New American Short Story Anthology Available
Selections from 1819 to 1920; includes "Micro Bios" of the Authors
I have compiled a volume of short stories that is now available from amazon in the kindle, paperback, and hardcover formats.
I have also written “micro bios” of the 14 authors of these 22 stories, which are appended to the back of the book (the micro bios, not the authors).
You might be able to read the list above, on the back cover (this is the paperback cover — they all differ a little from each other), but if not, here’s the list of stories the volume contains (FWIW, I’ve bolded the titles of the stories I especially like):
Rip Van Winkle by Washington Irving, 1819The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving, 1820The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allan Poe, 1839The Murders in the Rue Morgue by Edgar Allan Poe, 1841The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe, 1843The Angel of the Odd by Edgar Allan Poe, 1844Bartleby the Scrivener: A Tale of Wall Street by Herman Melville, 1853The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County by Mark Twain, 1865The Luck of Roaring Camp by Bret Harte, 1868The Outcasts of Poker Flat by Bret Harte, 1869A Horseman in the Sky by Ambrose Bierce, 1889An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge by Ambrose Bierce, 1890The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, 1892Désirée’s Baby by Kate Chopin, 1893Moon-Face by Jack London, 1902To Build a Fire by Jack London, 1902The Ransom of Red Chief by O. Henry, 1902The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry, 1905Paul’s Case by Willa Cather, 1905The Verdict by Edith Wharton, 1908A Piece of Steak by Jack London, 1909Paper Pills by Sherwood Anderson, 1919Bernice Bobs Her Hair by F. Scott Fitzgerald, 1920Besides the public domain stories themselves, I also wrote “micro biographies” of the authors, which appear at the end of the volume. Here’s one of them, to serve as an example:
Mark Twain (1835-1910)
The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County
Primarily known for his novels nowadays (such as The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Prince and the Pauper, and Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court), Twain (born Samuel L. Clemens) also wrote dozens of short stories, hundreds of letters, many essays, and several nonfiction books (mainly of travel, such as The Innocents Abroad, A Tramp Abroad, Life on the Mississippi, and Roughing It).
Twain’s most important short story, the one that increased his fame from a regional following in the West (California and Nevada) to nationwide and then worldwide fame is the one included in this anthology. A few other of Twain’s significant short stories are The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg, Captain Stormfield’s Visit to Heaven, A Dog’s Tale (written as a protest against vivisection), Eve’s Diary, and The Million Pound Bank Note.
During his lifetime, Twain had the nicknames “The Wild Humorist of the Pacific Slope,” “The King” (long before Elvis), “Moralist of the Main,” “Sage of the Sagebrush,” and even “The Belle of New York;” Twain was also considered to be the most famous person in the world. William Dean Howells called his friend Twain “The Lincoln of Our Literature.” William Faulkner designated Twain “The father of America’s literature.” Inventor extraordinaire Thomas Edison opined, “An average American loves his family. If he has any love left over for some other person, he generally selects Mark Twain.”
In 1935, a century after Twain's birth, Ernest Hemingway said that “All modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called 'Huckleberry Finn’.”
Someone once sent a letter to Twain which had no address on the envelope, just “Mark Twain, God Knows Where.” The letter found its intended recipient.
For more Twain short stories, visit your local library or select your favorite anthology of Twain stories from amazon or your favorite bookseller.
For more on Twain’s life story, see my biography-masquerading-as-an-autobiography Rebel With A Cause: Mark Twain’s Hidden Memoirs