Musical Fictions
Author JONATHAN TAYLOR talks to us about combining music and literature, as he prepares to launch his second short story collection, Kontakte and Other Stories – a book of ‘musical fictions’.
Tales of Mystery and Imagination
CHRISTINE GENOVESE explores the stories of Edgar Allan Poe, accompanied by Harry Clarke’s haunting black and white illustrations, in the collection Tales of Mystery and Imagination.
Whistle If You Dare
STEPHEN DEVEREUX examines ‘Oh Whistle, and I’ll Come to You, My Lad’, one of M.R. James’ spooky, supernatural stories: ‘M. R. James’ ghost stories have had an enormous influence, not only on other writers, but on the treatment of the supernatural in film and other popular forms…’
Diamonds in the Smooth
ANDREW LEON HUDSON discusses the stories of The New Yorker and the collection 20 Under 40: ‘I live in Madrid and I don’t read The New Yorker. But not because I live in Madrid. My reluctance has been reinforced for a number of years by almost everything my American friends say about it…’
Storm Warnings in a Purple Haze: Robert Stone
JASON CLIFTON recommends the short stories of Robert Stone’s collection Bear and his Daughter: ‘Stone’s characters start out in a bad place and go downhill from there. They’ve crossed a line out of greed, despair, anger or moral conviction, and they are going to have a very hard time crossing back…’
The Orphan and the Mob
JULIA ANDERSON recommends ‘The Orphan and the Mob’: ‘As I read the first sentence of ‘The Orphan and the Mob’, my eyes widened. At only sixteen words long, Julian Gough managed to insert into his first sentence: urination, a mob, and an orphanage burning down. Kudos to him…’
Time to Disappear
In this essay, KIRSTY WALTERS recommends The BBC International Short Story Award 2012 anthology: ‘Each one has, at its core, a theme of absence or disappearance. These are stories of missing people, death, and the ability to dispose of whatever we want, whenever we want…’
Silent Snow, Secret Snow
DORA D’AGOSTINO recommends ‘Silent Snow, Secret Snow’ by Conrad Aiken, a story about ‘Paul Hasleman, a boy who thinks, dreams and wishes for snow until it becomes an obsession…’
Whoever Holds the Rattle Tells the Tale
Ahead of International Short Story Day, and to celebrate the publication of Rattle Tales 2, ERINNA METTLER talks to us about how Rattle Tales has grown in the last two years and where their short story performances have led this Brighton-based co-operative.
The Unusual Ways of Roberto Bolaño
‘The narrators are failed artists, poets and writers struggling to get by in a world that has left them hopeless, a world where the Mexican and Chilean dictatorship wars are a constant underlying backdrop…’ Discover the unusual writing techniques of Roberto Bolaño in this essay from ANUSHREE NANDE.