Static8.com Journal Entry

12 Oct 2006 ... Booking: Short Stories


Booking Through Thursday meme

  • Do you read short stories? Why or why not? What do you like and dislike about short stories?

Oh, yes. Most definitely. I am always reading short stories!

I mentioned before that I subscribe to Fantasy and Science Fiction Magazine. It's full of short stories and the occasional novella. I usually read those at work... Partially because I don't mind the beating the mag gets when I haul it around (while I would mind messing up my books). The other part is it's easier to get through short stories when people are talking around you.

I also buy The Year's Best Science Fiction, which is an annual book of stories collected by Gardner Dozois. He usually sets up a pretty good collection.

I enjoy short stories because they have to be good, or they won't get printed! It's also a good way to feel out authors... if I read an excellent short story, I am going to find out what books that author has written.

I have been disappointed once, by an author who writes amazing short stories but hasn't written any books. Richard Chwedyk wrote "The Measure of All Things" which appeared in the Mag of Fant & SciFi. This is my favorite short story of all time! It's brilliant! It's about bio-engineered pets, it's horribly sad, it's fantastically happy, it's brilliant. Chwedyk has written some follow up stories, which I devour, but I am eagerly awaiting a collection to be published. Well, wishing for one.

My old favorite short story is "Grass" by Vonda McIntyre, to which she did a followup book called DreamSnake. It's about a healer who is helped in her healings by her companion snakes. The short story is heart wrenching, the book is pretty good too.

I prefer short story collections with a variety of authors, especially "Best of" books. But occasionally read a collection by a single author... I'm currently reading Anne McCaffrey's Get Off the Unicorn, which has stories from all of the universes that she has created. Except, amusingly, the Acorna series. ha.





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