"Celebrated for her powerful short fiction, Claire Keegan now gifts us three exquisite stories together forming a brilliant examination of gender dynamics and an arc from Keegan's earliest to her most recent work. In "So Late in the Day," Cathal faces a long weekend as his mind agitates over a woman with whom he could have spent his life, had he acted differently; in "The Long and Painful Death" a writer's arrival at the seaside home of Heinrich Böll...

"Here are eighteen stories of astonishing range and precision. A housewife drinks alone in her Connecticut living room. A guillotine glimmers above a sleepy town green. A pre-recorded customer service message sends a caller into a reverie of unspeakable yearning. With the deft touch and funhouse-mirror perspectives for which he has won countless admirers, Steven Millhauser gives us the towns, marriages, and families of a quintessential American lifestyle...

"A collection of stories that take an intimate look at the moments when a person's life changes forever"--

An anthology of ten stories by young adult authors about surprising and unusual collections.

"From one of the most accomplished writers of our time comes another brilliant collection of short fiction. Artful, agile, and inventive; Lydia Davis' newest collection of stories delves into topics ranging from marriage to tiny insects. These stories are a celebration of language and careful observation that once again confirms Davis' sincere love and mastery of the form." --

"The millions of readers of Amor Towles are in for a treat as he shares some of his shorter fiction: six stories set in New York City and a novella in Los Angeles. The New York stories, most of which are set around the turn of the millennium, take up everything from the death-defying acrobatics of the male ego, to the fateful consequences of brief encounters, and the delicate mechanics of comprise which operate at the heart of modern marriages. In...

"An anthology of fourteen Christmas stories, both previously published and newly commissioned, by such authors as Louisa May Alcott and William Dean Howells, and illustrated by such artists as Anna C. Leplar and Paolo D'Altan." --provided by publisher.

Wry, dark humor burnishes visionary SF in these often prophetic, sometimes troubling, but always fascinating tales that combine and masterfully conflate the disparate worlds of corporate tech and literary art.

"After the Thaw" is a hi-tech take on an ancient idea: immortality. "Terrible Trudy on the Lam" based on actual events, is a modern fable about a zoo escape, a private eye, a vaudeville act and keeping your mouth shut.

...

A pile of sensational bizarre blood cases, a cold silent body, what kind of crimes and secrets are hidden? A calm and wise female forensic doctor, an experienced criminal investigation captain, in the face of a paper forensic identification, one by one, the blood, violence and terror behind the dissection of the body, everything seems to have no trace, but in the bizarre doomed to the curse of the murderer

Updike's collection of 17 short stories are consecutive, with the same cast of characters, Jane and Richard Maples. They convey the same themes -- love, domesticity, infidelity, permanence and death -- in writing that is at once beautiful and honest.