core from a readertangent, that show the benefits of the oblique glance. I was drawn in 've always preferred coming to an author's output through their least obvious, allegedly throw-away pieces, and became so emotionally involved it's the same with franchises – I'd more likely go for Bree Tanner's short novella than the characters whole Twilight saga (although that it remains just a hunch, for obvious reasons). For another thing, there was often impossible every reason to close the book until I knew how each story ended.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1555976360</amazonuk>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|isbn=1846974658|title=Behind the FacadeThe Long Path To Wisdom|author=Dennis FriedmanJan-Philipp Sendker
|rating=4
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=We On my travels around the world, I have alla tendency to end up in any bookshop that is selling English-language books, at one time or anotherand while I buy as many second-hand escapist tales as the next person, wished that we had what I'm really looking for is the ability to read minds. Imagine how interesting it would be to peer beyond 'local' – the external appearance and to understand cookbook maybe, the various thought processes lurking beneath maps definitely, but above all: the surfacefolk tales. Psychiatrist Dennis Friedman gives the reader the opportunity If I ever get to do just that with his collection of short stories Burma, I won'Beyond the Facade'|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0720615070</amazonuk>t need to hunt, I can read before I go.
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Margo LanaganB077969HN8|title=YellowcakeAlternative Medicine|author=Laura Solomon
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=We should always make time for Laura Solomon's publisher describes the short storiesin ''Alternative Medicine'' as ''black comedy with a twist of surrealism''. Especially if they are written by Margo Lanagan. In I'm rather glad that I didn't see this until ''after''YellowcakeI'd finished reading as I'm not normally a fan of either, a traveller boy uses three items but I've come to reunite an old man with his memoriestwo conclusions about the book: what the publisher says is correct - and I really enjoyed it. A boy with The comedy is not ''too'' black and the surrealism is gentle and perhaps best described as a crippled foot watches his townfolk butcher a beautiful creature washed up in their harbourtwist or flick of reality when you were least expecting it. Rapunzel gets a makeover Your comfort zones are going to be invaded in which things turn out differently. We find out how the Ferryman of the Dead became the Ferrywoman. And morenicest possible way.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849921113</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Melvin Burgess9386897504|title=Krispy WhispersTales of Love and Disability|author=Laura Solomon
|rating=4
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=I''A woman stops you in ve always believed that less-able writers produce longer books: it takes a great deal of skill and talent to write a short story which holds the road reader and gazes fearfully into the pramkeeps them coming back for more. "Your babies There are far too many collections of short stories which are not human," she says. Then she runs off.'' Ooh! Alien changelings! Cuckoos in the nest? Are they really? Really, really, really? Can all too easy to put down and forget after you be sure? So begins the first story in ''Krispy Whispers'', ve read a series couple of flash fictions by Bookbag favourite Melvin Burgesspieces. You also get I've recently read a girl dreaming couple of riches, a lonely woman who finds a pet novellas by Laura Solomon - [[Marsha's Deal by Laura Solomon|Marsha's Deal]] and gets a boyfriend too closely together for mere coincidence. And a priest who actually meets God. And a very worrisome monster. Concentrate hard. Because you[[Hell's Unveiling by Laura Solomon|Hell'll need s Unveiling]] and enjoyed them, so I was intrigued to keep upsee what she could do with an even shorter form...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>B00DAC68EM</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Alison Moore1986586898|title=Going To The Pre-War House and other short storiesLast: Short Stories About Horse Racing|author=K D Knight
|rating=4.5
|genre=Short Stories
|summary=Alison MooreIn the opening story, a man whose wife has deserted him visits Sandown with little money but comes away with cash in his pocket - and his wife. In 's 'A Grey Day'Pre-War House'' is a collection an owner struggles with the problem of 24 short stories, only three of which are original whether or not to this collection, but most were first published run his horse in the last couple of years and, unless you are a an avid reader of Gold Cup when the ground is against him. My favourite was ''The New WriterStory of H'' they will probably all be new , the story of Foinavon. H is depicted as a kind horse who only wanted to youplease people. Moore's themes tend After changing hands on various occasions he came to concentrate on fairly dark characters, usually with a hidden secret, and more often than not dealing with the past and frequently some kind yard of personal loss John Kempton. H (or anguishFoinavon) was entered in the Grand National and considered a no-hoper. If you enjoyed Moore's Booker Prize shortlisted [[The Lighthouse by Alison Moore|The Lighthouse]], you will find plenty to enjoy here as In one of the most dramatic runnings of the stories have race, a similar hauntingly sad feel to thempile-up occurred at the 23rd fence. With one possible exception Foinavon, a very short piece called ''The Yacht Man'' which did nothing for mewho had been many lengths adrift, cleared the stories are beautifully judged fence and equally satisfyinggalloped to the line, often saving a final hit or a surprise until winning the end race at odds of the pieces100/1.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907773509</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Robert Walser9386897296|title=The Walk and other storiesHell's Unveiling|author=Laura Solomon|rating=3.5|genre=Literary FictionShort Stories|summary=The publication of this collection A 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 around forty short stories affords the English speaking public a unique opportunity; spoiler to say that of reading Walser, possibly Marsha bested the leading modernist writer of Swiss German devil in ''Marsha's Deal'', but the last centurydevil is not one to take defeat lying down. He has received high praise in 'A Place s out to wage war on Planet Earth and particularly on Marsha (who's thought of as a 'goody two shoes' in the Country'Hell). Although a strong person, W G Sebaldshe's recently published posthumous collection and he vulnerable where her foster children are concerned. Daniel is well-known as being framed for a significant influence on Franz Kafka. His work here dates from 1907 crime he didn't commit and sent to 1929 juvenile detention and along refused permission to return to live with his poetry won him recognition with BerlinMarsha. Then, of course, there are all the other children who are not only targeted but - worst of all - subverted to the devil's avant gardeevil ends. He combines lyrical delicacy 's out to prey on their fears and weaknesses and as with detailed observation; reflective melancholy with criticism of brash commercialismmany foster children, their self-esteem is very fragile. The fine writing in this volume strives to achieve This is no small-scale operation, either - the devil has set up a hard won integrity together training complex on earth, complete with an experimental capacity for reflection. It challenges the reader and provokes him elevator to new insightsHell.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846689589</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview|author=Ted Olinger|title=The Woodpecker Menace|rating=4|genre=Short Stories|summary=The Key Peninsula is a small spur of land on the Puget Sound in Washington state, shaped - you guessed it - like a key. Its resident are disparate Move to [[Newest Spirituality and include both incomers and those who'd see themselves as pioneer settlers. But they're joined in a communal sense of island living. It's on a much smaller scale, but I think most British people can feel affinity with identifying as an islander. It flavours our relationship with continental Europe in so many ways. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0984840036</amazonuk>}}Religion Reviews]]

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