All the Stories of Muriel Spark

In late December, I noticed on the old librarian's desk that we use for displays several complete-short-stories-of-an-author-in-one-volume books. Several tempted me, but I chose All the Stories of Muriel Spark, having had a personal Muriel Spark reading phase between 2004 and 2005. I had then intended to read much more of her work, but other books and authors were also calling to me. I read Spark's autobiography Curriculum Vitae in 2005 and the wickedly funny The Abbess of Crewe in 2008, but I had not really gotten back on track to reading the whole oeuvre. Reading all of the short stories was an important step toward my goal, so I borrowed the volume.

It took me nearly a month to finish, having other reading commitments as well as other reading opportunities. Spacing the reading of the 41 stories has let Spark's writing style and wit sink in deeper than if I had whipped quickly through them. It also seemed more polite to take time. It took the author most of her writing career to write the collection. I could surely give her a month of my attention.

The month was time well spent. All the Stories of Muriel Spark is an entertaining collection with great variety. I especially like the stories set in Africa drawn from Spark's experience in Southern Rhodesia in the late 1930s and early 1940s. These include the story that she wrote to get prize money "The Seraph and the Zambesi," which launched her career in fiction, and my favorite "The Go-Away Bird." The latter, the longest story in the book at 52 pages, tells the tragic story of Daphne du Toit, an orphaned daughter of Afrikaner and British parents, who fails to escape a fate that the reader foresees. One of Spark's great talents was to tell readers how a story will end in her opening sentences and charm into reading every word.

All the Stories of Muriel Spark is a great companion to Curriculum Vitae, the autobiography mentioned above, as she wrote stories that reflect every stage of her life. The fun is then in trying to decide how much of her fiction was about her long and unconventional life. Ask for a renewal if the book is due before you finish.

Spark, Muriel. All the Stories of Muriel Spark. New Directions, 2001. 398p. ISBN 081121494X.

One More Thing: Stories and More Stories by B. J. Novak

B. J. Novak is a contemporary comedian who has been seen on television and in the movies. With his recent book One More Thing: Stories and More Stories, he shows us that comedians are storytellers. They spin stories to make listeners laugh. Novak likes to make us laugh, but in tradition of George Carlin and Dick Gregory, he challenges us to consider subjects that make us uncomfortable.

Novak is bound to offend some readers. I winced several times as I listened to the audiobook as Novak and a cast of actors and actresses read his mostly comic stories. I started to write that he is of the Say Anything School, but I do not believe that is true. Novak sounds spontaneous, but his words are very well chosen.

A part of me thinks Novak's vulgarity is unnecessary in some stories, but another part believes that he depicts a segment of contemporary society as it is. With offensive words, he creates an atmosphere in which his stories seem to have more authority than if he used sanitized language. At least, I imagine it is that way for some readers.

Uncertain whether you want to read One More Thing? Try the first story "The Rematch" which is about the hare wanting the tortoise to give him another chance to race. It is a clever piece that points out that stories never really end, that there is always something next. Novak shows a bit of what he will dish out in heavier doses in later stories.

Novak, B. J. One More Thing: Stories and More Stories. Knopf, 2014. 276p. ISBN 9780385351836.

Kid Brady Stories and A Man of Means by P. G. Wodehouse

At the same time that a new author is taking up P. G. Wodehouse's characters (see Jeeves and the Wedding Bells), early Wodehouse works are being republished. In 2013, the Overlook Press put together Kid Brady Stories and A Man of Means, joining into one volume stories about two unlikely men, a street boy who becomes a champion boxer and a lowly bank clerk who becomes a multi-millionaire. These stories were all published in periodicals and later collected in books in 1907 and 1914. Together in a new volume, they humorously show us an Englishman's take on American initiative and social mobility.

The boy who becomes internationally known as boxer Kid Brady got his start as a errand boy at a gymnasium. When the proprietor asked what he could do, he answered "Anything," the properly optimistic American verbally-delivered resume. He made good on his promise in stories that must have drawn inspiration from dime-store novels of the time. Thankfully, Wodehouse supplied better than dime-store dialogue and description in his quickly-read stories.

Roland Bleke was a shy young man who seemed to get himself into situations by not being assertive. Readers first learn of him asking his employer to reduce his pay. If his slight savings declined, he hoped to discourage the young woman who had designs on marrying him. How he became wealthy without intention is quite comic. In the last story "The Hired Past," he hired a man-servant to help him escape another romantic entanglement, foreshadowing the later Bertie Wooster and Jeeves stories.

Wodehouse reflected the society of his time in racial and gender attitudes. Still, Kid Brady Stories and A Man of Means is good fun for Wodehouse fans and anyone interested the comic writings of early 20th century America.

Wodehouse, P. G. Kid Brady Stories and A Man of Means. Overlook Press, 2013. 206p. ISBN 9781468308334.

Something Out There: Stories by Nadine Gordimer

The late author Nadine Gordimer was thorn in the side of the apartheid government of South Africa for decades. It banned three of her novels about the daily lives of people on both sides of the color bar from publication. Known and respected internationally, however, she was difficult to silence. The world read Gordimer, and she was award a Nobel Prize for Literature.

During the apartheid years, Gordimer produced a constant stream of short stories. Among the best was "Something Out There," a 1980s tale of a Johannesburg suburb living with the knowledge that a wild animal is stalking its pets and raiding its gardens at night. Is it a big cat or some sort of ape? A boy takes a picture of something in a tree that may be the long-toothed creature. everyone is nervous, including a cell of rebels planning an operation against the government. At 86 pages, the tension-filled "Something Out There" could almost be called a novella and may take a couple of sittings to read.

In contrast, most of the other stories in her collection Something Out There: Stories are short and quickly read. Not all are set in South Africa, but most are. Collectively, they paint a stark picture of the cities, townships, and outback of the country that was boycotted by so many individuals and other countries during the 1970s and 1980s. The stories give readers born in the 1980s and later a look at the world before the fall of the Berlin Wall, breakup of the Soviet Union, and release from prison of Nelson Mandela.

Gordimer, Nadine. Something Out There: Stories. Viking, 1984. 203p. ISBN 0670656607.

Bark: Stories

"A maternal vertigo beset her, the room circled, and the cutting scars on her son's arms sometimes seemed to spell out Pete's name in the thin lines there, the loss of fathers etched primitively in the algebra of skin."

Author Lorrie Moore is noted for her eloquent writing. In the sentence above from the third page of the short story "Referential," she sums up what she has described in the first two pages of the story. A widow's son has become self-destructive and been institutionalized. In her mourning for all that is lost, she had denied herself what she still has.

Leaving the facility, the mother and her fading boyfriend are caught in a surprising springtime snowstorms. The wipers struggle to clear the glass. How can they see a way ahead.

In her recent collection Bark: Stories, Moore portrays many people finding reasons to be unhappy. Some of them are good reasons, most of which seem to radiate from making bad relationship choices. What these characters seem to lack are abilities to extract themselves. It is almost painful to read, but Moore draws us in, tapping out interest that precedes our willingness to help. But these are only characters in a book, so we can only observe. Maybe we can help those who are really around us.

Moore, Lorrie. Bark: Stories. Alfred A. Knopf, 2014. 192p. ISBN 9780307594136.

The Night Bookmobile by Audrey Niffenegger

I must return the The Night Bookmobile by Audrey Niffenegger today - right away. I checked it out a week ago but just now read it. If I had known how magical and moving it is, I would have read it right away so I could get it back on the graphics novel display quickly. I want others to have a chance to read it.

The act of reading and discovering your books is what The Night Bookmobile is all about. Its central character is Alexandra, a young woman whose difficult relationship with a young man sometimes compels her to walk the streets of Chicago after midnight. On one such evening she discovers a bookmobile in a Winnebago. The wise librarian invites her in, and she stays until dawn longingly scanning a collection that she has already read.

Though I want to get The Night Bookmobile back onto the graphic "novel" display, it is really a short story. Niffenegger first published it in 2004 in the journal Zoetrope All Story, she illustrated it for The Guardian in 2008 and Abrams Comicarts put into book form in 2010. While it creates a dream-like mood and is a bit sad, its existence is a happy fact for my library, which is promoting graphic novels in its adult summer reading program and short stories as this year's feature genre on its reading blog Thommy Ford Reads.

People who enjoy this book by Niffegegger, might also enjoy books by Neil Gaiman. He wrote the promotional paragraph on the back cover for The Night Bookmobile.

Niffenegger, Audrey. The Night Bookmobile. Abrams, 2010. ISBN 9780810996175.

My Father's Tears and Other Stories by John Updike

Looking back is a common theme in many of the stories in John Updike's final collection My Father's Tears and Other Stories, published several months after his death in 2009. A story that stands out to me is "The Walk with Elizanne" in which the Olinger High School class of 1950 holds its 50th reunion in a restaurant in West Alton, Pennsylvania. Before joining his class, David Kern and his second wife Andrea visit his classmate and cancer patient Mamie Kauffman, who has been in the hospital for six weeks. Mamie was a key organizer of their periodic reunions and secures a promise from David to deliver several messages that evening.

As in several of Updike's stories in My Father's Tears, readers discover in "The Walk with Elizanne" a main character who has spent most of his adult life many states away from his childhood home, gaining a perspective those who stayed put do not have. Most importantly, because he has been elsewhere, his memories of the school days are more detailed, not compromised by later events in the town. Still, his memory is imperfect. Several conversations reveal romantic opportunities that he never noticed. He, of course, then wonders what could have been and whether he took the better path. The plot is somewhat conventional. What is extraordinary is the Updike's layered storytelling.

Updike's sad reunion story, which was first published in the New Yorker, will resonate with older readers who have themselves attended reunions and have dreamed alternate narratives. Younger readers may infer the message that it is usually better to move away.

I never thought I was an Updike fan, having not cared for his novels. But having read some essays and poems from his final years, I am having a change of heart.

Updike, John. My Father's Tears and Other Stories. Alfred A. Knopf, 2009. 292p. ISBN 9780307271563.

Stick Out Your Tongue by Ma Jian

Upon finishing the fifth of five stories in Stick Out Your Tongue by Chinese dissident Ma Jian, I was not sure that I would write a review. The book felt important, but I did not know what to say. The stories are so strange and disturbing, and I was afraid I'd write something foolish. Maybe I still will. Then I read the Afterward by Ma Jian telling about the writing and banning of these stories in China. It took overnight, but I think I understand.

Ma Jian took a trip to Tibet in 1985 that shocked him. He had expected to find gentle people and enlightenment but instead found gray poverty and ignorance. The country had been under the control of Chinese Communists for over thirty years, and much that was beautiful had been suppressed or chased away. He wrote these stories that were accepted by Chinese literary magazines and then was luckily out of the country when they were published. They were only translated into English in 2006.

All of the stories have settings that feel ancient and timeless into which modernity invades. In "The Woman and the Blue Sky," the narrator mentions that he arrived in the province by army truck, but then he becomes a wanderer, walking through valley and villages, looking to witness a Tibetan sky funeral. In "The Smile of Lake Drolmula," a son back from two years of school in Beijing wanders hopelessly trying to find his nomadic family. In the fifth story, "The Initiation," the Buddhist monks must be those who remain in Tibet after the Chinese takeover, practicing a corrupt religion.

After both the first and second stories, and even in points mid-story, I considered closing Stick Out Your Tongue, but I persisted. I had heard praise for the stories, which were fascinatingly filled with strange cultural details, and saw that the time investment was short. I am glad I did get to the end, as the pieces make more sense together. I am left with a justifiable sense of horror. It is no wonder they are banned in China.

Ma Jian. Stick Out Your Tongue. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006. 93p. ISBN 0374269882.

Tenth of December by George Saunders

Earlier this year, listening to episodes of the New York Times Book Review Podcast, I kept hearing that short stories were back in vogue. New collections, such as Astray by Emma Donoghue, were getting excellent reviews, and Tenth of December by George Saunders was at the top of the fiction hardcover bestseller list. It was good news for short story readers.

Analysts speculate that digital reading is supporting a short story renaissance. Novellas are doing well, too, as some digital readers buy short forms for their readers. Of course, short stories never actually went away. I find they have more inventive plots, quirky ideas, and quick, intense characterizations. I always seem to read 5 or 6 collections a year, as well as my usual fare of nonfiction.

So, I was primed for Tenth of December when my request was filled. Knowing others are still waiting, I moved it to the head of the list and enjoyed several days with stories that reminds me of works by Ray Bradbury, Margaret Atwood, and Kazuo Ishiguro.

If there is a running theme in Tenth of December, it is the issue of control and lack of control. "Victory Lap" and "Sticks" have parents whose rule of the household is obsessive. Mood and behavior altering drugs are involved in controlling convicts and employees in "Escape from Spiderhead" and "My Chivalric Fiasco." In "Home" the central character and his parents seem to lack self-control.

I think the strangest of the lot is"The Semplica Girl Diaries." It would be a great choice for a short story discussion group. I'd love to hear whether readers believe it a fair criticism of our consumer culture living without regard to ethics. Maybe that is not what it is about it. I don't want to spoil the mystery of the story by saying too much.

I would also like to learn what readers think of the title story, the last piece in the collection. It seems totally different from the rest of the book, more of a straight drama and less about ideas. Still, it is a compelling piece of a collection that as a whole is a good omen for future reading. We should never worry about the habit of reading when there are books like Tenth of December.

Saunders, George. Tenth of December: Stories. Random House, 2013. 251p. ISBN 9780812993806.

Aerogrammes and Other Stories by Tania James

The popularity of short stories is growing, according to commentators on the New York Times Book Review podcasts. They cite recent titles, such as Tenth of December by George Saunders, which have become best sellers in a market that is usually dominated by novels. Long a short story fan myself, it is a trend I welcome. The latest collection that I have enjoyed is Aerogrammes and Other Stories by Tania James. 

If her stories may be used as evidence, James has wide-ranging interests. Her stories include wrestling, scriptology, Indian classical dance, chimpanzees, and ghosts. Most involve immigrants from India or their children living in the United States or Great Britain, and all have uncommon problems. How can serious wrestlers win respect in a country where wrestling is scripted farce? How can a young girl cope with a grandfather who thinks she is his deceased wife returned to her youth? How can a down-on-her-luck widow adjust to a new marriage to a wealthy Louisville ghost?

Aerogrammes and Other Stories is not a book full of happy endings. Most of the stories conclude with characters facing truths they have previously ignored or denied. Readers may think James a bit hard on her creations, but if readers care so much, the author has succeeded in making her stories believable. Let readers look beyond the endings and imagine what the characters can now do with their new-found knowledge. 

James, Tania. Aerogrammes and Other Stories. Knopf, 2012. 180p. ISBN 9780307268914.

Astray by Emma Donoghue

I do not read much fiction, but I listened to an intriguing interview with Emma Donoghue on an NPR Books podcast recently. She spoke about her latest book, a collection of short stories titled Astray. I was charmed by the idea that Donoghue combs through archived documents, historical incidents, and even statistics to find subjects for her stories. Finding the recent book at my library, I brought it home and was rewarded with several mornings and evenings of good reading.

Being mostly a biographical and historical reader (though I also like science), I found Donoghue's short stories appealing. They dramatize times about which I have read, focusing on rare events, giving me new insights into the movements of people across oceans and continents. For example, I had not thought much about the range of emotions within families split by the Atlantic, when a husband preceded the family in immigrating to Canada. Loneliness was a given, but other factors, such as envy, insult, despair, and surrender, shaped the handwritten letters that passed slowly back and forth across the ocean. Having now read "Counting the Days," I now also wonder how many wives and children were not met at the wharves in the New World and what became of them.

Donoghue's reading must be wide ranging. Her stories in Astray go back to Cape Cod in1639 and up to Newmarket, Ontario in 1967. Locations include the goldfields in Alaska, Louisiana slave plantations, and row houses in London. After each she reveals the documents and books that gave her characters and settings. In the back of the collection, she includes an essay that further explains her interests and methods.

Looking at her bio, I see Donoghue's books are wide-ranging, too. I suspect they will be popular in libraries for many years.

Donoghue, Emma. Astray. Little Brown and Company, 2012. 274p. ISBN 9780316206297.

Mama Leone by Miljenko Jergovic

Displacement of people by conflict is a thread running through Mama Leone, a collection of stories written in the 1990s by Miljenko Jergovic, newly translated from Croatian by David Williams. The conflicts vary but they almost always result in what characters hope to be a temporary change of address. Some of them move to other cities in the states of the former Yugoslavia as they break apart. Others even flee to Spain, Israel, Canada, and the United States.

In the case of twenty-one related stories grouped under the title "When I Was Born a Dog Started Barking in the Hall of the Maternity Ward," a family separates and neither the mother or father feels capable of raising their son. He spends most of his time with his maternal grandparents in Sarajevo with annual trips to summer homes. He is also sent to live with uncles and aunts on some occasions. When his mother joins whatever household he is in, she seems as much a child as he does. He is a precocious child who claims to remember everything, including his birth, a great gift for a narrating character. Like the grandmother, most readers will find him a source of troubling amusement.

The remaining unrelated stories are grouped under the title "That Day a Childhood Story Ended."  In most of these short pieces, characters are uprooted by the Balkan Wars. As rival forces attack new cities, family move in with relatives in other regions and draft age men hide or immigrate. Survival in new places often requires taking unfair advantage of others. Some even pledge love for the sake of refuge and a stake in a new place.

I enjoyed how Jerovic told these unfamiliar (to me) stories, balancing hope with despair, sympathy with revulsion, while giving me a peak into a culture different from my own. Mama Leone belongs in libraries with a demand for foreign or literary fiction.

Jergovic, Miljenko. Mama Leone. Archipelago Books, 1999, 2012. 351p. ISBN 9781935744320.

What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank by Nathan Englander

It has been four years since I listened to Nathan Englander's excellent collection of short stories For the Relief of Unbearable Urges. Having greatly enjoyed that book, I was eager to get his new collection What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank. As you might guess from the title, Englander focuses once more on the Jewish experience.

In the title story, an American couple awkwardly entertains another couple who emigrated to Israel several decades earlier. The wives are old friends, but the husbands clash, verbally sparring about issues of politics, orthodoxy, and kosher laws. The Americans are surprised to find that the seemingly zealous Israelis like to smoke pot, and the American wife steals some from her teenage son. Under the influence of the pot, the four begin to question each other about what sabbath laws they would break in emergency situations to save the lives of friends and family. The revelations are uncomfortable for all. 

"Sister Hills" is the most historical of the stories. In it, two zealous families claim farms on adjacent hills in disputed territory intent on forming new settlements. While the region becomes a metropolis, one family thrives, but the other is reduced through war and misfortune to only the matriarch. In a desperate attempt to find solace, she demands the payment of a terrible debt, bringing heartache to all. Her struggle to get her way involves the invoking of Jewish laws.

There are six more stories, each read by a different reader on the unabridged audiobook. With each, Englander creates a different world, showing great range of setting, pacing, and mood. All revolve around the ways Jewish laws are interpreted and applied. Serious book discussion groups should consider this worthy collection.

Englander, Nathan. What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank. Knopf, 2012. 207p. ISBN 9780307958709.

6 compact discs. Books on Tape, 2012. ISBN 9780307989314.

420 Characters: Stories by Lou Beach

"420 characters are a lot for even the most epic of novels," I thought, "and this book is rather thin." But I discovered the characters were letters, numbers, symbols, punctuation, and spaces, and 420 Characters: Stories by Lou Beach is a collection of very short short stories. They debuted on Beach's Facebook page, which at the time of their writing limited posts to 420 characters.

What can you do with so little? Beach as a professional illustrator working for magazines was already adept at conveying a message quickly. His job was to catch the eye and support the message of each article. In a similar vein, his little stories are really pictures made from a handful of words. They are truly stories, too, as each has characters and plot. Some even have settings. A few could be used as luring opening paragraphs for standard-length stories or novels.

You have to be in the right mood to read Beach's pieces. Some days I opened the book and was greatly entertained, but on other days I did not comprehend them at all. They are sort of like poetry. Being relaxed helps. Don't read more than a few at once. Some of Beach's mysterious illustrations are inserted between the stories.

You can find some of the stories read aloud by Jeff Bridges, Ian McShane, and Dave Alvin at 420characters.com.

Beach, Lou. 420 Characters: Stories. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2011. 169p. ISBN 9780547617930.

You Know When the Men Are Gone by Siobhan Fallon

Why do I forget that I enjoy short stories? Tending to read mostly biography, history, and science, I rarely venture to the fiction shelves. Luckily for me, Bonnie left You Know When the Men Are Gone by Siobhan Fallon on my night stand. This collection of stories describes the lives of soldiers and their families stationed at Ft. Hood outside Killeen, Texas during the years of the Iraq War. Because soldiers do twelve month (or longer) tours abroad and because most of the combatants are still men, many women and children populate the gigantic base, where there are schools, churches, shopping centers, hospitals, libraries, and such. Rarely having to ever leave the base, 40,000 women are absorbed into a regimental culture. Not all join willingly.

The author knows of what she writes. While her husband served two tours in Iraq, she lived at Ft. Hood, observing the life around her with the eye of a writer. She emphasizes in her notes that the stories are fiction. The specific plots may not be true, but the emotions that drive the conflicts between women and between married couples are authentic. Times of deployment, disastrous attacks in Iraq, and reunion are particularly stressful. A sign near one of the base gates warns "You Survived the War, Now Survive the Homecoming." That is also the title of one of the stories.

Each story stands by itself, but it is fun to identify a few characters that appear in more than one story. The two longest stories are about forty pages. The stories should be popular with readers of contemporary fiction. 

Fallon, Siobhan. You Know When the Men Are Gone. Amy Einhorn Books, 2011. 226p. ISBN 9780399157202.

The Chronicles of Harris Burdick: Fourteen Amazing Authors Tell the Tales

In 1984, children's book author and illustrator Chris Van Allsburg published a small collection of unusual drawings supposedly given to him by the children's book acquisition editor Peter Wenders, whose publishing firm is oddly not named. Van Allsburg said in the introduction that Wenders said that a man name Harris Burdick brought the drawings to Wenders in 1954, promised more drawings and stories, but then disappeared. All efforts to locate the secretive illustrator were unsuccessful. In the meantime, Wenders children had all written stories to go with the drawings. Around 1983, Wenders showed these and the drawings to Van Allsburg who thought other children would also enjoy writing stories to explain them. So The Mysteries of Harris Burdick became a frequently used book by writing teachers in schools across the country.

In 1993, novelist Stephen King got into the act and wrote a story for one of the pictures, that of a three-story house rising above its lawn like a rocket just launching. Perhaps this was the seed from which Van Allsburg's new book sprouted. King is joined by thirteen other famous authors, each contributing a story for the drawing of their choice. Sherman Alexie, Jules Feifer, and Kate DiCamillo are among the esteemed group. In late 2011, The Chronicles of Harris Burdick was published.

The Chronicles of Harris Burdick has been popular, so I just got it from my library last week, and it leapt to the top of my bookstack. Once I did start, I tried to space reading out a little to savor them, but I finished quickly anyway thoroughly satisfied. I especially liked "The Harp" by Linda Sue Park, "The Seven Chairs" by Lois Lowry, and "Oscar and Alphonse" by Van Allsburg. Also, "Just Desert" by M. T. Anderson, which describes exactly the fear that I used to have when I was about twelve.

Though described as a children's book, you are never too old to enjoy the good stories in The Chronicles of Harris Burdick.

The Chronicles of Harris Burdick. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2011. 195p. ISBN 9780547548104.

While Mortals Sleep: Unpublished Short Fiction by Kurt Vonnegut

At the urging of Citizen Reader, I read While Mortals Sleep: Unpublished Short Fiction by Kurt Vonnegut with a Foreward by Dave Eggers. I have enjoyed a few Vonnegut novels and stories before and the book was on my list, so convincing me to move it to the top was easy. Once I started reading, I kept reading, only stopping to go to work, get the latest news from Japan, or get some sleep. During pauses, I plotted reading the early Vonnegut books that my friend Pete Midkiff recommended years ago. Reading begets more reading.

In his Foreward, Eggers calls Vonnegut's pieces "mousetrap stories," short stories that have surprising plot twists and offer a moral in the end. These were fashionable in popular American magazines in the 1950s, the time at which Vonnegut was working as a public relations man for General Electric by day and writing at night. Since that time short story authors have written more realistic, ambiguous pieces that emphasize character over plot. Eggers thinks Vonnegut's previously unpublished stories are refreshing after reading so much work (including his own) in which authors shy away from making any moral judgments.

Trying to discover whether there is a story behind why the pieces in While Mortals Sleep were unpublished, I found a good number of serious reviews that suggested that they should have remained unseen by general readers. "Immature," "unpolished," "feeble," and "empty" seem to be some of the words used by reviewers. Several thought that Vonnegut had probably decided himself that they were failed pieces, perhaps after being unable to sell them. The unstated charge is that the Vonnegut estate is shamefully converting the author's legacy to cash, something he would not do. Or would he? Read "Money Talks."

Perhaps I like the stories because I am inclined to like the stories, but like them I do. My favorites are the title story, "Ruth," and "The Humbugs." Despite their lack of polish, they engaged me and made me wish for more. Readers as a rule will be more forgiving than critics who are paid to criticize. I think it is a good addition to most public library collections.

Vonnegut, Kurt. While Mortals Sleep: Unpublished Short Fiction. Delacourt Press, 2011. ISBN 9780385343732.

Nocturnes: Five Stories of Music and Nightfall by Kazuo Ishiguro

Just before Christmas, aware that I had somehow let my stack of books dwindle, Bonnie brought me Nocturnes: Five Stories of Music and Nightfall by Kazuo Ishiguro. Having already enjoyed three of his novels - The Remains of the Day, When We Were Orphans, and Never Let Me Go, I was disposed to like the short story collection for two reason - I like Ishiguro's storytelling and I like the brevity of short stories. The five stories did nothing to disappoint me. Ishiguro shows that he can write short fiction as well as novels. They may even be better.

In each of the stories in Nocturnes, a barely-making-it musician recalls an incident in which he became involved with someone who seemed to have been a success but somehow lost momentum. A guitarist in Venice accompanied an over-the-hill pop singer in a gondola to serenade the latter's wife, and later a brilliant but homely saxophonist undergoing reconstructive facial surgery (for which he was still bandaged) wandered through the banquet halls of a five star hotel through the night seeking to return stolen trophies with the former wife of the same over-the-hill pop singer. The stories share characters and minor details, suggesting they are all part of a larger drama. Each story is filled with comic details, but no one is laughing. The story-telling musicians are still puzzling over their experiences at the time of the telling.

Each Ishiguro book creates a totally new world unlike those in his previous books. Nocturnes is no exception. Readers do not know what to expect from the author - except that the story will be good.

Ishiguro, Kazuo. Nocturnes: Five Stories of Music and Nightfall. Alfred A. Knopf, 2009. ISBN 9780307271020.

Nothing with Strings: NPR's Beloved Holiday Stories by Bailey White

When I was asked by a client for books by Bailey White recently, I discovered a title that had slipped my notice - Nothing with Strings: NPR's Beloved Holiday Stories. Since we are already planning holiday book displays, and since I enjoyed White's somewhat autobiographical story collections Mama Makes Up Her Mind and Sleeping at the Starlite Motel, and since the client took one of the other books, I checked out Nothing with Strings. I took it with me to West Texas and read three of the thirteen stories one night and the rest on my flight back to Chicago. They provided good company during a long day.

The string of Christmas lights on the book jacket suggested to me that stories would be set around Christmas, but I was wrong. The stated holiday connection is that White read these stories on Thanksgiving Day broadcasts of National Public Radio's All Things Considered. I think one - maybe two - of them actually mentioned Thanksgiving. In "The Progress of Deglutition," on Thanksgiving Day, after the company has left, Dave tells Sally that he is leaving her after several decades of marriage. It is totally out of the blue for Sally who thought they were happy. In "Return to Sender," Mrs. Nash looks at a Sears Catalog with "O Holy Night" in the background while her daughter plans the town's Victorian Christmas celebration, which takes place later in the story. If the other stories had holiday themes, I have quickly forgotten them. The domestic drama stands out. Is the reference to holiday stories in the subtitle just a marketing tactic to help sell this collection of offbeat stories?

White should not need any deception to sell her stories, as she has many NPR listeners as fans. She is known for her witty descriptions of life in the rural South, where people try to preserve their traditions in the face of modern disruptions to their routines and relationships. Her previous book was a novel Quite a Year for Plums, which was not has entertaining as her autobiographical stories. I think Nothing with Strings rises above the less satisfying novel. While not as funny as Mama Makes Up Her Mind, the recent story collection more sincerely describes the problems people experience with family, friends, and the lack of emotional support. Short story fans, especially those who like Southern flavored storytelling, will enjoy this book.

White, Bailey. Nothing with Strings: NPR's Beloved Holiday Stories. Scribner, 2008. ISBN 9781439102268

The Labours of Hercules by Agatha Christie

Readers who see shelves filled with Agatha Christie mystery novels may not realize that she also wrote 157 short stories. Most were published first in newspapers or magazines and then republished in story collections. In the appendix of The Duchess of Death: The Unauthorized Biography of Agatha Christie, biographer Richard Hack includes a complete list of these stories and identifies the collections in which readers may find them.

I just finished the light and entertaining collection The Labours of Hercules by Agatha Christie, which features the astute and impeccably dressed Belgian detective Hercule Poirot. In this collection first published in 1948, Poirot is thinking of retiring and has decided to take only twelve more cases. To make things more interesting, he has decided the cases must somehow reflect the twelve labors of the Greek hero Hercules. He applies his little gray cells to solve unusual mysteries, most of which do not involve murder. Once he sees the truth of each matter, he moves quickly to broker settlements, often without calling in the police.

Though the stories take the reader around the globe, they mostly address the English way of life. Take the following paragraph as an example:

For John Hammett was particularly dear to the people and Press of England. He represented every quality which was dear to Englishmen. People said of him: "One does feel that Hammett's honest." Anecdotes were told of his simple home life, of his fondness for gardening. Corresponding to Baldwin's pipe and Chamberlain's umbrella, there was Hammett's raincoat. He always carried it - a weather-worn garment. It stood as a symbol - of the English climate, of the prudent forethought of the English race, of their attachment to old possessions. Moreover, in his bluff British way, John Hammett was an orator. His speeches, quietly and earnestly delivered, contained those simple sentimental cliches which are so deeply rooted in the English heart. Foreigners sometimes criticize them as being both hypocritical and unbearably noble. John Hammett did not mind in the least being noble - in a sporting, public school, deprecating fashion.

Of course, the former prime minister thus described proves to be a crook. Nothing is really simple in Agatha Christie mysteries.

Many of the British television adaptations of Christie mysteries are drawn from the short stories. Readers shouldn't forget them.

Christie, Agatha. The Labours of Hercules. Dodd, Mead & Company, 1967. No ISBN.