Stories We Love: “Stranger,” by Steven Schwartz
“In Schwartz’s fiction, as in life, it is often the unspoken or withheld that holds power”: Ellen Prentiss Campbell on the story “Stranger,” by Steven Schwartz, from his collection Madagascar.
“In Schwartz’s fiction, as in life, it is often the unspoken or withheld that holds power”: Ellen Prentiss Campbell on the story “Stranger,” by Steven Schwartz, from his collection Madagascar.
From the Archives: After waiting impatiently for Daniel Orozco’s debut story collection, J.T. Bushnell finds that it exceeds all expectations. Bushnell calls these stories “full of satire and absurdity and insight.”
From the Archives: Christopher Mohar talks with Anthony Doerr about the politics of writing, the importance of curiosity, the role science plays in his fiction, why he likes the novella as a form, and how we can successfully inhabit characters different from ourselves.
“Perhaps this is what is so successful about Those Fantastic Lives: the collection goes beyond familiar narratives of the supernatural by asking why we are afraid of monsters and ghosts, and the things we cannot explain…” Costa B. Pappas reviews Bradley Sides’s debut collection.
“I think that the ‘stakes’ in my stories come out of those struggles, internal or between people, which become moments of decision.” Ellen Prentisss Campbell talks with Josh Barkan about her new story collection, Known By Heart.
“A close examination of economy and endings in this collection reveals several craft choices made by the author that consistently bolster efficiency and surprise.”
Venita Blackburn and Malinda McCollum talk about dangerous women in short fiction, loss as a narrative catalyst, the stories of ZZ Packer and David Foster Wallace, and their own recently published collections.
“She captures so beautifully the isolation that many feel in an increasingly cloistered Midwest, the desperation we all experience in our teeter-totter of needs and wants”: Mike Ferro appreciates Laura Hulthen Thomas’s “Sole Suspect” in this Stories We Love essay.
“I’m honored to be a lifelong Midwesterner and to write and think about place with central allegiance”: Melissa Scholes Young talks with Melissa Fraterrigo about her story collection, Glory Days.
From the Archives: The title of Jim Shepard’s 2011 collection, You Think That’s Bad, could also be a creative mantra. Here the veteran writer discusses his research process, the apocalyptic state of the world, the (possible) irrelevancy of literature to the apocalypse, his epic mustache—and other matters of importance.
