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Again, another year of great small fictions collected. As I read, I started a list of all the great stories and the separate reasons they're great. I kept reading and the list kept growing and, by the time I finished the book, my list with its reasons seemed longer than the book. Read the book. It's that good.
Just yesterday I read an online article that listed the writer’s favorite “very short” fiction pieces. She also mused on the idea that flash fiction was perhaps out of fashion. Through the years I’ve heard the same of any-length short stories, but that’s never been my experience. This series is proof that--to paraphrase Mark Twain--the report of the death of small fiction is an exaggeration. As with the earlier two volumes, though quality is consistent, the works are satisfyingly varied. Just to...
If you logon to Duotrope and conduct a search for publications which feature flash fiction, you will find over 1000 listings featuring every genre, audience and market imaginable. The list is daunting and inspiring at the same time. This speaks to the increasing popularity of short fiction in an age where attention spans have shortened and technology has rendered it possible for a reader to carry hundreds of books on e-readers that can be slipped inside of purses and bags (continue reading athtt...
This. Collection. Wow. I reviewed BSF 2016 and came away impressed by about half of the stories. I got a review copy of this book from Tara Masih this summer. After finishing this collection tonight I came away loving so many of them. Those I didn't love I still really liked or appreciated. BSF 2017 has a great range to it, full of so many styles and voices and effects.These stories evoke laughter, pain, and a variety of emotions. Among my favorites were Joy Williams' Dearest, and her Polyuretha...
My general thoughts about the Best Small Fictions series are probably no secret. I’ve called both BSF 2015 and BSF 2016 the most important books published in their respective years.This year is no different.The most important book published this year is now and will prove to be Best Small Fictions 2017.Now that’s we’ve established that once again, I will say this year has been a particularly good year for flash fiction. The New Yorker has decided to publish flash stories throughout the summer (t...
Instagram Review: www.instagram.com/p/B-YqogZAtqK/I sometimes read a book more than once. Usually, I do that when I remember that I have enjoyed a book, but I can't remember why. (I read a ridiculous number of books.) I read 2017 Best Small Fictions more than once, but definitely not for this reason. Not at all. I read it three times; some of the stories, four (fivesixseven...) times because I could not stop thinking about them and ended up using them for my Write Short Journal, where I write my...
great flashes here.. another tsundoku down...
“There’s something about [an extremely short poem] that calls for attention. Surrounded by white space, it stands out, glowing like an island inviting us to land. It asks for only a moment of our time, and offers the hope of instant reward.”X. J. KennedyThe Best Small Fictions 2017 is guest edited by Amy Hempel. Hempel is a former student of Gordon Lish, in whose workshop she wrote several of her first stories. She has produced three other collections: At the Gates of the Animal Kingdom (1990),
This is an excellent collection of small fictions, short fictions. I have come to appreciate this form so much since I was first introduced to it by Tara Lynn Masih a few years ago. To have the skill to tell a story, convey emotions so fully in such a short space and to have it be complete, complex, a full experience, is amazing.There are so many stories I enjoyed or was moved by. One of the most powerful was "Don't Walk" by Joy Katz. Initially I was confused and then I was there with the writer...
(3.75) Now in its third year, this anthology collects the year’s best short stories under 1,000 words. Starting with a zinger of a first line is one strategy for making a short-short story stand out, and there are certainly some excellent opening sentences here. Symbols and similes are also crucial to conveying shorthand meaning. Two stand-outs are “States of Matter,” Tara Laskowski’s deliciously creepy story of revenge aided by a gravedigger; and Matthew Baker’s “The President’s Doubles,” in wh...
A splendid and varied collection of flash-fiction. Despite having published my own collection in the genre, I did not know much about it before.
Great variety of approaches and POVs in this classy collection of flash. I read this gradually over many months and what strikes me now, as I sit down to write a short review, is how often titles give you no prompt whatsoever by which to help remember what happened in a piece of writing you read ages ago. The best title in this book, in terms of prompting my memory, is "Silent Hill" by Ras Mashramani, because that piece was about, in part, a character's evolving relationship to the video game of...
A lot of work goes into this series. And we love the writing that we get to give a special nod to. This is my last year as series editor. It's been quite an experience setting this up, designing it twice, and bringing it out into the world for you readers. Thanks to all of you who helped make it a small press bestseller. As one of our reviewers says, each story is a "mini-masterwork." Hope you will check it out and judge for yourself.
There are many exceptional flash fiction stories in this series, including authors such as Joy Williams, Tara Laskowski, William Woolfitt, Michael C. Smith, Brian Doyle and more. If you enjoy short stories that make you pause, think, contemplate and consider, read this collection. The Best Small Fictions is available for 2015, 2016 and 2017. Can't wait for the next!!
The President's Doubles (Matthew Baker) is a great story.
Review of The Best Small Fictions 2017I was so excited to get the opportunity to review an early release of The Best Small Fictions 2017 edited by Amy Hempel (One of my favorite sentence makers! Get her Collected Stories right now!) and Tara L. Masih. And thanks to Braddock Avenue Books for taking the reins to publish this third volume of the anthology which I’ve been loving since before the first one. I LOVE Flash and Microfiction and was very very pleased to find several wonderful pieces of Mi...
Perfect for teachingAn excellent anthology exploring the landscape of flash fiction. These stories pin you down like bolts of lightning - impossibly strong however brief. Great book to teach emerging writers such as my self.
The TL:DR version: skip this year's edition. Read Wigleaf's Top 50 Very Short Fictions instead for exciting flash fiction.***This year's edition of Best Small Fictions is incredibly disappointing. It doesn't have the same crackling energy as last year's addition and I wonder if that's because it's the same flash fiction gatekeepers imposing what they feel is truly the best flash fiction, which seemed to be shorter versions of Raymond Carver stories more so than anything else. I would challenge t...