I’m trying to figure out a way to blog about my short story thing that isn’t completely boring. But I am reading/listening to some great stuff that I do want to share with you. So let’s just see how things progress.
Anyway, here’s what I’ve read this week.
| 2/15/20 | The Silent Kingdom | Claire Dean |
| 2/15/20 | The Hitchhiker | Roald Dahl |
| 2/15/20 | Goodnight Nobody | Sarah Hall |
| 2/16/20 | All About Alice | Danielle McLaughlin |
| 2/17/20 | Girls are Always Hungry When All the Men are Bite-Size | Kirsty Logan |
| 2/17/20 | Spiderweb | Mariana Enriquez |
| 2/18/20 | I’m Here | Ludmilla Petrushevskaya |
| 2/19/20 | The Possibility of Evil | Shirley Jackson |
| 2/19/20 | End of Term | Mariana Enriquez |
| 2/20/20 | Carnivores | Kate Jonez |
| 2/21/20 | The Swan | Roald Dahl |
| 2/22/20 | El Gallo (The Rooster) | Cynthia Pelayo |
General thoughts this week:
Hot Priest Andrew Scott’s performance of Roald Dahl’s The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Six More is amazing, and you should all check it out. Will and I are having a blast listening to it.
Claire Dean (nee Massey) is a fantastic writer, and her 2017 collection The Museum of Shadows and Reflections is a real treat. And I’ve just learned she has not one, but two new stories in some upcoming collections, which means I have to spend more money on books. Awful, just awful 🙂
Sarah Hall is an absolute master of the short story. I’ve nearly finished her collection Madame Zero, and am so grateful I have two more collections of hers to get through. She wins loads of awards, you should check her out.
Mariana Enriquez is quickly becoming one of my favorites writers. Her collection, Things We Lost in the Fire contains some genuinely disturbing stories, and I can’t get enough of it.
Reading any of Shirley Jackson’s work is always like getting a warm hug from an older relative. I felt incredibly down one day this week, and reading Jackson’s story, The Possibility of Evil, picked me right up again. Yes, I’m strange, we established that the time I was voted “Most Likely to Start a Cult” in high school.
Love, love, love, loving Cynthia Pelayo’s collection of miniature horrors, Loteria. Dark? You bet your bloodied stumps it is! And completely dispels my belief that almost everything on Kindle Unlimited is absolute trash.
As always, feel free to follow along. I’m nearly at 600 stories now, very exciting! And if you would like to read more short fiction, and don’t know where to start, please let me know. I’d be very happy to direct you towards some outstanding writers.
Cheers!
California Reading 