The Decameron Project: 29 New Stories from the Pandemic by New York Times Magazine

$35.00 AUD

Category: Short Stories

A stunning collection of new short stories originally commissioned by The New York Times Magazine as the COVID-19 pandemic swept the world, from twenty-nine authors including Margaret Atwood, Tommy Orange, Colm Toibin, Kamilia Shamsie, David Mitchell and more, in a project inspired by Boccaccio's The De cameron. When reality is surreal, only fiction can make sense of it. In 1353, Giovanni Boccaccio wrote "The Decameron": one hundred nested tales told by a group of young men and women passing the time at a villa outside Florence while waiting out the gruesome Black Death, a plague that killed more than 25 million people. Some of the stories are silly, some are bawdy, some are like fables. In March of 2020, the editors of The New York Times Magazine created The Decameron Project, an anthology with a simple, time-spanning goal: to gather a collection of stories written as our current pandemic first swept the globe. How might new fiction from some of the finest writers working today help us memorialize and understand the unimaginable? And what could be learned about how this crisis will affect the art of fiction? These twenty-nine new stories, from authors including Margaret Atwood, Tommy Orange, Edwidge Danticat, and David Mitchell vary widely in texture and tone. Their work will be remembered as a historical tribute to a time and place unlike any other in our lifetimes, and offer perspective and solace to the reader now and in a future where coronavirus is, hopefully, just a memory.   ...Show more

Raised in Captivity - Fictional Nonfiction by Chuck Klosterman

$29.99 AUD

Category: Short Stories

Fair warning: Raised in Captivity does not slot into a smooth pre-existing groove. But it does bid fair to be one of the most original and exciting story collections in recent memory, funny, wise and weird in equal measure, a fever graph of our deepest unvoiced hopes, fears and preoccupations.

The Best of Me: Ultimate Short Story Collection by David Sedaris

$32.99 AUD

Category: Short Stories

A lavish gift edition of David Sedaris's best stories, spanning his spectacular bestselling career. Hand-picked by David himself, these are stories that will make you laugh and cry, sometimes at the same time, from "the funniest man alive" (Time Out New York). What could be a more tempting Christmas gif t than a compendium of David Sedaris's best stories, selected by the author himself? From a spectacular career spanning almost three decades, these stories have become modern classics and are now for the first time collected in one volume. For more than 25 years, David Sedaris has been carving out a unique literary space, virtually creating his own genre. A Sedaris story may seem confessional, but is a so highly attuned to the world outside. It opens our eyes to what is at absurd and moving about our daily existence, and it is almost impossible to read without laughing. Now, for the first time collected in one volume, the author brings us his funniest and most memorable work. In these stories, Sedaris shops for rare taxidermy, hitchhikes with a lady quadriplegic, and spits a lozenge into a fellow traveler's lap. He drowns a mouse in a bucket, struggles to say 'give it to me' in five languages and hand-feeds a carnivorous bird. But if all you expect to find in Sedaris's work is the deft and sharply observed comedy for which he became renowned, you may be surprised to discover that his words bring more warmth than mockery, more fellow-feeling than derision. Nowhere is this clearer than in his writing about his loved ones. ...Show more

Rural Dreams - Short Stories by Margaret Hickey

$24.99 AUD

Category: Short Stories

Funny, heartbreaking and true; the characters in Rural Dreams are the people we know and grew up with. Some of them might even be us. A girl finds strength in poetry, a football coach ponders obsession, a woman grapples with the fall out of an affair and a mother can’t and won’t stop swearing. In ‘Binky ’, the character asks, ‘who gets the farm?’ and in ‘Rescue’, a backpacker is pulled out of a crocodile swamp. Written through the lens of landscape, Rural Dreams highlights the richness of life on the land and showcases the beauty of lives lived outside city walls. ‘Rural Australia is a dangerously neglected part of our national consciousness — Margaret Hickey populates it with stories that are lively, entertaining and authentic.’ — Martin Flanagan ...Show more

Daddy by Emma Cline

$27.99 AUD

Category: Short Stories

The eagerly-awaited new book by Emma Cline, author of the global phenomenon The Girls The stories in Emma Cline's stunning first collection consider the dark corners of human experience, exploring the fault lines of power between men and women, parents and children, past and present. A man travels to h is son's school to deal with the fallout of a violent attack and to make sure his son will not lose his college place. But what exactly has his son done? And who is to blame? A young woman trying to make it in LA, working in a clothes shop while taking acting classes, turns to a riskier way of making money but will be forced to confront the danger of the game she's playing. And a family coming together for Christmas struggle to skate over the lingering darkness caused by the very ordinary brutality of a troubled husband and father. These outstanding stories examine masculinity, male power and broken relationships, while revealing - with astonishing insight and clarity - those moments of misunderstanding that can have life-changing consequences. And there is an unexpected violence, ever-present but unseen, in the depiction of the complicated interactions between men and women, and families. Subtle, sophisticated and displaying an extraordinary understanding of human behaviour, these stories are unforgettable. ...Show more

Maar Bidi: Next Generation Black Writing by Elfie Shiosaki (Editor); Linda Martin (Editor)

$24.99 AUD

Category: Short Stories

In this beautifully crafted, evocative and poignant anthology of prose and fiction, a diverse group of young black writers are encouraged to find strength in their voices and what is important to them. maar bidi is a journey into what it is to be young, a person of colour and a minority in divergent and conflicting worlds. All talk to what is meaningful to them, whilst connecting the old and the new, the ancient and the contemporary in a variety of ways. These young essayists, critics, novelists, poets, authors shake down words and works to find styles, forms and meanings that have influenced them and all their writings. These pieces are snapshots of peoples, places and perception. 'Each writer is telling an individual story but if you map them they are telling a story of young black Australia – and that makes it profound – because unlike other writers, Indigenous writers speak of country and kin. What does it mean for us when young Indigenous people find their voice in writing?' — Elfie Shiosaki, Editor ...Show more

Blue in Chicago - And Other Stories by Bette Howland

$34.99 AUD

Category: Short Stories

'The work of a woman who has invested her life in her art, and who will, I think be remembered as one of the significant writers of her generation.' Saul Bellow Blue in Chicago collects together the sharp, bittersweet stories of Bette Howland and restores to our bookshelves an extraordinarily gifted wr iter, who was recognized as a major talent before all but disappearing from public view for decades, until nearly the end of her life. Bette Howland was an outsider: an intellectual from a working-class neighborhood in Chicago; a divorcée and single mother, to the disapproval of her family; an artist chipped away at by poverty and perfection. Each of these sides of her life plays a shaping role in her work. Mining her most precarious struggles for her art in each of these stories, she chronicles the fears and hopes of her generation. Blue in Chicago, and other stories introduces readers to a wry, brilliant observer and a writer of great empathy and sly, joyous humor. Published in the US under the title Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage. 'If there's a Howland bandwagon (and there should be), hold me a seat, or I'll stand. No problem, I'll stand.' Paris Review ...Show more

Kitchen Sink Drama (Short Stories) by Paul Connolly

$24.99 AUD

Category: Short Stories

As seen in Good Weekend: one hundred of Paul Connolly's beloved one-hundred-word vignettes along with Jim Pavlidis's whimsical illustrations. From tempestuous family roasts to the first blooms of young love, from relationship missteps to moments of familial joy, Kitchen Sink Dramareflects domestic life in all its messy, delightful and humorous glory. With characters depicted in nuanced fullness, these poignant, pithy stories capture the truth at the heart of so many of our experiences--each one a glimpse of a whole world. Kitchen Sink Dramais a collection of some of the finest writing on the human condition. Paul Connollyis a journalist, writer and university tutor. His work has appeared in the Monthly, the Guardian, the Age, the Sydney Morning Herald, the Sun-Herald, and Qantasmagazine among many other publications. His books include The World's Weirdest Sportsand The Mighty Bras, and he edited the anthology Father Figures. Paul lives in Melbourne with his family. Jim Pavlidisis a painter and illustrator. His work is held in several public collections including the Australian National Gallery, State Libraries of Victoria and New South Wales, Geelong Gallery, Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery, and Victoria and Albert Museum, London. In 2015 his portrait of Ross Hannaford won the Rick Amor Print Prize and he won Melbourne Press Club Quill awards for best artwork in 2015 and best cartoon in 2019. Jim has been an artist with the Agefor thirty years. 'I hate those Kitchen Sink Dramas. They're so clever and funny and succinct, it kills me that I can't come up with anything that good.' Danny Katz 'Kitchen Sink Dramais my ideal book. With a wonderful economy of language it perfectly captures our funny ways. The stories are so droll and the lovely pictures so wise.' Jane Turner 'Somehow, Paul Connolly manages to convey in 100 magic words what takes the rest of us thousands.' Benjamin Law     ...Show more

The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree by Shokoofeh Azar

$24.95 AUD

Category: Short Stories

SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2020 INTERNATIONAL BOOKER PRIZE From the pen of one of Iran's rising literary stars,The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree is a family story about the unbreakable connection between the living and the dead. Set in Iran in the decade following the 1979 Islamic Revolution, this movi ng, richly imagined novel is narrated by the ghost of Bahar, a thirteen-year-old girl, whose family is compelled to flee their home in Tehran for a new life in a small village, hoping in this way to preserve both their intellectual freedom and their lives. But they soon find themselves caught up in the post-revolutionary chaos that sweeps across their ancient land. Bahar's mother, after a tragic loss, will embark on along, eventful journey in search of meaning in a world swept up in the post-revolutionary madness. Told from the wise yet innocent gaze of a young girl,The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree speaks of the power of imagination when confronted with cruelty, and of our human need to make sense of trauma through the ritual of storytelling itself. Through her unforgettable characters, Azar weaves a timely and timeless story that juxtaposes the beauty of an ancient, vibrant culture with the brutality of an oppressive political regime. ...Show more

Being Various - New Irish Short Stories by CALDWELL L (ED)

$19.99 AUD

Category: Short Stories

Following her own brilliant short story collection Multitudes, Lucy Caldwell guest edits the sixth volume of Faber's long running series of new Irish short stories, continuing the great work started by the late David Marcus and subsequent guest editors Kevin Barry, Deirdre Madden and Joseph O'Connor. Co ntributors to this richly diverse collection include: Kevin Barry, Eimear McBride, Lisa McInerney, Stuart Neville, Sally Rooney, Kit de Waal and Belinda McKeon 'BEING VARIOUS has a brilliant array of writers making waves in the twenty-first century, from lauded names to newcomers ranging from their twenties to their sixties; Irish by birth, by parentage, or residence.' Lucy Caldwell ...Show more

Fifty-Two Stories by Anton Chekhov

$49.99 AUD

Category: Short Stories

Chekhov's genius left an indelible impact on every literary form in which he wrote, but none more so than short fiction. Now renowned translators Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky give us their superb renderings of fifty-two Chekhov stories. These stories, which span the full arc of his career, rev eal the extraordinary variety of his work, from the farcically comic to the darkly complex. Including several never-before-translated stories, this is a collection that promises to delight. ...Show more

Life, Bound by Marian Matta

$27.99 AUD

Category: Short Stories