KEEPING IT short

On the basis of what we last shared, I thought revisiting the short story might be not only enjoyable, but we could also share a few writers of this genre who are expecially good at their craft.

I was delighted to read author, Marianne Wiggins review of Our Story Begins by Tobias Wolff, an author I have long admired, in the (Easter) Sunday 3/23/08 LA Times Book Review section ---and what a review this was! She does what a reviewer aspires to do: she writes such a strong, positive review that the reader wants to fly out of the house and get to the library and/or bookstore as fast as possible.

She loves his writing, adores his subject choices and has a great appreciation of his many 30 years as an author. She refers to Wolf as a "master mason" and his language, very ordinary, is the kind that just pulls the reader in because it is the sort that people around us happen to use. Wiggins, Salman Rushdie's former wife, has a few short story collections ('92, '93?) of her own so I am looking into locating these. However, her review of Wolff's new short stories was particularly glowing: Wiggins points out that Wolff's mastery of the craft compares to Poe, Hemingway, J. D.Salinger and Raymond Carver.

Naturally, this review is a must-read, but I also began thinking...what other short story crafters should we discuss?

Waiting to hear of other short story writers recommendations you'd care to share here. I may have left two off the kings, J. D. Salinger and Raymond Carver from my list earlier this month; Ray Bradbury, Katherine Mansfield. additionally, swimming in my head are the names of Jack London, Paul Theroux, Bernard Malamud, David Bezmozgis -just a few others who spring to mind. Let's hear some of your favorites - love to learn about new and different writers...thanks.

Let's Praise the Short Story, Not Bury It!

Well, I continue to hear that the short story is dead. Can this be true? I believe that readers often don't select short stories because they conjecture that they are too short, not complete and don't have much substance. To this I would say: wrong, wrong, wrong. Of course, this is my (strong) opinion, but I would say if we each go out and check out short story collections and anthologies, we can give new life to this suffering breed of fiction - take a walk on a (good) short story side and you will find that - for the most part - they are surprisingly well-constructed: very briskly paced, challenging yet compact and overall, clever compelling and concise.

I love good short stories so I would like to take this time to introduce or familiarize readers with twelve terrific short story authors including the following: Don Chaon; Amanda Davis; Anthony Doerr; Ryan Harty; Stephen King; Jhumpa Lahiri; Steven Millhauser; Lorrie Moore; Alice Munro (practically the QUEEN of this form); Julie Orringer; Annie Proulx and Eric Puchner.

Don Chaon's Among the Missing, a splendid collection of tales in which the past haunts the future- this collection is riveting, puzzling and filled with wonder; Amanda Davis, who tragically perished in a plane accident near age 30 in 2003, focuses on the lives of (chiefly) female characters in the dark, lyrical, ferocious yet playful studies of vulnerability in her amazing Circling the Drain.

Anthony Doerr's The Shell Collector is complex and powerful in its depiction of the natural world and how its beauty and power move our lives; Ryan Harty, who happens to be married to Julie Orringer, another writer highlighted here, wrote Bring Me Your Saddest Arizona: a stark, subtle unsettling look at the Southwest and its denizens' love and loss.

Stephen King's Night Shift and or Skeleton Crew underline his abilities to remain in tone and theme yet stay simple and to the point - plus not all King is horror!; Jhumpa Lahiri's Interpreter of Maladies elegantly, meticulously depicts both East Indians and Indian Americans, who experience culture conflicts and a constant curiousity about the human condition...this April should bring Lahiri's new short story collection!

Steven Millhauser's new collection of short stories, Dangerous Laughter, is a strange and magnetic invitation to his uncanny world of magical realism-this collection and his The Knife Thrower are remarkable in their depiction of amazing other-wordly paradoxes : his finesse in conjuring up the strange, mesmerizing worlds he creates is extraordinarily brilliant and we can see the influence of Poe, Kafka, Borges and Faust; Lorrie Moore has written stories filled with the unsettled of America, in Birds of America and Self-Help - Moore uses her trademark humor and fuels each story with pathos and empathy.

Alice Munro is known as the finest living short story writer-her tales of Ontario, Canada involve characters who confront conflict while adhering to tradition, experiencing the inabiltiy to delay life moving forward as evidenced in The Runaway, Friends of My Youth and Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage ; the incredible Julie Orringer has offered her debut collection How to Breathe Underwater which is a terrific in-depth study of various aged characters desperately trying to sustain viable realtionships.

All of Annie Proulx's bleak but whimsical collections, such as Bad Dirt, Close Range, That Old Ace in the Hole reflect forgotten places at a pace closely aligned with quieter days. And, finally,Eric Puchner's debut collection of short stories, Music through the Floor, highlight a group of cultural misfits attempting to navigate mainstream America - strikingly original, fiercely funny, and quietly heartbreaking.

So . . . please offer your analyses, beliefs, feelings, ideas, impressions, inspirations, investigations, observances, opinions, theories, thoughts and views on what makes a good short story and who some of your favorite short story authors are. Looking forward to you sharing your ideas. Yearning to hear of your choice in yarns and yarn-spinners.