2000 Fish Anthology
ISBN:0-9523522-4-9
Introduction by clem Cairns
It’s interesting that there are not more short stories in circulation. In these fast times when attention span is allegedly shortening, and the sound-bite has taken hold, why is the reading public not queuing up to buy the latest batch of short stories? Particularly at airports and stations, where one would think a book of short reads would be entirely preferable to a several hundred page blockbuster? A well known novelist said recently on a TV programme that many who buy her books read them four miles high and only the first 60 pages. It’s like the eyes are bigger than the stomach – ordering a 16 oz steak and eating only eight and you haven’t touched the chips. But at least you know what you are getting. Like a trip to MacDonalds. It’s safe. Anywhere in the world you can be served the same bland fare. No matter that you might not eat all of it, or that however much you do eat you’ll still be hungry in an hour. There are no surprises.
And that’s where the good short story differs. It may shock, surprise, dazzle, leave you high and dry, out on a limb and hanging. It might change the way you look at something, the way you think. You don’t know what you are buying, what you are letting yourself in for. I sometimes feel like issuing a health warning with the Fish Anthology – these stories may seriously damage your outlook - The seventeen stories in this book come from all over the place, but they have in common their originality. Here is the view of writers who see the world in their unique ways, and have the imagination, talent, and the courage to refine it into that most surprising of all art forms – the short story.
Clem Cairns
Durrus
2000
ISBN:0-9523522-4-9
Edited by Clem
Cairns
Contents:
Kathryn Hughes, "Five
O'Clock Shadow"
Julia Asher, "The
Neighbor"
Kevin Parry, "Drowned
Boy"
Robert Grindy, "Little
Stevie Augers In"
Sami Moukaddem, "Ahmad's
Teeth"
Audrey Thomas, "Volunteers"
Lisa Steppe, "Teller
of Tales"
Melissa Gaskill, "Swift
Water"
Robin Winick, "Mrs
Purvis"
Read
this story in Short
Stories to Read Online
Morag McIntyre Hadley, "Making
History"
Eleanor Flegg, "The
Lobster Shift"
Celia Bryce, "Skate
Blades"
Sylvia Baker, "History
Of A Vagrant"
Ian Baker, "All The
Good Times Too"
Rebecca Lisle, "Toppling
Lorna"
Frank Cossa, "Cloud
Shadows"
Pansy Billingsly, "Headline
News"