[.uk] The Best American Short Stories 2002 (The Best American ... (ISBN 0618131736)

Amazon.com Review:
In her opening remarks to The Best American Short Stories 2002, guest editor Sue Miller notes the difficulty of reading fiction produced during 2001, the year of the September 11 terrorist attacks. She also remarks that by the time she had finalized her 20 selections, this act of reading had restored her faith both in fiction's significance and its ability to tap into timeless themes. The 2002 anthology includes stories best described as realist fiction or traditional fiction, many set in contemporary times. The tales range from E.L. Doctorow's "A House on the Plains," a murder set at the turn of the century, to pieces with more recent settings, like "Puppy" by Richard Ford, which shows how a New Orleans couple deals--or doesn't deal--with the appearance of a stray dog. Both Jhumpa Lahiri's "Nobody's Business" and Edwidge Danticat's "Seven" deftly portray the disconnection a semi-assimilated Indian American and Haitian American couple experience both as partners and as U.S. citizens. Leonard Michael's "Nachman from Los Angeles," in contrast, adds some levity to the mix. Miller adds in her preface that maybe next year the tales will depart further from tradition, but judging from this volume no departure is necessary: the selections take the reader on a delightful journey through some of America's best contemporary writers. --Jane Hodges

The BEST?:
There are twenty stories in the 2002 BEST AMERICAN SHORT STORIES. The best out of how many? I did the math. In the back of the book is a list of 227 American and Canadian magazines. These aren't the only magazines that publish short stories, but they are the ones (it is claimed - though I doubt that Alligator Juniper or Porcupine are truly in the running) from which the gems were selected. I did some research and averaging and came up with a number for their yearly submissions: 817,200. Of course, only a minuscule fraction of these stories get accepted for publication. The great mass of them were written, they were submitted, they were rejected. So we are unable to judge their quality. We can only evaluate the ones that do see the light of day. And now, on the pages of BEST, we have before us the creme de la creme. Interesting, that out of the 227 magazines, eight of the twenty stories are from The New Yorker and nine others are from prestigious publications. As for the authors, I recognized ten of the names in the table of contents. When I checked out the brief biographies at the back of the book, I found that those unknown to me have impressive credentials. Of course, you could say that the best authors write the best stories and submit to the best magazines, and thus they congregate on the pages of BEST. What contradicts this assumption is the stories themselves. Not that they aren't well-written. Someone who's been through a writing program at Columbia or Iowa - or who teaches creative writing - knows not to use the word "resonant" twice in the same sentence. The stories aren't outright bad (except for two BOMBS); most have their virtues. But are they the best? The recurring problem has to do with content. A story fails in its own way, but I finished many with the ultimate question WHY looming before me. Why was it written? Why was it published? Why did I just read it? I'm not asking for a message or a social purpose - nothing so shallow as that - but I do want to feel that some meaningful and truthful and completed interaction took place between me and the world created on the page. Many of these stories are insular and artificial - roses with no fragrance, waxy to the touch. Many.... Since quality should always be recognized, I want to acknowledge the stories in the collection that I thought were worthy - to varying degrees - of being there: Ann Cummins' "The Red Ant House" Jhumpa Lahiri's "Nobody's Business" Jill McCorkle's "Billy Goats" Tom McNeal's "Watermelon Days" Akhil Sharma's "Surrounded by Sleep" Five out of twenty (with the McCorkle story being the only one that is wholly successful). Where does that leave us, as regards the state of literature? To my thinking, nowhere good. What could be the cause?

a wonderful collection:
The Best American Short Stories 2002 is a wonderful collection, and a great introduction to some of america's finest new authors. I especially liked the first story, entitled Along the Fontage Road -a compelling story from a father's point of veiw about raising his son in today's world. I would recomend this book to just about anyone who enjoys reading.

There's no acccounting for taste:
Every year I buy a copy of "The Best American Short Stories". Some years I like the stories; some years I don't. I loved the collection selected by Amy Tan (1999). I thoroughly enjoy Garrison Keillor's writing - but his taste in short stories is like a dose of castor oil for me (1998). Sue Miller's choices are even more... medicinal. Some years I win; some years I lose... in fact, if it were possible, I wouldn't give this year's edition 1 star. Out of 20 stories, not one caught my imagination; not one held my attention. I wouldn't have even wasted the paper and ink to publish this collection. I'm sure Ms. Miller can give a very erudite defense of her choices, but I can't. But then there's no accounting for taste... and that's what this all come down to. Sue Miller likes stuff that I don't. Big deal, I suppose.

Worth it!:
Only a few of the stories here evoke tears, laughter or breath-holding, but still worth the price. Several previous reviewers were critical because 9 stories were from THE NEW YORKER. (The same thing happened in 1992.) Cream rises to the top. Enough said! I found great variations in locales, time periods, voice, texture, as well as responses of the characters to their circumstances. In her introduction, editor Miller fashions loose categories: the immigrant experience, deals gone awry, dog stories, etc. I could just as easily name groups such as: illicit love, children's voices, academia, morality, etc. So, it is all so very personal! Thank goodness! Miller praised Richard Ford's "Puppy" due to its "meandering" style, which is exactly what turned me off. If an author wants to ask (and not answer) giant philosophical questions, he should write a novel or maybe an essay. But the Short Story depends on and is driven by an economy of words, and this piece was a failure in that respect. Alice Munro's "Family Furnishings" was easy to read, engrossing and it glided along without a single bump. It was a satisfying and complex, but not ponderous, a richly woven tapestry of family conflict, snobbery, secrets, growth, shifting alliances and revelations. Munro clearly respects her readers by not being too obvious and not withholding too much. "Heifer" begins in Finland, telling us of Aina, a teen girl with a fantasized love for Uwe, who sails to Canada to establish a farm. The incredibly strong-willed Aina later follows but only finds misery and a dolt of a husband. She takes her fate into her own hands. Cool stuff! At first I was disappointed in "Digging" for it's seeming lack of character development, but then I came to realize that character development can be done ancesterorally as well as in the traditionsl way. Excellent writing and technique. To me, most stories written from a child's perspective fail because the voice of origin seems so phony. Not so in "Red Ant House," where the child's voice is as clear and true as a ringing bell. But untruth and the usual phoniness prevailed in "Billy Goats." Too bad. "Watermelon Days" tells us of Doreen, a Philadelphia flapper who winds up in South Dakota where she meets an insipid radio announcer. With nothing more on the horizon Doreen marries him and has a child, Edna. We learn that Doreen has neither talent nor desire for motherhood and seems almost sociopathic in her selfishness, irresponsibility and disdain for her husband. (She reminded me of Mildred in OF HUMAN BONDAGE - a user, a taker.) Perhaps Doreen's behavior originates in her disordered and deceitful childhood (and maybe that's the point). If you like nihilistic and depressing stories, this one is for you! Those are the highlights (in my opinion). Happy reading!

More valuable for writers than readers:
There are good stories in this book, no doubt. But, "Best" of 2002? Of the (I think I recall correctly) 20 short stories, eight are from The New Yorker. Perhaps The NYer prints many of the best short stories; in fact, they probably do - given their readership, pay scale, and authors they attract. However, if you want to read The new Yorker just buy The New Yorker. If you want a variety of short stories from a variety of magazines, you won't find them in this book. What you will find is a nice bibliography of all the magazines read by the editor and considered for publication in this touted series. As a new author, this is good. To me, it's a nice list of suggestions about where to submit stories. Even though those stories probably won't make it to this series, the bibliography suggests a degree of clout. I think this is important given how many magazines out there; the honed-down list can be useful. (This isn't the only place to find such a thing, but it is a way to see which magazines the editors of this series consulted.) Another book, the annual Pushcart Prize selection, works similarly. The list of publications *they* used gives us a good lesson in small presses that aren't so small as to be ignored, yet too small to be viewed by _this_ series or a wide readership. Basically, I feel this is a book for writers more than for readers. We learn what the editors are reading, where they are reading it, and what they are looking for. If you are a reader looking for a short story collection, I'd say skip it - despite, I'm sure, the many hours of reading and thought put in by the editor.