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[[Category:Short Stories|*]] __NOTOC__<!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Roald DahlGuadalupe Nettel and Rosalind Harvey (Translator)|title= WarThe Accidentals|rating= 4.5|genre= Short Stories|summary=In warThis collection was truly enchanting in all senses of the word: spellbinding with its fantastical, are we at our heroic best or our cowardly worst? Featuring the autobiographical magical elements and charming in its gentle portrayal of nature and human relationships. Guadalupe Nettel writes intelligently and precisely, her stories from Roald Dahl's time as structured by a fighter pilot in wisdom that appears to want to teach us something about the Second World War as well as seven other tales world.|isbn=1804271470}}{{Frontpage|author=Mariana Enriquez|title=A Sunny Place for Shady People|rating=5|genre=Short Stories|summary=Mariana Enriquez writes horror that is disturbingly real, achieving this uncanny familiarity by basing her paranormal plots on gritty realities: her settings include an abandoned field full of conflict disused refrigerators due to an urban planning mishap, an overcrowded homeless shelter and strife, Dahl reveals a crime-ridden neighbourhood where safety meetings are routine - all within Argentina. The circumstances of her characters are so plausible that the human side of our most inhumane activitysupernatural or otherworldly horror which seeps into these spaces adopts a similarly tangible texture.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1405933194</amazonuk>1803511230

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Roald DahlFyodor Dostoyevsky|title= TrickeryWhite Nights|rating= 5|genre= Short Stories|summary=How underhand could you be to get what you want? In these ten tales of dark and twisted trickery Roald Dahl reveals that we are at our smartest and most cunning when we set out to deceive others - andAs always in Dostoyevsky, sometimes, even ourselvesthe character work is sublime. Here, among others, you'll read of the married couple and the parting gift which rocks One is never left wondering what a character is thinking or feeling because Dostoyevsky lays bare their marriage, the light fingered hitch-hiker innermost dispositions and the grateful motorist, and discover why the serious poacher keeps a few sleeping pills in his arsenaltemperaments with remarkable clarity.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1405933232</amazonuk>0241619785

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Roald DahlAllTomorrowsFutureCover|title= InnocenceAll Tomorrow's Futures: Fictions that Disrupt|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)|rating= 5|genre= Short StoriesScience Fiction|summary=What makes us innocent and how do we ''Opening up new ways of thinking about the shape of things to come to lose .'' I've heard it? Featuring the autobiographical stories telling of Roald Dahlsaid that 'technology' is what happens after you's boyhood and youth as well as four further tales of innocence betrayedre eighteen. Well, Dahl touches on the joys and horrors I must confess that there have been more than a few decades of growing technology in my lifetime. I've kept up. Among other stories, youreasonably well with what's advantageous to me but I'll read about m left with the wager feeling that destroys a girlit's faith in her fatherall getting away from me. Some of it is - frankly - quite frightening. Of course, I could research the landlady possibilities and the probabilities and end up down rabbit holes without really understanding whether I'm reading someone who has plans for her unsuspecting young guest knows what they're talking about or the latest conspiracy theorist. I needed people I knew I could trust and the commuter who is horrified to discover that could deliver information in a fellow passenger once bullied him at schoolway I could understand.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1405933259</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Tania HershmanB0CDZRGT1M|title=Some of Us Glow More Than OthersSuper Short Stories: Flash Fiction|author=Mark C Wallfisch

|genre=Short Stories |summary=I won't 'Got a minute to be alone amused, entertained, or challenged?''''These 100 stories are super short. None is more than 300 words. You can read one in stating that reading a flash.''''Some are funny. Some are poignant. All are short story collections can be slightly awkward. Going through from A-Z, witnessing '' Question: how do you review flash fiction? How do you give a bounty flavour of ideas and characters a fully rounded little story if that story is told in short order can be too much, but fewer than three hundred words? Or do you have try to draw out themes from all the right to pick and choose according to what appeals, and what time you have to fillflash fictions in a book of them? The sequence has carefully been considered, surely. Such would appear to be the case here. The last time I read one don't know! Perhaps we could start by explaining that there really isn't a fixed definition of flash fiction but that for this collection, authorMark C Wallfisch has gone for a three hundred word limit. That's collections, with [[The White Road by Tania Hershman|The White Road]], the only real difficulty was holding back and rationing them, but here you not only get about a whopping forty pieces of writing, they are also spread into sectionssingle page in your average paperback.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1910061484</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=James KelmanRachel Harrison|title=That Was a Shiver, and Other StoriesBad Dolls|rating=3.54|genre=Short Stories |summary=This is the ninth book of short stories by this author, which means heIt's presented just as many collections of the short form as he has novelsbeen some time since I've read any horror. You will find it hard to think I had a couple of another author that has been so noted for longer works (what misspent teen years reading Stephen King, borrowing the books from a boy I fancied at school and scaring myself half silly with [[How Late It Was, How Late by James Kelman|How Late It Was, How Late]] winning them to the Booker) but who is so generous in presenting shorter pieces point that I couldn't shut my bedroom curtains at night for fear of the timevampires outside! Don't worry -poorthis short story collection isn't like that! It doesn't have those jump scares, or those like me who see the variety in a writerand I didn's short or less typical works t have to be read it during daylight hours only! But it is creepy, and I found most of that feeling came from the more interesting places to turn. Opening fact that these pagesare stories about women, living normal lives, and that at least in part, the horrors arises from the pen of very normal situations such an esteemed proas a breakup, trying a new dieting app, came going to a hen party and a coping with no small sense of anticipationgrief.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1786890909</amazonuk>1803363932

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Various AuthorsB0CCCVRSGX|title= A Change Is Gonna ComeStories 2|author=Richard F Walker|rating= 54|genre= TeensShort Stories|summary= This is Richard F Walker''A Change Is Gonna Come'' is an anthology s second volume of short stories . There are thirteen in all and poems interpreting the theme I took something from each of change by twelve BAME writersthem. ItThere isn's Stripes Publishingt a single one that doesn's response t deserve to be among the under-representation of BAME authors in others or brings down the UKoverall quality. And itIt can be tricky to review short stories without giving too much away, so I's ll just pick two to talk about and I think they give a great responsegeneral flavour.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847158390</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Helen Stancey1739593901|title= 22 Ideas About The Madonna of the PoolFuture|author=Benjamin Greenaway and Stephen Oram (Editors)|rating= 3.5|genre= Short StoriesScience Fiction|summary= In most short story collections''Our future will be more complex than we expected. Instead of flying cars, an overarching theme is usually present in each we got night-vision killer drones and automated elderly care with geolocation surveillance bracelets to track grandma.'' I've got a couple of confessions to make. I'm not keen on short stories as I find it easy to read a few stories and then forget to return to the narratives which help each story gently flow in book. There's got to be a very compelling hook to the nextkeep me engaged. In this debut collection Helen Stancey explores Then there's science fiction: far too often it's the technology which takes centre stage along with the quiet disappointments, achievements, and complications that each of us experience through everyday lifeworld-building. She draws attention to It's human beings who fascinate me: the small events technology and decisions that can both disrupt and significantly alter the lives world scape are purely incidental. So, what did I think of others and ourselvesa book of twenty-two science fiction short stories? Well, all while maintaining a delicately poetic tone throughoutI loved it.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1912054000</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Joanna WalshB09XZMCDVF|title=Worlds from the Word's EndStories: 13 tantalising tales|author=Richard F Walker|rating=3.54

|summary=We here at The Bookbag liked this author's fairly recent 'A news vendor is crying out the headlines in the middle of the night; a wheelchair user loses touch with reality when he tries walking around in his imagination; a stickler for correct grammar goes back in time to correct an iconic quote; a volunteer teacher proves the ideal person to have around in a lawless village; the new boy on the pub football team is very useful with his feet, and awfully familiar…'' This collection of thirteen short stories, [[Vertigo by Joanna Walsh|Vertigo]]Richard F Walker has a lot to offer the eclectic reader. I myself missed outTying them together is the idea that remarkable and strange, even miraculous, but things can happen to ordinary people. And that seemed to be vignettes from one characterordinary doesn't mean boring or uninteresting. Form and tone varies so this little treasury of short fiction is never boring and you're never quite sure what's narration – here we get homosexual male narrators coming next.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1737030942|title=Bag O'Goodies|author=Jolly Walker Bittick|rating=4|genre= Anthologies|summary=Sometimes, you deserve a treat and a host more, as well as much less of the sadness prevalent beforemine was Jolly Walker Bittick's ''Bag O'Goodies''. Having had I first encountered his writing about a brief encounter with this author courtesy of her entry into the year ago, when I read his [[Bookshelf (Object Lessons) Cape Henry House by Lydia PyneJolly Walker Bittick|Object LessonsCape Henry House]] series, I was intrigued by her name being stamped on a selection rollicking tale of shortswhat happens when five young men find a base for their partying. Was it the ideal calling card? Let's face itRight now, the very short story itself can be a postcard – letI didn's say, from t want a specific hotel or twofull-length novel, as we see hereso I turned to this anthology of verse and short stories. Perhaps I should have geared myself up, however, for such intricate Bittick's writing on said postcards – has matured - and for the exotic locations from which they came…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1911508105</amazonuk>so have his characters. Well... most of them!

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Helen Phillips1529418100|title=Some Possible SolutionsBruno's Challenge and Other Dordogne Tales|author=Martin Walker

|summary=Picture I'm not usually a world where you, a new mother, move fan of short stories - I find it all too easy to a town where you slowly start put the book down between stories and forget to realise that every other woman seems pick it up again - but I am a replica fan of you – dressing Martin Walker's [[Martin Walker's Commissar Bruno Courreges Mysteries in Chronological Order|Bruno Courreges Mysteries]] so the temptation to read ''Bruno's Challenge'' was hard to resist and doing as you doI'm rather glad that I didn't even try. Consider a place where For those new to the series, there's an excellent introduction that will tell you all you have a perfect other half – most literally – but itneed to know about who's only who and the background to be found on an alien planetwhy Bruno is in St Denis. Or how about }}{{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 woman who suddenly finds she can see everything and everyone else alive as having no skinCherry Blossom Boutique, for just organs, tissue six months when she's nominated for - and bone as if everyone was having a Gunther von Hagens plastination job? wins - the Retail Best Newcomer Award. A lot of these stories are hard She's delighted and the two people she's brought with her to summarise without dropping into the voice of 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'Twilight Zones thirty-four and Liberty'' narration, but s best friend: they're not specifically genre works – theyve known each other since university and Liberty adores Jessica're just further examples of this authors husband, Charles and their four-year-old daughter, Ava. Life would be perfect for Liberty if it wasn's unsettling look at the bizarre elements of t for one thing: she misses having a man in her life.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782273425</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Cixin LiuB08KKQ85FN|title= The Wandering EarthBut Never For Lunch|author=Sandra Aragona|rating= 54|genre= Science FictionShort Stories|summary= ''If anyone thought that a woman approaching the short story as menopause can be likened to a Rottweiler in lipstick, an Ambassador nearing retirement resembles a form had been relegated pampered peacock about to be released into the pages company of womencarrion crows or, more to the point, about to discover the real world of bus timetables and paying his own gas bills.'s magazines (no disrespect) – think again. One genre ' You don't get many better opening sentences than that has always been a stalwart supporter and encourager of the short form is Sci-fi. So when you pick up a collection of Sci-fi shorts, do you know that it will have just as much depth ? We first met His Excellency and thought-provoking philosophy as any similar novel. Add to that The Ambassador's Wife in [[Sorting the intrigue of seeing how Priorities: Ambassadress and Beagle Survive Diplomacy by Sandra Aragona|Sorting the concepts are approached by someone from China which – Priorities]] and we learned what it was like to be polite – moved around countries like accompanying baggage by the Italian Government but the time has a somewhat different world-view in many ways come for HE to retires and for Sandra Aragona to much become The Wife of Former Ambassador... They have left The Career and settled in Rome. Well 'settled' rather overstates the rest of the planet…and add to that an author who is not only a best-seller in his home country but situation and their dog, Beagle, has the distinction no intention of having produced the first translated work of SF ever to win the Hugo Award…this has got to be good!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784978493</amazonuk>slowing down any time soon, despite being sixteen and deaf.

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Fleur Jaeggy and Gini Alhadeff (translator)B08CHJLNBS|title= I Am The Brother Of XXCapturing Emilia|author=Brooke Adams|rating= 43|genre= Short StoriesWomen's Fiction|summary=He''I Am The Brother of XX'' is a collection of twenty one short stories from Fleur Jaeggys Charles Devereaux, who expertly wields malevolence thirty-eight and spite throughouta partner at Wickham Jones, from the evil done between husband Mayfair letting agents. She's Emilia, twenty-nine, librarian and wife archivist in ''the heritage library next door. Emilia has read [[The Secret by Rhonda Byrne|The AviarySecret]] but she's moved on from new age books like that, which leave you dependent on someone else's philosophies, to something a nasty tale little deeper. Charles is more of Oedipal menace and viciousa [[Personal by Lee Child|Jack Reacher]] man himself, although admittedlybut, artful crueltyabove all, to senseless annihilation and immolation in he's shocked that Emilia reads ''The HeirGuardian''. Jaeggy also appears to have a particular fascination with religion They're obviously not at all compatible, from the nun receiving a rather special sort so why can Charles not get this woman out of communion in ''The Visitorhis mind? She's not his usual type at all: it' s obvious to general references to the Church and religious devotion throughout many of her storieshis friends. Family is also a recurrent theme; whether focused on the distance between siblings in the titular story And given that Emilia regularly feels repulsed by Charles's superficiality, told from the point of view of a brother filled with longing and loneliness trying why does she feel drawn to create him? The relationship's obviously a bond with his distant older sisternon-starter, or the primal need to protect the bond between mother and son, regardless of the cost in isn''Adelaide''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1911508024</amazonuk>t it?

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Malcolm DevlinMarie O'Regan and Paul Kane (editors)|title= You Will Grow Into ThemCursed: An Anthology of Dark Fairy Tales|rating= 4.5|genre= Short StoriesFantasy|summary=Curses. They''You Will Grow Into Them'' is a thrilling collection re there throughout tales of ten short stories all centred faery and other fantastical folk – people being cursed to do this, or not to be able to do that. Children can be cursed, as can princesses on the nature verge of transition marrying, and changeolder people too. The often grisly, macabre and ghoulish nature of the stories included It seems in Devlina way there's debut collection are intoxicatingly illicit and no escaping it. Which is why the darkness within each tale theme of this book of short stories is deviously addictivesuch a standout – we may well think we know all there is to know about this accursed character, that demonised place, and that other bewitched person. We'd be very wrong.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1907389431</amazonuk>1789091500

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Tove JanssonStibbe_Xmas|title= Letters From KlaraAn Almost Perfect Christmas|author=Nina Stibbe|rating= 4.5|genre= Literary FictionHumour|summary= Famed in Christmas – the UK for her creation time of the Moomin family, Jansson is rather belatedly beginning traditional trauma. You only have to gather think about the richly deserved esteem turkey for her adult writings. For that I offer my heart– once upon a time it was leaving it sat on the downstairs loo to defrost overnight, and if that failed the hair-felt thanks dryer shoved inside it treatment was your next best bet. Nowadays it's all having to publishers make sure it's suitably 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. Christmas, though, is of course also a time of great boons. It'Sort s cash in hand for a lot of books'' plump people who can hire red suits and Thomas Tealbeards, who has been responsible it was always a godsend for most of postmen with all the translations. Receiving this onethank-you letters to aunties you saw twice a decade that your parents made you write out in long-hand as a child, two things strike: firstly I somehow seem to have missed one and as for the makers of the seriesMeltis Newberry Fruits – well, did they even try and secondly there'll come a sell them any other time sooner rather than later when there'll be no more to be had. The former will be rectified, of the latter is a sad thought.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1908745614</amazonuk>year?

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Lee Child0954899520|title= No Middle NameA Winter Book|author=Tove Jansson|rating= 45|genre= Crime Literary Fiction|summary= There is a theory, to which those who regularly read my reviews will know I sometimes subscribe, which says that the short storyTove Jansson's heyday has passed and it has now put itself out to grass. This is particularly true, some sayworldwide fame lasts on the Moomin books, written in the 1940s and I have been known to concur, later becoming television characters of the crime simplicity, naivety and thriller genres. Tosh! I can only apologise to all authors involved and own up: I simply havensheer 'goodness't been paying attentionthat would later produce flowerpot men or teletubbies. Not even to shorter offerings my by favourite authorsSimple drawings, simple stories, simple goodness. So: big thanks to Lee Child and publishers Bantam Press What is often forgotten outside of her native Finland is that she was a serious writer…that she wrote for putting me straight with ''No Middle Name'' : adults as well as children…and that she had a collection feeling for the natural world and the simple life that not only informed those child-like trolls but went far beyond any fantasy of short stories about my favourite latter-day, American-style, Robin Hood by how the name of ''Jack Reacher''world might be.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0593079019</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1911115847|title=A Fanfare Nights of Talesthe Creaking Bed|author=Patrick C ReidyToni Kan

|genre=Short StoriesLiterary Fiction|summary=I love short stories, so I'm always happy when a new collection arrives for review. ''A Fanfare Nights of Tales'' by Patrick C Reidy promises me the Creaking Bed''is a compilation collection of short stories that highlight by Toni Kan. The series of stories tell of the adventures lives and lusts of an assortment of diverse characters as each encounters unforeseen challenges''living in and around Lagos, Nigeria. I like Nigeria, in this premisecollection, is imbued with its very own heart of darkness. So how does Danger stalks the book shape up? |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1524665983</amazonuk>shadows and people are killed for nothing more than a wrong look. Kan writes with a vitality and passion that allows these cynical stories to achieve a glimmer of hope.

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Peter O'Donnell and Enric Badia Romero1529014484|title=Children of Lucifer: Modesty BlaiseExhalation |author=Ted Chiang|rating=3.5|genre=Graphic Novels Science Fiction|summary=Out of ninetyOver the past twenty-five diverse comic strip eight years, Ted Chiang has published fifteen science fiction short stories, the publication of this book leaves just the last three yet to be presented in these fabulous large format paperbacks. So magnificent stories have won twenty-seven major science fiction awards so if you haven’t yet met with the sassy brunette with her curves and her great crime-solving mind, and are a science fiction fan it is likely that you have already come across some of course with her Willie, this is the last-but-one chance for work by Ted Chiang. If you haven't then take this opportunity to do sonow. And if you have any interest in quick little action tales, or even dated kitsch, for both apply here, then you should eagerly Trust me; your imagination will be on board…|amazonuk=<amazonuk>178329860X</amazonuk>grateful.

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Martin Edwards (editor)1794467440|title= Miraculous Mysteries (British Library Crime Classics)Watchwords |author=Philip Neal|rating= 54|genre= CrimeShort Stories|summary=Consider This satisfying collection of short stories has a provenance at least as beguiling as the following scenario: provenance of the antique watches that inspired it. Philip Neal lost a watch. It was a policeman hears someone screaming watch he was fond of and runs to had been told was like a house on a particular street1930s Cartier. Instead of mourning its loss, number 13, from where the noise is emanatinghe began to collect vintage watches that resembled it. When he peeps through the letterbox And that's how he discovers became a dead man in watch collector. An eBay purchase led him to the hallway with a knife Antique Watch Company watch repairers in his throatClerkenwell. He goes to fetch helpThe eBay purchase was a fake, but upon returning, finds the friendship that grew between the street does not have a number 13 buyer and that the body repairer of watches was not and the room he saw have both mysteriously vanishedseed of an idea for a book was born...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0712356738</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Michael R Lane1529006031|title= UFOs and GOD: A Collection of Short StoriesReturn to Wonderland|author=Various Authors|rating= 4.5|genre= Short Stories|summary=From stories of In following a young people caught up in girl called Alice down the rabbit hole a Robin Hood style operation gone wrongfew years ago, to a believer when the first book she was in [[Alice's Adventures in God having her faith shaken Wonderland (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 arrival -sake-of aliens-it did not gel, author Michael R Lane has compiled and I don't remember loving it more as a collection of fascinating and clever child. But I would suggest I am the perfect audience for this book. I had every chance to enjoy these short stories here. From farm to urban, that come at the core from World War II to the Digital Age, the places and timesa tangent, people and events in ''UFOs and God'' spotlight that show the tender underbelly benefits of the human condition in all its glory and despair on these varied stages of fictionoblique glance.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>163491712X</amazonuk>}}{{newreview| I've always preferred coming to an author= Rick Bass|title= For a Little While|rating= 4|genre= Short Stories|summary='s output through their least obvious, allegedly throw-away pieces, and it'For a Little Whiles the same with franchises – I'd more likely go for Bree Tanner' is s short novella than the whole Twilight saga (although that remains just a collection of twenty-five short stories from Rick Basshunch, for obvious reasons). As someone previously unacquainted with Bass' work this new collection For another thing, there was a wonderful introduction every reason to his quirkyexpect some kind of greatness here – with Carroll much loved by millions, unusual style which focuses on stripped back, simple fables featuring often mundane situations, mysterious characters and magical experiences. The characters surely pieces written with that love in each tale are beautifully crafted and the stories are dreamy, loose narratives covering everything from love to death to choices made and chances taken.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782273042</amazonuk>mind could only provide for success after success?

{{newreview <!-- remove 25/1 -->Frontpage|isbn=1846974658|title=A Collection of Short StoriesThe Long Path To Wisdom|author=Gillian FletcherJan-EdwardsPhilipp Sendker

|summary=Marged Evans allowed On my travels around the world, I have a break-tendency to end up with a lover to affect everything in her life. Osian wanted to invest in the present but Marged loved any bookshop that is selling English-language books, and while I buy as many second-hand escapist tales as the past. Since they drifted apartnext person, Margedwhat I's life has been careful, ordered, unadventurous. But then Osian sends her a Christmas card and everything changes. ''Marged Evansm really looking for is the 'local' is – the first and longest in this collection of short stories from Gillian Fletcher-Edwards. It's almost a novella and its initially slow pace sets off quite cookbook maybe, the masterclass in how one event can throw everything into unexpected - maps definitely, but lovely - chaosabove all: the folk tales.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1524662445</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Sybil Marshall and John Lawrence|title= The Book of English Folk Tales|rating= 4|genre= Anthologies|summary= From ghosts If I ever get to witchesBurma, I won't need to giants and fairieshunt, ''The Book of English Folk Tales'' is a fascinating collection of stories retold by social historian and folklorist Sybil Marshall. Out of print for over three decades, this beautiful new clothbound edition is complete with wood engraved illustrations by John Lawrence and is sure to capture the attention of a new generation of lovers of folkloreI can read before I go.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1468313177</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Shirley McKayB077969HN8|title=1588: A Calendar of Crime (A Hew Cullan Mystery)Alternative Medicine|author=Laura Solomon

|genre=Crime (Historical)Short Stories|summary=A lot of crime happens Laura Solomon's publisher describes the short stories in St Andrews during 1588 and therefore in the life ''Alternative Medicine'' as ''black comedy with a twist of law lecturer and local investigator Hew Cullen toosurrealism''. As we travel through 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 the year with him, his recently wedded English wife Frances, doctor brother in law Giles publisher says is correct - and I really enjoyed it. The comedy is not ''too'' black and his sister Meg, the wise woman, we also encounter some surrealism is gentle and perhaps best described as a twist or flick of his most interesting casesreality when you were least expecting it. In fact there's one Your comfort zones are going to match each of be invaded in the year's big festivals: Candlemas, Whitsun, Lammas, Martinmas and Yulenicest possible way.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846973635</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=9386897504|title=Mary Telford Tales of Love and Louise VerityDisability|titleauthor=SinsLaura Solomon

|summary=Is there enough new to say about the seven deadly sins? WeI've seen them all shown to us, from school age always believed that less-able writers produce longer books: it takes a great deal of skill and up talent to write a short story which holds the movie ''Se7en'', which we sincerely hope was NOT shown to anyone at school agereader and keeps them coming back for more. We can each recount them There are far too many collections of short stories which are all, having been long familiar with them, even if we probably cantoo easy to put down and forget after you't pin down when they were actually set in stone without helpve read a couple of pieces. Similarly, is there anything new in the world I've recently read a couple of fairy tale? We know the tropes novellas by Laura Solomon - characters identified [[Marsha's Deal by their status or gender (the woman, the husband), a clear set of rules to obey, Laura Solomon|Marsha's Deal]] and a moral as strong as, if not stronger than, the formulae involved. Well, this volume demands we decide the answer to those questions as being positive ones, and if it[[Hell's Unveiling by Laura Solomon|Hell's not always definitive in the writing here that there is something newUnveiling]] and enjoyed them, rest assured there will be something in the imagery that will definitely strike one as freshso I was intrigued to see what she could do with an even shorter form...|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1843516624</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Carys Bray and others1986586898|title=How Much the Heart Can HoldGoing To The Last: Seven Short Stories on LoveAbout Horse Racing|author=K D Knight|rating=34.5

|summary=This Sceptre collection does In 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 ''A Grey Day'' an owner struggles with the problem of whether or not have to run his horse in the Gold Cup when the ground is against him. My favourite was ''The Story of H'', the story of Foinavon. H is depicted as simple a remit as it might appear; these are kind horse who only wanted to please people. After changing hands on various occasions he came to the yard of John Kempton. H (or Foinavon) was entered in the Grand National and considered a no straightforward love stories-hoper. Instead, they each take In one aspect of love – often one the most dramatic runnings of the ancient Greek classifications – and provide race, a whole new way of thinking about itpile-up occurred at the 23rd fence. After all Foinavon, who had been many lengths adrift, cleared the fence and galloped to the line, winning the heart holds a lot race at odds of metaphorical weight100/1.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1473649420</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Helen Simpson9386897296|title=CockfostersHell's Unveiling|author=Laura Solomon

|summary=This was a belated reunion for me, having been introduced to the author's snappy short story collections courtesy the very first one A little while at uni. Mind, it was a much more gentle and placid reunion than the one that starts this book – Julie and Philippa have had a shop-bought curry together, but have had to forsake a cultural chat for a trip haring along the London Underground chasing after a pair of glasses one of them left behind. The piece is definitely about the subject of ageing – about time passed and what might be remaining ahead – but you soon discover that not only do all the pieces here have titles that are unadorned place names, but they all concern that very theme. Can anyone, let alone Helen Simpson, sustain such a vaguely morbid topic over a full collection?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>178470198X</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author=David Beckler|title= The Road More Travelled: Tales of those seeking refuge|rating= 5|genre= Short Stories|summary= ''The Road More Travelled'' is an anthology of short stories - and one poem - written in response to the refugee crisis as it exploded across our TV screens and newspapers throughout 2015. To the horror of the authors, the language used by many was aggressive and dehumanising, describing this mass of desperate people as a swarm or a horde. The stories together form a response to this othering.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0993147224</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Ransom Riggs|title= Tales of the Peculiar|rating= 5|genre= Teens|summary= A fork-tongued princess. A boy who can control the currents of the sea. Cannibals who feast on the limbs of a village of peculiars. These are just a few of the brilliant stories to be found in ''Tales of the Peculiar'', all of which hold mystical information about the peculiar world - a place familiar to many of us since its first introduction by Ransom Riggs in ago I really enjoyed [[Miss PeregrineMarsha's Home for Peculiar Children Deal by Ransom RiggsLaura Solomon|Miss PeregrineMarsha's Home for Peculiar ChildrenDeal]]. The stories in this collection explore peculiar history and folklore in a wonderfully imaginative way, and also include some beautiful illustrations to accompany each of the tales.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141373407</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|title=I'll Be Home For Christmas|author=Benjamin Zephaniah and Others|rating=5|genre=Teens|summary=Publisher Little Tiger and homelessness charity Crisis have got together and produced ''I'll Be Home For Christmas'' - an anthology of short stories from some of the most popular writers on the UK YA scene. The stories are connected was delighted by the theme of home. What does home mean opportunity to you? Is it your house, read the physical place where you live? Is it your family? Your friends? Home can mean different things to different peoplesequel, can't it? The book opens with a powerful poem by Bookbag favourite, Benjamin Zephaniah. The following stories are disparate - some telling tales of hardship and fear, some warming the cockles of your heart. But all of them are about 'Hell'homes Unveiling''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847157726</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Rebecca Schiff|title= The Bed Moved|rating= 5|genre= Short Stories |summary= Rebecca Schiff It's collection probably not much of short stories was a revelation. It has everything I want from a collection: humour, (often of spoiler to say that Marsha bested the black variety), heartbreaking sadness, and moments of shocking clarity. These stories feel like the revealing of the inner workings of a young American womandevil in 's psyche. In fact, in the last short piece, entitled 'Marsha'Write What You Knows Deal'', it feels that but the narrator/author devil is telling us the experiences which have led not one to this collectiontake defeat lying down. He's out to wage war on Planet Earth and particularly on Marsha (who's thought of as a 'I only know about parent death and sluttinessgoody two shoes'in Hell). Although a strong person, she tells us's vulnerable where her foster children are concerned. She goes on Daniel is framed for a crime he didn't commit and sent to talk about her knowledge of Jewish people who are assimilated, liberal and sexual guilt, juvenile detention and I think it is no exaggeration refused permission to say that these are the underlying themes return to practically all of the stories herelive with Marsha.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>147363184X</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Simon Van Booy|title= Tales of Accidental Genius|rating= 5|genre= Short Stories|summary=A diverse Then, haunting and humorous collection of short fictioncourse, Simon Van Booy offers a collection there are all the other children who are not only targeted but - worst of stories highlighting how human genius can emerge through acts of compassion. With characters ranging from an eccentric film director, an aging Cockney bodyguard, all - subverted to the teenage child of Nigerian immigrants, a divorced amateur magician and a Beijing street vendor, devil's evil ends. He'Tales of Accidental Genius'' takes the reader s out to prey on their fears and weaknesses and as with manyfoster children, incredible journeys, and conveys more in a few pages than many authors would struggle to do in a whole novel. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1780749716</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Amnesty International|title= Here I Stand|rating= 5|genre= Teens|summary= Every so often Amnesty International gets together a number of great authors and produces an anthology of writingtheir self-esteem is very fragile. This timeis no small-scale operation, they've done it for younger readers with ''Here I Stand''. Twentyeither -five contributions explore where we are with human rights in today's society: the sacrifices many made to win them; the sacrifices that still need to be made to spread them; howdevil has set up a training complex on earth, where and why these rights are under attack and how deep is the need complete with an elevator to defend themHell. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>140635838X</amazonuk>