February 2020 favorites

February 2020

The February stories ordered solely on my personal tastes.

  1. ‘Lunch At The Loyola Arms’ by Stuart Dybek
  2. ‘The Most Girl Part Of You’ by Amy Hempel
  3. ‘The Proxy Marriage’ by Maile Meloy
  4. ‘Snow’ by Ann Beattie
  5. ‘The Metal Bowl’ by Miranda July
  6. ‘A Talking Cure’ by Justin Taylor
  7. ‘Turgor’ by Mary Gaitskill
  8. ‘The Sock’ by Lydia Davis
  9. ‘The Tree Of Knowledge’ by Henry James
  10. ‘Life After High School’ by Joyce Carol Oates
  11. ‘My Sister’s Marriage’ by Cynthia Marshall Rich
  12. ‘Reading Lessons’ by Edwidge Danticat
  13. ‘Northeast Regional’ by Emma Cline
  14. ‘Show Don’t Tell’ by Curtis Sittenfeld
  15. ‘The Hanging Of The Schoolmarm’ by Robert Coover

As always, join the conversation in the comments section below, on SSMT Facebook or on Twitter @ShortStoryMT.

Subscribe to the Short Story Magic Tricks Monthly Newsletter to get the latest short story news, contests and fun.

June 2019 favorites

June 2019

The June stories ordered solely on my personal tastes.

  1. ‘The Surrogate’ by Tessa Hadley
  2. ‘The Card Trick’ by Tessa Hadley
  3. ‘Silk Brocade’ by Tessa Hadley
  4. ‘A Bundle Of Letters’ by Henry James
  5. ‘Cecilia Awakened’ by Tessa Hadley
  6. ‘The Sound Of Summer Running’ by Ray Bradbury
  7. ‘The Long QT’ by Hilary Mantel
  8. ‘Paste’ by Henry James
  9. ‘Clever Girl’ by Tessa Hadley
  10. ‘Agatha’ by John O’Hara
  11. ‘Greville Fane’ by Henry James
  12. ‘One Saturday Morning’ by Tessa Hadley
  13. ‘Second-Hand Man’ by Rita Dove
  14. ‘The Special Type’ by Henry James
  15. ‘Miss Gunton From Poughkeepsie’ by Henry James
  16. ‘Principal Alpaca’ by Richard Leise
  17. ‘Reading The Paper’ by Ron Carlson
  18. ‘Invasion Of The Martians’ by Robert Coover

As always, join the conversation in the comments section below, on SSMT Facebook or on Twitter @ShortStoryMT.

Subscribe to the Short Story Magic Tricks Monthly Newsletter to get the latest short story news, contests and fun.

November 2014 favorites

November 2014

The November stories ordered solely on my personal tastes.

  1. ‘Chickamauga’ by Ambrose Bierce
  2. ‘Paul’s Case’ by Willa Cather
  3. ‘The Veldt’ by Ray Bradbury
  4. ‘The Story Of An Hour’ by Kate Chopin
  5. ‘Of This Time, Of That Place’ by Lionel Trilling
  6. ‘The Nose’ by Nikolai Gogol
  7. ‘A White Heron’ by Sarah Orne Jewett
  8. ‘A Circle In The Fire’ by Flannery O’Connor
  9. ‘Going For A Beer’ by Robert Coover
  10. ‘Two Thanksgiving Gentlemen’ by O. Henry
  11. ‘Dawn Of Remembered Spring’ by Jesse Stuart
  12. ‘The Middle Years’ by Henry James
  13. ‘The Catbird Seat’ by James Thurber
  14. ‘The Wonderful Tar-Baby Story’ by Joel Chandler Harris
  15. ‘The Peach Stone’ by Paul Horgan
  16. ‘Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius’ by Jorge Luis Borges
  17. ‘An Old Fashioned Thanksgiving’ by Louisa May Alcott
  18. ‘Who Lived And Died Believing’ by Nancy Hale
  19. ‘The Devil And Tom Walker’ by Washington Irving
  20. ‘The Facts Concerning The Recent Carnival Of Crime In Connecticut’ by Mark Twain

July 2014 favorites

July 2014

The July stories ordered solely on my personal tastes.

1.       ‘Hot Ice’ by Stuart Dybek
2.       ‘The Babysitter’ by Robert Coover
3.       ‘Jeeves And The Impending Doom’ by P.G. Wodehouse
4.       ‘A Solo Song: For Doc’ by James Alan McPherson
5.       ‘City Boy’ by Leonard Michaels
6.       ‘You’re Ugly, Too’ by Lorrie Moore
7.       ‘The Flats Road’ by Alice Munro
8.       ‘Greasy Lake’ by T. Coraghessan Boyle
9.       ‘Train’ by Joy Williams
10.     ‘Testimony Of Pilot’ by Barry Hannah
11.     ‘The Joy Luck Club’ by Amy Tan
12.    ‘Liars In Love’ by Richard Yates
13.     ‘How To Date A Brown Girl (Black Girl, White Girl, Or Halfie)’ by Junot Diaz
14.    ‘A Poetics For Bullies’ by Stanley Elkin
15.     ‘Greenwich Time’ by Ann Beattie
16.     ‘Pretty Ice’ by Mary Robison
17.     ‘Lechery’ by Jayne Anne Phillips
18.     ‘Here Come The Maples’ by John Updike
19.     ‘Territory’ by David Leavitt
20.     ‘Bridging’ by Max Apple
21.     ‘The Circling Hand’ by Jamaica Kincaid
22.     ‘Are These Actual Miles?’ by Raymond Carver
23.     ‘The Other Wife’ by Colette
24.     ‘A.V. Laider’ by Max Beerbohm
25.     ‘White Rat’ by Gayl Jones
26.     ‘Search Through The Streets Of The City’ by Irwin Shaw
27.     ‘The Dead Man’ by Horacio Quiroga
28.     ‘A Life In The Day Of A Writer’ by Tess Slesinger
29.     ‘In The Heart Of The Heart Of The Country’ by William Gass
30.     ‘The Indian Uprising’ by Donald Barthelme
31.     ‘The Facts Of Life’ by Somerset Maugham