im looking to get into writing short stories and I looking for some good authors to read. i have maps in the mirror by orson scott card, Bradbury stories by ray bradbury, and the collected stories of richard matheson. any advice or suggestions are welcomed.
I liked the Barnum Museum collection by Steven Millhauser, one of which spawned the Illusionist film. Many authors do collections though. Salmon Rushdie's "East, West" has worthy moments in it, Rudyard Kipling has quite a few collections, though some are a little bleak. Similarly, if you can tackle a bit of period Scots, then Walter Scott has a couple that are quite charming, and of course Oscar Wilde has some including Lady Windermere's Fan. Henry James's "Turn Of The Screw" is considered a classic short ghost story. For many a vivid short, short story maybe try The Brothers Grimm collection. Will Self has a few collections of post-modern oddity that may be worth exploring. Thinking about it I bet your local library would be a good source of information, maybe speak to them on top of these suggestions.
Ive just got a collection of short stories by Henry James from the library. Also F Scott Fitzgerald has a book of short stories which includes The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.
Katherine Mansfield practically invented the modern short story, and, in my opinion, is still unsurpassed as its greatest practitioner.
Arthur C Clarke's short work is absolutely fantastic and more often than not very humerous. There's a wonderful doorstopper called "the Collected Stories" which contains every short story he ever wrote, check it out. Stephen King's short stories are also very good. I'd suggest starting with his collection "Different seasons" which contains the stories, or rather novella's, that were the basis for the films "the Shawshank Redemption" and "Stand by Me".
Short story collections are not very common, and it really depends on the genre. Reading out of the genre is great, but getting the basics of what works within a genre is also handy. There are often The Year's Best for Science Fiction anthologies out. Check out places like Short Mystery Fiction Society's Derringer Winners, places like that. Good luck. Terry
It certainly does depend on genre....with literary fiction, almost the opposite to your claim is true--there are relatively few authors who don't have a collection of short stories (or at least a few notable short stories published in magazines).
Raymond Carver's collection of short stories titled 'Elephant' are really good. Also, not read his work yet, but recently been recommended to read short stories by Colum McCann.
It depends on what you are looking for in terms of modern VS more traditional? I'm far more interested in the newer stuff that's out there than Hemingway, James or Melville (i.e. the classics). I think I OD'ed on traditional folks in undergrad. I also like to see what's being published NOW as opposed to 50 years ago. I guess it goes along with researching your market. If you're looking to study the classics, then there are a lot of great suggestions here (though I loathe Henry James! eeeeeh). If you are looking to build your own writing for modern publication, then you may not want to ignore modern stories. Get the latest "America's Best Short Stories" and see what's out there. Go to the library and start perusing through lit-mags. I have to say, though, that I luuuurv me some Ray Bradbury. =) And I've just recently stumbled upon some Orson Scott Card short pieces. Lovely stuff!
