For Powell's 2016 Short List, we scoured our brains and our bookshelves to put forth a group of the best debut short story collections ever published. With some notable exceptions, the short story collection is a relatively new phenomenon, and we approached this list with that in mind — you won't find books dating back beyond the 20th century here. What you will find are some pretty phenomenal first collections by a wildly talented group of writers. We hope you enjoy our list.
÷ ÷ ÷
The Age of Wire and String (1995)
by Ben Marcus
The Age of Wire and String was the world's introduction to the bold experimentations of Ben Marcus, who has gone on to become one of America's most respected postmodernists.
The Age of Wire and String deconstructs language, the world, and human behavior in a way that is bizarre, hilarious, and possibly even visionary.
– Kevin S.
The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God and Other Stories (2004)
by Etgar Keret
I have a good time when I read Etgar Keret. The stories in
The Bus Driver Who Wanted to Be God are wonderfully varied, and there is no predicting what will happen. In one, a woman's uterus is put on display in a museum (because it is just so beautiful). Another takes place in a convenience store at the mouth of Hell. There is no writer like him and no book like this.
– Britt
CivilWarLand in Bad Decline (1996)
by George Saunders
CivilWarLand in Bad Decline is the foundation George Saunders has built his influential career on. It's a modest collection: six short stories and a novella, all set in dystopian near-futures when America is a tourist trap and its people live under corporate law. He explores soul-grinding jobs for faceless companies and the dreams of the downtrodden as they are beaten down by their rich and powerful overlords. His writing is funny, it's dark, it's genuine, and it still feels fresh 20 years later. With this collection as a launching point, it's easy to see why Saunders has been rightfully called the next Vonnegut.
– Jake A.
Dance of the Happy Shades (1968)
by Alice Munro
In Alice Munro's debut, her great talent sprung forth at full force. These early stories are shorter and more restricted in setting and scope than her later ones, but they are just as astonishingly rich. Somehow, these quiet accounts of mundane lives in tiny Jubilee, Ontario, contain whole worlds and perspective-shaking insights.
– Cindy
Drinking Coffee Elsewhere (2003)
by ZZ Packer
I read this whole collection more or less by accident; I originally only intended on browsing the book but found I couldn't put it down. ZZ Packer's style is well-crafted, her writing flawless. And the stories are vivid, almost like stored memories you're only now recalling, because of her ability to tap into the core undercurrents that take place between humans, no matter their skin color, social background, or place in the world. It's a brilliant debut.
– Aubrey
Dubliners (1914)
by James Joyce
Here is Joyce at his most approachable and naturalistic, soaking in the culture of prewar Dublin. These stories are like facets in a diamond: the whole glittering. The concluding tale, "The Dead," might be the best short story in the English language, or at least the one most likely to make you weep like a child after every reading.
– Jason C.
Girl with Curious Hair (1989)
by David Foster Wallace
Most of Wallace's literary reputation rests on his novels (the maximalist, futuristic tragicomedy of
Infinite Jest in particular) and his essays (slice-of-life pieces about cruises and state fairs and David Lynch and everything in between). But a strong argument could be made that his greatest works were his short stories. Some of the pieces in this first collection, published in 1989, hint at the complex themes of his novels — the intersection between mass culture and politics, the wide gulf that irony and postmodernism has created between us and our internal lives — and some have the biting, sharp humor of his nonfiction. All of the stories suggest a writer thinking deeply about where our society was and where it was headed, for good and for ill.
– Tim B.
Goodbye, Columbus (1959)
by Philip Roth
Winner of the 1960 National Book Award,
Goodbye, Columbus shocked many in the Jewish community. The title novella and five short stories tell of Jewish characters in, some said, a less-than-flattering light. When I read it, I see real people in less-than-happy situations any reader can empathize with. It's a fantastic beginning to a first-rate career.
– Jeff J.
A Good Man Is Hard to Find (1955)
by Flannery O'Connor
You probably read a story from this collection in your high school lit class, and I can't stress enough that the entire collection is worth revisiting. O'Connor is exemplary of the Southern Gothic style: her stories are deeply rooted in the paradoxes of American Southern culture. They each examine morality by way of strange, monstrous characters, but her style is never didactic. There wasn't a single story here that didn't leave me thoughtful and satisfied.
– Ashleigh
Interpreter of Maladies (1999)
by Jhumpa Lahiri
The characters in Lahiri's Pulitzer Prize–winning collection are children of Indian immigrants living in the Boston area. The book is hailed as politically important in its sophisticated treatment of cultural intersections. But I love that these stories are also deeply personal. What they say about love, loss, and childhood perceptions is so right and so heartbreaking. I can't think of a better example of how the political and the personal are really one thing.
– Cindy
In the Garden of the North American Martyrs (1981)
by Tobias Wolff
In the Garden of the North American Martyrs begins with one of my all-time favorite short stories, "Next Door." It's a simple premise: an older couple irritated with their next-door neighbors. And it's only five and a half pages. But it has stuck with me for years. That is what Tobias Wolff does so well — take something simple and make it significant. His stories are built to last.
– Britt
Jesus' Son (1992)
by Denis Johnson
This is outsider fiction at its best. The narrator, a heroin addict without a name, drifts through a series of encounters on the fringes of society. Along the way, reality twists away from him, and he entertains violent fantasies and obsessions about the other "weirdos" he meets, before he eventually winds up in detox. These stories aren't for the faint of heart, but they are an intriguing view of a subculture most of us never even see.
– Ashleigh
The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fist Fight in Heaven (1993)
by Sherman Alexie
The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fist Fight in Heaven is an impressive collection of humorous and heartbreaking stories lyrically written, with intertwining story lines portraying the hardships of contemporary Indians. Alexie gives an honest account of the divide between natives and whites, reservation Indians and urban Indians, traditionalism and modern culture. This stunning debut — from one of the most celebrated Native American orators, authors, and poets of all time — went on to be the basis for the award-winning movie
Smoke Signals, and set the foundation for many more beautiful and heartbreaking works about native life.
– Kate L.
The Lottery and Other Stories (1949)
by Shirley Jackson
Nearly 70 years after its release,
The Lottery and Other Stories is still a startling, deeply unsettling collection. Many of Jackson's pieces feature characters drifting blithely through life until someone destroys their secure world with the flick of the wrist. Others, like the infamous "Lottery" or the much quieter "Flower Garden," reveal how quickly we can turn on those we once held close, if tradition calls for it. You, too, will be pulled out of your comfort zone reading these tales, which unfold so sinuously, so gracefully, it can be easy to forget until they reach their end that they're horror stories through and through.
– Renee
Nine Stories (1953)
by J. D. Salinger
Nine Stories is a book that speaks to nearly everyone, from precocious adolescents to jaded adults. The stories are technically brilliant — with vividly drawn characters, revelatory turns, and all the components that teachers say short stories should have — but they're also lovable and interesting. And the best few stories, like "For Esmé — with Love and Squalor" and "A Perfect Day for Bananafish," are unforgettable.
– Cindy
The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories (2015)
by Ken Liu
Ken Liu's
The Paper Menagerie houses a collection of stories that are independently stunning. They dabble outside the grasp of reality, creating rich worlds threaded with magic and science fiction in order to breach the threshold between something new and something ancient. While the stories are sometimes haunting, consistently indelible, it's their strength together that earns this collection a place on the Short List. Combined, the stories weave their way through layers of human experience with a tireless grace.
– Miranda H.
Self-Help (1985)
by Lorrie Moore
Self-Help is a collection of stories written under the guise of being guides. Many are in the second person, and many have titles like "How to ______." One is even just called “How.” But, of course, they aren't actually instructional. Instead they tell stories of people who know better, and bad situations getting worse.
Self-Help may not be helpful, but not for lack of expertise.
– Britt
The Stories of Breece D'J Pancake (1983)
by Breece D'J Pancake
In an attempt to make sense of the tragic suicide of 26-year-old literary phenomenon Breece D'J Pancake, Kurt Vonnegut once wrote in a letter to John Casey: "I give you my word of honor that [Breece D'J Pancake] is merely the best writer, the most sincere writer I've ever read. What I suspect is that it hurt too much, was no fun at all to be that good. You and I will never know." Collected and published posthumously,
The Stories of Breece D'J Pancake contains 12 haunting and beautiful stories set in rural impoverished West Virginia. With a debut collection that Joyce Carol Oates compared to Hemingway's, this young writer with the eccentric name deserves to be more than just a long lost American treasure.
– Wesley
What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours (2016)
by Helen Oyeyemi
What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours came out just this year, and it is bizarre, magical, whimsical, dark, and delightful. Oyeyemi's works are usually haunting and weird and peopled with genuinely diverse characters. Each story centers somehow around the idea of keys and their quiet power: sometimes keys help, sometimes they hurt, but Oyeyemi makes them feel ominous, like they know something we don't. Her stories are full of heart and humor and a little bit of horror. Oyeyemi is a brilliant writer and a uniquely imaginative storyteller, but she never seems to take herself too seriously, which I love.
– Katie V.
Will You Please Be Quiet, Please? (1976)
by Raymond Carver
Most of the stories in Carver's first collection were written between 1960 and 1974, the era when he was drinking heavily, raising two small children, and teaching. In Carver's world, a cigarette smolders in an ashtray, an alcoholic beverage is consumed, and a tense, awkward conversation unfolds. This first book is perhaps his most stark and minimalist, but, like all of his work, it is shot through with moments of startling, incandescent illumination.
– Mary Jo