Customer Reviews

The Best American Short Stories 2009

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Alice Sebold and Heidi Pitlor are to be commended for assembling an excellent collection of stories from a wide variety of different themes, styles, viewpoints, subjects, tones and genres. Often the guest editor will make a strong imprint on the collection by choosing a particular type of short story. Sebold and Pitlor appear to have taken their job very seriously this year, and have put together a volume worthy of the moniker "Best American Short Stories".

There is one story which rises far above the others, due to the writer's craftsmanship: Richard Powers' "Modulation". Powers mixes together a variety of dissimilar characters scattered around the globe and ties them all together with a science fiction storyline that conveys the power and importance of music in the present day. Powers has excellent command of the English language and keen observational skills, and it is hard to imagine how this story could be any better than it is.

Other stories that I enjoyed include:

-- "The Idiot President", by Daniel Alarcon: No, this is not a diatribe against George Bush. Rather, it is a gripping portrait of the performing arts scene in a second world country, and the struggles that actors and audience members endure for the sake of the performance. The tale-within-the-tale, or more accurately the play-within-the-story, is also engaging and features a nice plot twist and moral at the end.

-- "Beyond the Pale", by Joseph Epstein: besides being an interesting character study of the younger immigrant wife of a Yiddish author, it also illustrates how renowned artists often are famous because of the right set of circumstances, especially having the right members of an audience, and how there can be similarly skilled artists whose work fades into obscurity because of a single shortcoming in conveying the artistic work to the audience, not in the artistic work itself.

-- "NowTrends", by Karl Taro Greenfield: A lesson in how China's rapid modernization and adaption of capitalism while still within the constraints of an officially communistic or socialistic system has produced dramatic effects on (and much uncertainty about) the lives, morals and behaviors of Chinese citizens.

-- "Sagittaruius", by Greg Hrbek: a story about the process a father undergoes while learning to accept and love his less-than-perfect child. While few children will have the defect that the subject of this story does, all parents should be able to relate to the lesson in this story, as no child (or parent) is perfect.

It is hard to limit myself to just citing these stories; "Modulation" stands alone as the best story in the book, but once past that one, the other stories (with just two exceptions) were all very good. The only two stories I felt should have been omitted were Namwali Serpell's "Muzungu" and Kevin Moffett's "One Dog Year", both of which I didn't think had coherent or interesting plotlines.

2009 Best American Short Stories is definitely worth reading if you are a fan of the short story form. If you are not yet a fan, I can recommend the 2009 volume as being one of the best of the recent vintages, and a worthy entrée into the world of the short story.

Compared with last year's compilation, edited by Stephen King, the body count is much lower. There's less disease than usual; no cancer and only one Alzheimer's disease. Not that it's very cheerful. There's not much humor and there are are no new Perelmans, or Thurbers or Woody Allens. Sebald must prefer Kafka and George Orwell. She favors stories about helpless victims of oppressive bureaucracies.Asimov's was not among the magazines surveyed.
The plots are as follows:
Guerilla theater in South America
Middle school teachers' romantic intrigues
Viet Vet trapped by Katrina
Great neglected Yiddish writer stays neglected
Prohibition era dim young things
Oppressive Chinese bureaucracy
Unappreciated Good Samaritan
Baby is Centaur
Displaced Katrina victims
Francophile mother-in-law
More oppressive Chinese bureaucracy
Oppressive Kafka-like bureaucracy
Stands up date to help kid
Elderly billionaire is childish
Catchy tune
Homeless on the range
Hilly-billy ginseng-induced crime
Seder memories
Mechanical civil warfare
White trash in Zambia

A few years ago I decided I wanted to learn about the craft of short stories and figured the best way to do this was to subscribe to a number of literary journals. So I subscribed to The Paris Review, Zoetrope, Boulevard, Glimmer Train, Crazyhorse, Iowa Review, and a few others. It didn't take me long to realize though that, unless you have a job in the industry, wading through these magazines every quarter is a significant waste of time. Yes, there are some great stories in these quarterlies, but finding them can be like finding a needle in a haystack. Most of the writing is competent enough, but the truly good stories are few and far between. I even found this to be the case in the really prestigious journals, like Paris Review. So I decided to let my subscriptions lapse. Around the time I did so however, I discovered this annual anthology and decided to pick it up. Having an esteemed writer do all the wading through the muck to leave only the best stories for me to read seemed a great idea.

There are twenty stories here. If you read a lot of short stories you will have heard of some of the writers represented, such as Annie Proulx, Jill McCorkle, and Yiyun Li. But more than likely, most of these writers will be new names to you. Like any anthology, it's doubtful that you'll like every story because there are so many different styles represented. There's the stories that hit the emotional chords, like "Yurt" by Sarah Shun-Lien Bynum, `Magic Words" by Jill McCorkle, and "The Anniversary Trip" by Victoria Lancelotta. There's the historical fiction, like "One Dog Year" by Kevin Moffett and "The Peripatetic Coffin" by Ethan Rutherford. There's the recent-history fiction, like "Rubiaux Rising" by Steve De Jarnatt and "Hurricanes Anonymous" by Adam Johnson. The foreign stories, like "The Idiot President" by Daniel Alarcon, "NowTrends" by Karl Taro Greenfield, and "A Man Like Him" by Yiyun Li. There's the fantastical and experimental fiction, like "Sagittarius" by Greg Hrbek and "Modulation" by Richard Powers. And wherever there's Annie Proulx, you know you have at least one cowboy story.

I liked the emotional stories the best, such as "Yurt" and "Magic Words". I disliked the Katrina stories, but I dislike most recent-history fiction because they're usually too preachy for me. I dislike fantasy so hated "Sagittarius". I thought "Modulation" was creative and well-crafted. In other words, reading this anthology wasn't much different from reading a good literary journal. All the writing is competent, but your tastes will determine which stories you like. Most readers will like a few stories here, hate some, and be indifferent to most. So, unless you're really interested in the craft of short stories or don't mind wading through a lot of uninspired writing just to get a few good morsels, I'd suggest skipping this book.

I'll warn you first that I'm reviewing early and haven't read every story in the collection. Normally, I wouldn't dare review a product if I didn't have the full range of interaction with it. But with fiction I think it's notable and appropriate to offer a review if much of it is so banal and expected that one can't muster the desire to keep reading.

I'm an aspiring writer, which I know doesn't mean jack and/or squat. It does mean I read a lot, though. I would go so far as to say I RELY on The Best American series as a sort of textbook (and thankfully it's also often entertaining on levels that range from 'amazing craft' to 'that was fun'). It's THE way to understand the contours of the contemporary short-fiction world as well as basically setting the 'you must be this good' bar for writers wanting all the fame and riches writing short fiction can offer (not much, you?).

This collection? I was eight (8!) stories in before I found one that truly engaged me and MADE me keep reading (the mark of a good story, in my opinion). It's pretty hard for me NOT to keep reading in such a collection, as I'm a firm believer that one can often learn the most from stories one may not 'like' very much. So, even when I don't 'like' a story as a reader, I still finish it as a writer, ya dig? But there a handful of stories in this anthology that were so awkwardly un-engaging I couldn't keep reading. It HURT to keep reading. The first story, for instance, is from The New Yorker (meaning it HAS to be good, right?) and reads like a senile grandparent rambling about the past, but it isn't even our grandparent telling the story, so why would the reader really care for this personal-history lesson? Oh really, grandma, the theater you say, fascinating... and with paragraphs half a page long.

The stories felt like the kind of stories rewarded in fiction workshops. Well crafted, proper language, seeming by all accounts to look like a story. But many didn't feel like stories, didn't make me a part of a new world or pull me into a character's experiences or truly bring about a new insight in me. They felt like manuscripts you read because you have to for class, and then are technically sound enough there isn't much to critique there, and most people don't want to say 'this story was just boring' so everyone nods and says 'pretty good, pretty good' and the next day it's forgotten.

It seems to me there are two directions guest selectors of The Best American Series can take. Route 1) put in a ton of the expected fare from The New Yorker because they must be good to be in The New Yorker, right? 2) Actually scour the short stories from the year and try to find those gems that are truly innovative, engaging and memorable. In my opinion, Alice Sebold simply picked all the 'must be good' stories from the year and didn't really ever question whether they were actually good. Nothing wrong with this. Some people will be pleased because in many ways the stories are good (I mean, half of them were from The New Yorker, so they've GOT to be good, right?). The selections just felt safe and expected, though, which in the fiction world, to me, translates to banal and unmemorable. I guess I just prefer when editors find the more cutting edge stuff, the fiction we haven't quite seen before, the stuff that we may not even realize as we read it that in a few years we'll look back and treasure the stories as not just another anthology, but an event in our lives. I can't imagine a single story in this collection doing that for me.

To make a long review even longer and broader in scope, I don't blame Sebold for the selections. I think a better method for selecting stories is by committee, as having one author selecting seems to lead to an unreliable process when one is supposed to be selecting the best. Also, I think the sad truth is that short fiction is in a tough place. All these collections end up with stories so out-of-place bad or boring that one scratches their head, not being able to find any rationale for their inclusion--though 99% of the time they're from a has-to-be-good top literary journal--that even the tried and true 'it's just all so subjective' nonsense doesn't seem valid. And a lot of what I keep seeing published by the heavy hitters is the safe, expected fare that of course then gets re-published in these anthologies in an endless cycle of nobody seeming to question if the fiction they're being fed is actually good or not. The short-fiction world at large feels stagnant, like everyone is just doing what they've always done and what they think they're supposed to do.

To me, that's exactly what The Best American Short Stories 2009 feels like: safe, predictable, expected. Not a bad idea for dinner with the in-laws. But for fiction, especially what's supposed to be the best, it's disappointing. A shrug-worthy story is usually worse than if a writer or selector for The Best American takes chances that don't end up working out; at least then it's often memorable and interesting in the crash and burn. Instead, this anthology is just a huge shrug. Finish a story, finish the anthology, shrug and the stories are forgotten... which to me is not the mark of the best of anything, much less fiction.

If these stories are the best published in the past year, it is no wonder that short fiction is dying in our culture.

None of the stories are actively bad, but none are particularly good either. For the most part they are bland and pointless. Too often I found myself mentally asking the author "Why are you telling me this?"

The emphasis seems to be on writing style rather than content -- that is, "writing to impress rather than express" as our English teachers used to warn us against back in school.

Remember when a story's primary purpose was to entertain? Great stories do far more than entertain, but if they don't entertain in some way they are always lousy stories. Somehow our culture has gotten stuck in the ridiculous and indefnsible notion that there is a steel wall between entertainment and art, and never the twain shall meet. Actually, while not all entertainment is artistic of course, any supposed art that has no entertainment value is just worthless pretension.

I was really saddened to read this volume. Art and culture in our society is really in a very sorry state if these tedious ramblings are the best our modern literature has to offer.

There is no point in mentioning any of the individual stories in this collection. They all tend to blend together in the bland mush. Basically it is just a collection of 20 "so whats"

"The Best American Short Stories" is, as they proudly like to point out on the cover, "best, first and best selling" collection of short stories published in the US over the preceding year. The second of these claims is of course entirely subjective, but there is no doubt that this series is one of the most respected and widely used anthologies of contemporary American short fiction. These anthologies give a snapshot of current trends in fiction writing, and are, for better or worse, representative of the writing styles and themes in this genre. The upside is that the stories that are collected here are without exception all written extremely well. On the other hand, sometimes the most interesting and original stories tend to be a bit rough on the edges and not too polished. Such stories almost never make it into a collection such as this one. In the recent years these collections tended to be predominantly filled with the "workshop-style" writing. The exception seemed to be last year's collection, The Best American Short Stories 2008. This collection was so far the only one where I felt that every single story was really, really good. I was hoping that maybe the series had permanently turned a new leaf, but based on this year's collection this doesn't seem to be entirely true.

By and large, most of the stories in this collection are really good and interesting. This last point should not, unfortunately, be taken for granted any more when the quality of writing is judged these days. Oftentimes utterly mind numbingly boring stories are praised for their supposed literary merits, and several of those had made it into this collection. For some reason, most of the more boring stories happen to be the longer ones as well, which makes their reading quite tortuous. However, there are many good stories in this collection and their reading was quite rewarding. I will probably continue to read these collections in the upcoming years, and just take what I can get from them. At this point I've probably learned my lesson and I won't expect too much beyond impeccably crafted prose.

I could not wait to review this collection of short stories! Since 1999 I have sought out this volume for reading pleasure, and in recent years noted that the selection of established writers all but eliminated work by new talent. Ms. Sebold has reversed the trend and presents us with beautiful samples. Short stories are alive and well as an art form. The assortment here confirm it. I fell in love with the piece by Joseph Epstein. Tipping the balance of a collection toward those who are less well-known is long overdue. It gives hope to anyone who has yet to be published and establishes a standard of excellence new writers can aim to match. Any fan of short stories must get a copy. It's a perfect stocking stuffer for the MFA student in your family as well.

The stories in this book are beautifully written. They were chosen well and each has its own writing style. Plus the stories are short enough to finish one each night before bed.

Most of the stories in this collection, edited by Alice Sebold, contain somewhat depressing or pessimistic subject matter. Namely, "Rubiaux Rising" by Steve De Jarnatt concerns a military veteran nailed into an attic as Hurricane Katrina pounds down onto the surrounding town, "NowTrends" by Karl Taro Greensfield is about a writer whose publisher is thrown in jail by a strict, media-controlling government, "Them Old Cowboy Songs" by Annie Proulx revolves around a young couple in the 19th century West whose relationship is stretched and ultimately destroyed due to financial and work troubles, and so on. I'm not saying that I need happy endings to make me enjoy literature (in fact, I tend to dislike those even more), but this collection is somewhat disheartening if not downright saddening. Not really surprising when you consider the fact that Sebold's best book revolves around a little girl whose killed, chopped up into tiny pieces, and scattered across a wide patch of woods by a demented murderer.

My favorite stories were:

"The Idiot President" by Daniel Alarcon, about a trio of young theatre actors in South America.

"The Farms" by Eleanor Henderson, about a young white girl who lets two young black sisters into her home when they are stuck outside in a rainstorm.

"Hurricanes Anonymous" by Adam Johnson, by far the longest story of the collection, concerning a very interesting UPS driver with a dying father and a locked-up baby's momma, who drives around post-Katrina Louisiana with his toddler son strapped in.

"One Dog Year" by Kevin Moffett, a somewhat fictional/non-fictional account of John D. Rockefeller in his dying years watching a airplane stuntman at the beach.

This collection isn't the best Best American Short Stories of the series, but it has several "can't miss" stories that any fan of the short story should read.

what a great way to get the best short stories of each year for those of those who dont have time to read much