Short Story Challenge

The second trimester of the year I’ll be reading short stories.  Again, one a day but a “day” is defined as Monday through Friday not including holidays and vacation.  I found the perpetual short story challenge, 100 Shots of Shorts, on Rob Around Books so between what I read last year (remember this is a perpetual challenge) and my second trimester goal, I should make pretty good progress.   The opinion codes are the same on this page as the front page of “Kim’s Nightstand.”

1.  “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” by F. Scott Fitzgerald – GL – certainly better than the movie!

2.  “Brother Robber” by Helen Christaller - RR - I read it every Christmas

3.   ”Mrs. Sen’s” by Jhumpa Lahiri – GL

4.  “Cathedral” by Raymond Carver – GL - such a guy story.  I can’t believe that his first writing teacher was John Gardner, talk about luck.

5.  “The Thanksgiving Visitor” by Truman Capote - RR - I read it every Thanksgiving

6.  “A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings” by Gabriel Garcia Marquez GL

7.  “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Conner – RR - I think I have to keep re-reading it just to understand it.

8.  “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin - GL

9.  “A Worn Path” by Eudora Welty - RR

10.  “I Stand Here Ironing” by Tillie Olsen - RR

11.  “The Swimmer” by John Cheever – RR – This is my favorite short story, I’ve read it over and over again.

Here I go for the second third of the year, a short story-a-day, not counting holidays and vacation.  I’m going to put the date and a number so I can keep track of my 100 shorts progress.

12. May 1 – “The Lady and the Dog” by Anton Chekhov – GL – although I’ve read it several times, I think this time is my last, excellent character writing

13.  May 4 – “Bliss” by Katherine Mansfield – GL – blindsided!

14.  May 5 – “Big Two-Hearted River: Part I” by Ernest Hemingway – GL – I like his writing style better in a short story, in his books they sometimes take on a barking tone

15. May 6 – “Big Two-Hearted River: Part II” by Ernest Hemingway – GL

16.  May 7 – “Young Goodman Brown” by Nathaniel Hawthorne – GL – fabulous morality tale, another writer that I like better in short story format

17.  May 8 – “Araby” by James Joyce – GL – so painfully sweet, read with my son (he was assigned the story), we had very different views of the boy

18.  May 11 – “Everything That Rises Must Converge” by Flannery O’Connor – RR – stunning

The following are from Jhumpa Lahiri’s Unaccustomed Earth, I wasn’t as entralled by the stories as the rest of the English speaking world but it may just be a classic case of too much build up before I read the stories.

19 .  May 12 – “Unaccustomed Earth” – GL

20.  May 13 – “Hell-Heaven” – GL

21.  May 14 – “A Choice of Accomodations” - GL

22. May 15 – “Only Goodness” – GL

23.  May 18 – “Nobody’s Business” – GL

24.  May 19 – “Once in a Lifetime” – GL – this one and the following were an interesting grouping with the different perspectives and time gaps

25.  May 20 – “Year’s End” – GL

26.  May 21 – “Going Ashore” – GL – The ending scenes have stayed with me and I’ve thought of them over and over again

The following are from Olive Kitteridgeby Elizabeth Strout, a book I completely enjoyed:

27.  May 22 – “Pharmacy” – GL- I’m very taken with how Strout showed Henry’s true goodness

May 25 – Holiday

28.  May 26 – “Incoming Tide” – GL – Loved how she showed Olive’s strong presence in this story

29.  May 27 – “The Piano Player” – GL - I kept expecting this character to show up again and then realized how much her story added to my understanding of the town

30.  May 28 – “A Little Burst” – GL – hilarious, I’ll remember this story if I have an awful daughter-in-law!

May 29 – Vacation

31.  June 1 – 33.  June 2 – “A Different Road” – GL – if only we could take words back

32.  June 3 – “Winter Concert” – GL – a story of how married people know so much by instinct, for better or for worse

32.  June 4 – “Tulips” – GL – Wow!

34.  June 5 – “Basket of Trips” – GL

June 7 through June 19 – Vacation

35.  June 22 – “Ship in a Bottle” – GL

36.  June 23 – “Security” – GL – LOVE the parrot!

37.  June 24 – “Criminal” – GL – I think it’s interesting that the reader is pulled so far from Olive right before the last story

38.  June 25 – “River” – GL – beautiful last story, the reader has a fuller of view of Olive and she has changed into a fuller, more compassionate person, although still very rough around the edges.  This story has the funniest lines and one of the most touching scenes.

The following are from J.D. Salinger’s Nine Stories, a book that received a lot of praise on this blog, Marianne Wiggins includes it on her Best American Literature list, and while Claire is ambivalent about short stories, but loves this collection, I’m not as sold.  I found some of the stories compelling, but others too abrupt.  In the end, it was a chore to finish the book.  I would rate the entire collection GL because I would wonder about what I was missing if I hadn’t read it, right now I feel like I wouldn’t have missed all that much.

39.  June 26 – “A Perfect Day for Bananafish”

40.  June 29 – “Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut”

41.  June 30 – “Just Before War with the Eskimos”

42.  July 1 – “The Laughing Man” – I enjoyed the viewpoint

43.  July 2 – “Down at the Dinghy” – the perfect story to demonstrate the use of reading a story or book and then going back and re-reading the first section

44.  July 3 – “For Esme–with Love and Squalor” – one of Claire’s favorite short stories, I’m going to ask why

July 6 thru July 10 – Vacation

45.  July 13 – “Pretty Mouth and Green Eyes”

46.  July 14 – “De Daumier-Smith’s Blue Period” – my favorite of the collection, but I wonder if it is only because it reminded me of the voice in Catcher in the Rye

47.  July 15 – “Teddy” – so many of the stories have an abrupt ending, but this one is blindsiding in its abruptness

48.  July 16 – “Babylon Revisited” by F. Scott Fitzgerald - RR

49.  July 17 – “First Confession” by Frank O’Connor – GL – the older sister reminded me of the elder son in the Prodigal Son parable, loved the priest and the main character

Did not get anywhere near staying on track date wise, so I’m just going to keep plugging away until I hit 100.

50. “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant – GL

51.  “1647 Ocean Front Walk” by Dan Fante – maybe GL – well written, but I could have gone my entire life without reading it.

52.  ”Rain at the Construction Site” by Ersi Sotiropoulos, translated by Karen Emmerich – GL

53.  “The Lady in White” by Christian Bobin, translated by Alison Anderson - RR

The following stories are from Live Studies by Susan Vreeland (link to my overall review of the book):

54. ”Mimi with a Watering Can” – GL – Conveys a feeling of trapped by life, too quick of a resolution though

55.  “Winter of Abandon” – GL – Interesting take on the death of Monet’s first wife and his subsequent relationship

56.  “Cradle Song” - GL

57.  “Olmpia’s Look” – GL – Vreeland created an interesting back story for this very famous painting.

58.   “The Yellow Jacket” – GL

59.  “Of These Stones” – GL

60.  ” A Flower for Ginette” – GL

61.   “In the Absence of Memory” – GL – one of the best in the collection

62.   “The Adventures of Bernardo and Salvatore, or, The Cure:  A Tale” – GL – I loved this story, a great friends on the road tale

63.  “The Things He Didn’t Know” – GL

64.  “Uncommon Clay” – GL

65.  “Respond” – GL

66.   “Crayon, 1955″ – GL

67.  “At Least Five Hundred Words, with Sincerity and Honesty” – GL – I found this the most humorous

68.  “Gifts” – GL

69.  “Their Lady Tristeza” – GL – loved this one, a touching teachers tale

70.  “Tableaux Vivants” – GL

The following stories are from Maile Meloy’s stunning book Both Ways is the Only Way I Want It (which is now one of  my life mantras).  ”Travis, B.” has received a lot of press, and deservedly so, I’ll never forget the young lawyer driving all night and all day, but the one that turned me inside out was “The Girlfriend,” tender, heart-felt and shocking.

71.  ”Travis, B.” – RR, I  just noticed that the title is written as a teacher would see on a class list

72.  Red from Green – GL

73.  Lovely Rita – GL

74.  Spy vs. Spy – GL

75.  Two-Step – GL

76.  The Girlfriend – RR

77.  Liliana – RR, the Grandmother from hell

78.  Nine – GL

79.  Agustin – RR, more tender than I thought it would be

80.  A new favorite short story writer:  Free Fruit For Young Writers by Nathan Englander – RR

81.  Father Confessor by Herman Hesse – GL – loved the model of both monks