I’ve always enjoyed reading short stories, although I must confess that ever since I’ve started writing them seriously I tend to read them with a more critical eye. I say critical, but it’s really more a case of mentally dividing them up into categories such as the all-too rare “meh, could do that”, the convenient “couldn’t do that but wouldn’t want to” and the intensely annoying “couldn’t do that and really hate the writer because they can.” And of course it’s the latter category that’s the one that makes for the most satisfying reader experience as well as being the most instructive for a writer.
I could very easily just pick a selection of titles published by Salt here, but I guess that wouldn’t be entirely right, seeing as they’re going to be my publishers very soon. However, I will start with a couple of their titles, the first one of which is “The Best British Short Stories 2011”, edited by Nicholas Royle. This has a wonderfully varied selection, most of which are very good indeed. In fact, the very first story, David Rose’s “Flora”, a delicate study of obsession, is probably the best single thing I’ve read this year, and I was so impressed that I’ve just ordered a copy of his recent novel “Vault” on the strength of it (and I’m also seriously looking forward to his own collection coming out next year). Other stand-outs for me were Hilary Mantel’s splendidly dark “Winter Break” and Kirsty Logan’s weirdly poignant “The Rental Heart.”
Next up is David Gaffney’s “The Half-Life of Songs”. I’ve been a fan of his ever since I read “Sawn-off Tales” and I think this is his best yet. His stories are exquisite vignettes of everyday life in that grey area where it steps just slightly over the boundary, such as “Gelling” where a corporate bonding session is about to be disrupted by unspecified unpleasantness and “Not Static”, where the main character has to come to terms with his arm slowly detaching itself, in the face of indifference from all around him.
“Slowly Downward” is a collection by Stanley Donwood, who’s better known for providing the cover art for Radiohead’s albums. It’s a very odd read, because the stories individually seem quite inconsequential, but after you’ve read a few (and they’re all very short) something clicks and you suddenly realise you’ve entered a whole different world. From then on, the whole collection is a delight.
Lastly, but by no means least, I’d like to mention “Strange Men in Pinstripe Suits” by Cate Gardner. This is a collection that’s impossible to categorise from a writer with a unique voice who’s staking a claim to a substantial part of the space vacated by the Brothers Grimm a while back. Someone desperately needs to get this book in front of Tim Burton – or even better, Studio Ghibli.
And I know I said I wasn’t going to mention any more Salt collections, but I really can’t move on without a quick nod to Vanessa Gebbie’s “Storm Warning”, her powerful follow-up to “Words from a Glass Bubble”, and Tom Vowler’s “The Method”, the last story of which, “The Little Man”, will linger in your head for a long time afterwards. |
