Tobias Wolff

Previous owner's name jotted onto front end paper

Hardcover (1 to 2 lbs)

New Jersey

Stories

In a collection of short stories, one man is shot while waiting in a bank line, another is fired for writing a premature obituary, and a woman visits her father after his mental breakdown.

The Night in Question

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Jasmon Drain

Light Hardcover (1 lb or less)

Indiana

A blazingly original story collection about the interconnected lives of the residents of a public housing project on the South Side of Chicago.

NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEWEDITORS' CHOICE .A blazingly original story collection about the interconnected lives of the residents of a public housing project on the South Side of Chicago

"The residents and their buoyant dreams are documented, celebrated, honored. I bow to this writer in gratitude."-Sandra Cisneros

NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY CHICAGO TRIBUNE

Before being torn down in 2007, the Stateway Gardens public housing projects on Chicago's South Side were ridden with deprivation and crime. But for some, like Tracy, the shy, intelligent young boy at the center of this enthralling collection of linked stories, they are simply home. Set in the mid-1980s and taking readers up to the point of the destruction of the infamous Cabrini-Green housing projects-a set of buildings similar in design to Stateway Gardens to the south-this collection gives an intimate look at the hopes, dreams, failures, and fortunes of a group of people growing up with the deck always stacked against them. Through Jasmon Drain's sensitive and often playful prose, we see another side of what we have come to know as "the projects."

Stateway's Gardenis a coming-of-age story told in short stories, through the lens of a childhood made rough by the crush of poverty and violence, with the crack epidemic a looming specter ahead. And yet, through the experiences and ambitions of Tracy and other young characters, Drain reveals a vibrant community that creates its own ecosystem, all set in a series of massive, seemingly soulless concrete buildings. Not shying away from the darkness of life for his characters, Drain shows the full complexity of their human experiences.

Exquisitely detailed and novelistic in scope, this collection of stories will linger in your mind long after you have turned the final page.

Stateway's Garden

ce56ec54-0235-4381-9b6d-7e835e7c728e-1

#paperback #shortstories #jimcrace #fables #poetry

Paperback (1 to 2 lbs)

New York

A sumptuous, scintillating stew of sixty four short fictions about appetite, food, and the objects of our desire
All great meals, it has been said, lead to discussions of either sex or death, and "The Devil's Larder," in typical Cracean fashion, leads to both. Here are sixty four short fictions of at times Joycean beauty--about schoolgirls hunting for razor clams in the strand; or searching for soup-stones to take out the fishiness of fish but to preserve the flavor of the sea; or about a mother and daughter tasting food in one another's mouth to see if people really do taste things differently--and at other times, of Mephistophelean mischief: about the woman who seasoned her food with the remains of her cremated cat, and later, her husband, only to hear a voice singing from her stomach (you can't swallow grief, she was advised); or the restaurant known as "The Air & Light," the place to be in this small coastal town that serves as the backdrop for Crace's gastronomic flights of fancy, but where no food or beverage is actually served, though a 12 percent surcharge is imposed just for just sitting there and being seen.
Food for thought in the best sense of the term, "The Devil's Larder" is another delectable work of fiction by a 2001 winner of The National Book Critics Circle Award.


The Devil's Larder

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#hardcover #levelreaders #youngreaders #shortstories 

Tennessee

Puddle Lane 

Magic Box

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David Sedaris

Massachusetts

Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim

42adfc2c-f1d9-469e-b29c-a0747cd9e3d9-1

Ted Bell

Grant Blackwood

Lee Child

Heather Graham

James Grippando

Denise Hamilton

Raelynn Hillhouse

Alex Kava

Robert Liparulo

David Liss

Dennis Lynds

Gayle Lynds

Chris Mooney

David Morrell

Katherine Neville

Christopher Reich

Christopher Rice

James Rollins

M. J. Rose

James Siegel

Brad Thor

Eric Van Lustbader

M. Diane Vogt

F. Paul Wilson

Arkansas

Stories to Keep You up All Night

Featuring North America's foremost thriller authors, Thriller is the first collection of pure thriller stories ever published. Offering up heart-pumping tales of suspense in all its guises are thirty-two of the most critically acclaimed and award-winning names in the business. From the signature characters that made such authors as David Morrell and John Lescroart famous to four of the hottest new voices in the genre, this blockbuster will tantalize and terrify.

Lock the doors, draw the shades, pull up the covers and be prepared for Thriller to keep you up all night.

Thriller

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#paperback #fiction #tomhanks #funread #shortstories #biography #shortstory 

Light Paperback (1 lb or less)

One of the Best Books of the Year: NPR, USA Today National Bestseller A small-town newspaper columnist with old-fashioned views of the modern world. A World War II veteran grappling with his emotional and physical scars. A second-rate actor plunged into sudden stardom and a whirlwind press junket. Four friends traveling to the moon in a rocketship built in the backyard. These are just some of the stories that Tom Hanks captures in his first work of fiction: a collection of shorts that explore--with great affection, humor, and insight--the human condition in all its foibles. The stories are linked by one thing: in each of them, a typewriter plays a part, sometimes minor, sometimes central. To many, typewriters represent a level of craftsmanship, beauty, and individuality that is harder and harder to find in the modern world. In these stories, Hanks gracefully reaches that typewriter-worthy level. By turns whimsical, witty, and moving, Uncommon Type establishes him as a welcome and wonderful new voice in contemporary fiction.

Uncommon Type

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#hardcover #fiction #shortstories #schoolissues #teenlit #yalit #teenliterature #teenageliterature #youngadultliterature 

Alabama

In every school at every grade, there's a pecking order among students--an in crowd and those outside it, who are often ridiculed mercilessly for the "crime" of being different. This powerful anthology explores the teen outsider experience in electrifying, never-before-published stories by eleven of today's most acclaimed YA authors. A tomboy finds the relief of self-expression through her music, while in another tale a relentless bully tests the faith of an intensely religious girl. A cheerleader discovers that the true soul of her school can't be found within the cool clique; a football player finally stands up for a harassed fellow student; and a boy watches in horror as the school "freak" marches into his classroom with a loaded rifle.Offering insights into popularity and peer pressure, nonconformity and persecution, acceptance and hate, these riveting, provocative tales will leave readers thinking and start them talking.

On the Fringe

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Michigan

David Sedaris's beloved holiday collection is new again with six more pieces, including a never before published story. Along with such favorites as the diaries of a Macy's elf and the annals of two very competitive families, are Sedaris's tales of tardy trick-or-treaters ("Us and Them"); the difficulties of explaining the Easter Bunny to the French ("Jesus Shaves"); what to do when you've been locked out in a snowstorm ("Let It Snow"); the puzzling Christmas traditions of other nations ("Six to Eight Black Men"); what Halloween at the medical examiner's looks like ("The Monster Mash"); and a barnyard secret Santa scheme gone awry ("Cow and Turkey"). No matter what your favorite holiday, you won't want to miss celebrating it with the author who has been called "one of the funniest writers alive" (Economist).

Holidays on Ice

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Jill McCorkle

Jill McCorkle tells the varied tales of today's southern women, the lives they end up leading, and the loves that distract them. Stuck in the slow lane, gunning their motors, they are women living the real life, hoping things will get better, but surprised when they occasionally do.

Crash Diet

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Kate Chopin

Ohio

With a selection of short stories

When a Louisiana woman meets a young resort owner while on vacation, she begins to fall in love with him despite her own marriage, in a sensuous short novel, first published in 1899, that is accompanied by a selection of short fiction by Chopin. Reissue.

The Awakening (Bantam Classic)

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Howard Garis

Oregon

A collection of thirty-six stories about the adventures of a wise rabbit and his animal and human friends.

Uncle Wiggily's Story Book

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Signed copy, dedication to April. 

 #paperback #fiction #shortstory #americana #realism #shortstories #alangood #barnagain

Colorado

The stories in this collection have been referred to as hilarious, fascinating, and "totally boss." Infused with the author's standard blend of bile, humor, and smartassery, the stories in The War on Xmas explore themes of family, ennui, sex, faith, masculinity, duty, independence, art, and socioeconomic status within trailer parks. This slim volume is packed with sadness, jokes, satire, songs, and subtle absurdity. Plus a sexually and culturally frustrated superhero uses his laser eyes to set a Confederate flag on fire. Several of the stories have been published in fine literary journals like Word Riot, Red Fez, and The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature, while three of them have never been published before. The reader is advised that this book has almost nothing to do with either Christmas or Xmas.

The War on Xmas

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63 pages. Check my shop for a lot of other books!  

Please let me know if you have any questions.  

Used condition: book may have minor issues such as sticker residue, minor cover blemishes, discolored pages, minor page bends, etc. If there are major issues, they will be listed in the book description. #hardcover #fiction #children #bedtime #shortstories

North Carolina

The Little Book of Bedtime Stories

#hardcover #shortstories #funny #motherhood 

Minnesota

Stories 

"A beautifully written and beautifully conceived series of stories about, well, conception...Among the thousands of books for prospective and new parents, I doubt any will make you feel more understood and less alone than this one."--ANTHONY DOERR, author of ALL THE LIGHT WE CANNOT SEE A candid, ultimately buoyant debut story collection about the realities of the "baby years," whether you're having one or not The women in Polly Rosenwaike's Look How Happy I'm Making You want to be mothers, or aren't sure they want to be mothers, or--having recently given birth--are overwhelmed by what they've wrought. Sharp and unsettling, wry and moving in its depiction of love, friendship, and family, this collection expands the conversation about what having a baby looks like. One woman struggling with infertility deals with the news that her sister is pregnant. Another woman nervous about her biological clock "forgets" to take her birth control while dating a younger man and must confront the possibility of becoming a single parent. Four motherless women who meet in a bar every Mother's Day contend with their losses and what it would mean to have a child. Witty, empathetic, and precisely observed, Look How Happy I'm Making You offers the rare, honest portrayal of pregnancy and new motherhood in a culture obsessed with women's most intimate choices.

Look How Happy I'm Making You

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#paperback #civilwar #shortstories #war #ambrosebierce 

Virginia

Newspaperman, short-story writer, poet, and satirist, Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914) is one of the most striking and unusual literary figures America has produced. Dubbed "Bitter Bierce" for his vitriolic wit and biting satire, his fame rests largely on a celebrated compilation of barbed epigrams, The Devil's Dictionary, and a book of short stories (Tales of Soldiers and Civilians, 1891). Most of the 16 selections in this volume have been taken from the latter collection.
The stories in this edition include: "What I Saw at Shiloh," "A Son of the Gods," "Four Days in Dixie," "One of the Missing," "A Horseman in the Sky," "The Coup de Grace," "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge," "The Story of Conscience," "One Kind of Officer," "Chickamauga," and five more.
Bierce's stories employ a buildup of suggestive realistic detail to produce grim and vivid tales often disturbing in their mood of fatalism and impending calamity. Hauntingly suggestive, they offer excellent examples of the author's dark pessimism and storytelling power.



Civil War Stories

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Laura van den Berg

One of Entertainment Weekly's 50 Most Anticipated Books of 2020, one of O, the Oprah Magazine's 30 Most Anticipated Books of 2020, one of BuzzFeed's Most Anticipated Books of 2020, one of the BBC's Ten Books to Read in 2020, and one of The Millions Most Anticipated Books of the First Half of 2020 An urgent and unsettling collection of women on the verge from Laura van den Berg, author of The Third Hotel I Hold a Wolf by the Ears, Laura van den Berg’s first story collection since her acclaimed and prizewinning Isle of Youth, draws readers into a world of wholly original, sideways ghost stories that linger in the mouth and mind like rotten, fragrant fruit. Both timeless and urgent, these eleven stories confront misogyny, violence, and the impossible economics of America with van den Berg’s trademark spiky humor and surreal eye. Moving from the peculiarities of Florida to liminal spaces of travel in Mexico City, Sicily, and Iceland, I Hold a Wolf by the Ears is uncannily attuned to our current moment, and to the thoughts we reveal to no one but ourselves. In “Lizards,” a man mutes his wife's anxieties by giving her a La Croix–like seltzer laced with sedatives. In the title story, a woman poses as her more successful sister during a botched Italian holiday, a choice that brings about strange and violent consequences, while in “Karolina,” a woman discovers her prickly ex-sister-in-law in the aftermath of an earthquake and is forced to face the truth about her violent brother. I Hold a Wolf by the Ears presents a collection of women on the verge, trying to grasp what’s left of life: grieving, divorced, and hyperaware, searching, vulnerable, and unhinged, they exist in a world that deviates from our own only when you look too close. With remarkable control and transcendent talent, van den Berg dissolves, in the words of the narrator of “Slumberland," “that border between magic and annihilation,” and further establishes herself as a defining fiction writer of our time.

I Hold a Wolf by the Ears

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Mississippi

School’s In!

#paperback #fiction #literary #music #shortstories #africa #africanliterature #nigeria #music #romance #anthologies 

Stories (from Songs)

"A dozen interlinked, music-oriented stories set in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, where Garricks was raised... Each songlike story feels like a breakout hit encapsulating the brokenness and the beauty in life's soundtrack."--Booklist, starred review

"Beautifully woven . . . a magical delight."--Hari Kunzru, author of White Tears

A Broken People's Playlist is set to the soundtrack of life, comprised of twelve music-inspired tales about love, the human condition, micro-moments, and the search for meaning and sometimes, redemption. It is also Chimeka Garricks's love letter to his native city, Port Harcourt, introducing us to a cast of indelible characters in these loosely interlocked tales.

There is the teenage wannabe-DJ eager to play his first gig even as his family disastrously falls apart--who reappears many years later as an unhappy middle-aged man drunk-calling his ex-wife; a man who throws a living funeral for his dying brother; three friends who ponder penis captivus and one's peculiar erectile dysfunction; a troubled woman who tries to find her peace-place in the world, helped by a headful of songs and a pot of ginger tea.

Infused with the author's resonant and evocative storytelling, each page holds "the depth of a novel" (Hari Kunzru); a character, a moment that will--like a favorite song--long linger in the heart and mind.

A Broken People's Playlist (ARC)

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Georgia

In this brilliantly told short story collection, critically acclaimed author David Updike skillfully portrays the multi-faceted nature of love and of the heart. From a father's painful realization his son has discovered the dark heart of racism still beats, to a quiet love affair that needs an audience to bloom; from the bumbling of a professor who unwittingly falls for one of his students to the wistful memories of a bittersweet affair tinged in regret, Updike portrays the intricaciesof loving someone with candor.  Full of sparkling wonder and poignant melancholy alike, Old Girlfriends is a clear-eyed vision of the world we live in. Drifting from the unrequited to the secretive, the familial to the first poetic moments, this soulful collection leaves no avenue of expression untouched.

Old Girlfriends

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Roxane Gay

Wisconsin

"A collection of stories of ... hardscrabble lives, passionate loves, and quirky and vexed human connection"--

Difficult Women

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Maryland

Ann Rule’s Crime Files: Volume  3

A Fever in the Heart and Other True Crimes

Viet Thanh Nguyen

Washington

A collection of stories written over a twenty-year period that examines the Vietnamese experience in America as well as questions of home, family, and identity.

The Refugees

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Lafcadio Hearn

Pennsylvania

Short Stories

" Ranging from the legends of the West Indies to the mysteries of the Orient, Lafcadio Hearn blurs the line between myth and reality. Featuring 65 of his favorite stories, this is the perfect introduction to a unique writer whose unbounded imagination and cultural sensitivity make him essential reading for the modern reader."--Amazon.com.

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Tobias Wolff

The Night in Question

Jasmon Drain

Stateway's Garden

Jim Crace

The Devil's Larder

Sheila K. McCullagh; Gavin Rowe (Illustrator)

Magic Box

David Sedaris

Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim

Thriller

Tom Hanks

Uncommon Type

Francess Lantz; Graham Salisbury; Will Weaver; Nancy Werlin; Donald R. Gallo (Compiled by); Jack Gantos; Chris Crutcher; Angela Johnson; Joan Bauer; Alden R. Carter; M. E. Kerr; Ronald Koertge

On the Fringe

David Sedaris

Holidays on Ice

Jill McCorkle

Crash Diet

Kate Chopin

The Awakening (Bantam Classic)

Howard Garis

Uncle Wiggily's Story Book

Alan Good

The War on Xmas

Various

The Little Book of Bedtime Stories

Polly Rosenwaike

Look How Happy I'm Making You

Ambrose Bierce

Civil War Stories

Laura van den Berg

I Hold a Wolf by the Ears

Debbie Dadey, Marcia Thornton Jones, Suzy Kline, Beverly Cleary, Ann Cameron, James Preller, and Tomie dePaola

School’s In!

Chimeka Garricks

A Broken People's Playlist (ARC)

David Updike

Old Girlfriends

Roxane Gay

Difficult Women

Ann Rule

A Fever in the Heart and Other True Crimes

Viet Thanh Nguyen

The Refugees

Lafcadio Hearn

Lafcadio Hearn