The 2009 edition of The Best American Short Stories, edited by Alice Sebold, was pretty good. Only one clunker and two amazing leaps of imagination, one about a family whose second child is a centaur, the other a submarine in the Civil War.
Specifics:
1. In "Yurt" by Sarah Shun-Lein Bynum, middle-school teachers dance on Friday afternoons at a nearby bar. "Ms Hempel realized that an awful mistake had been made: she had actually been meant to spend her whole life dancing, not teaching English to the seventh grade." (page 18) Ah. Moments of truth. But do you think dancers ever realize they were meant to have spent their whole lives teaching English?
2. On war in "Rubiaux Rising" by Steve de Jarnatt: "Then in testament to true absurdity, Rubiaux, a double amputee with severe brain damage, was declared AWOL." (page 34) Catch 22, all over again.
3. In "the Shadow Table" by Alice Fulton. "Waitressing appeals to people who like to leave a place neater and cleaner than they found it." (page 61) Not me. Waitressing appealed to me because every time I worked as a waitress, I lost a minimum of one pound a day.
4. Also in "The Shadow Table," "My family had no sense of background. Some might say we were raised to aim low, but I'd say we chose our disappointments just as others choose their battles." (page 62) I like that.
5. Also in "The Shadow Table," "I once asked Ray if Episcopals had Lent. Why yes, he said. So I asked if he'd ever given up sweets for Lent. Why no, he said, he'd never given up anything. How could anyone live without abstinence? That was my question." (page 63) And it's a question I've never thought to ask. Not ever.
6. In "Sagittarius" (the centaur story) by Greg Herbk. ""No, he doesn't want his son to vanish. He just wants him to be normal. He wants fatherhood to be free of pain and paradox." (page 114) True certainly if the son's a centaur, but also true I imagine for any father, which is what made the story work for me. Gotta find some more stuff by this Herbk fellow.
7. Bit of dialogue from "A Man Like Him" by Yiyun Li. "'The weak-minded choose to hate,' she said. 'It's the least painful thing to do, isn't it?'" (page 175) And that could be the explanation for a whole lot of opinions I don't understand.
8. In "Magic Words" by Jill McCoreke. "Anyone drawing breath believes in something, even if it's only that life sucks and there's no reason to live." (page 197) Really?
9. In "Them Old Cowboy Songs" by Annie Proulx: "But for the first time she realized that they were not two cleaving halves of one person but two separate people, and that because he was a man he could leave any time he wanted, and because she was a woman she could not." (page 251) When Crash beat Brokeback Mountain for the Academy Award, Proulx (author of "Brokebreak Mountain") kept referring to the winner as Trash. Immediately I disliked her, although I did go one to read—and like—"Brokeback Mountain." Now I'm going to reread "Them Old Cowboy Songs" and may have to separate Proulx, the author, from Proulx, the person. Hope I can. For years I tried to separate Streisand, the actor/singer/director, from Streisand's press but finally gave up.
Words (Literary short stories. Need I say more?):
1) crepuscular: "… the light coming in felt crepuscular …" (page 48) "of, pertaining to, or resembling twilight; dim; indistinct" Felt? Feels wrong somehow.
2) quiver: "… the taxi driver finds the quiver of buildings." (page 78) No. Dictionary.com gives only shaking and container for arrows. Anyone out there ever run into another use? A collection of arrow-shaped buildings?
3) putatively: "…putatively heavy cuisine …" (page 79) "commonly regarded as such; reputed; supposed: the putative boss of the mob." Reputedly wouldn't work? I fail to see a difference.
4) Ameliorative: "He practices sustained ameliorative forgetting." (page 211) "to make or become better, more bearable, or more satisfactory; improve; meliorate. " Meliorate, of course, means ameliorate. Damn dictionaries.
5) Drover: "… spit on the ground like a drover." (page 245) "a person who drives cattle or sheep to market." Didn't know that, but it was from an Annie Proulx story so it fits.
6) "Muzungu": title of last story. Mzungu is Swahili for white person. The story is set in Africa and does deal with children of mixed races.
