Product Description

Since its inception in 1915, the Best American series has become the premier annual showcase for the country's finest short fiction and nonfiction. For each volume, a series editor reads pieces from hundreds of periodicals, then selects between fifty and a hundred outstanding works. That selection is pared down to the twenty or so very best pieces by a guest editor who is widely recognized as a leading writer in his or her field. This unique system has helped make the Best American series the most respected -- and most popular -- of its kind.

This year's Best American Short Stories features a rich mix of voices, from both intriguing new writers and established masters of the form like Michael Chabon, Edwidge Danticat, Richard Ford, Jhumpa Lahiri, and Arthur Miller. The 2002 collection includes stories about everything from illicit love affairs to family, the immigrant experience and badly behaved children -- stories varied in subject but unified in their power and humanity. In the words of this year's guest editor, the best-selling author Sue Miller, "The American short story today [is] healthy and strong . . . These stories arrived in the nick of time . . . to teach me once more what we read fiction for."

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #526911 in Books
• Published on: 2002-10-15
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 400 pages

Amazon.com Review
In her opening remarks to The Best American Short Stories 2002, guest editor Sue Miller notes the difficulty of reading fiction produced during 2001, the year of the September 11 terrorist attacks. She also remarks that by the time she had finalized her 20 selections, this act of reading had restored her faith both in fiction's significance and its ability to tap into timeless themes. The 2002 anthology includes stories best described as realist fiction or traditional fiction, many set in contemporary times. The tales range from E.L. Doctorow's "A House on the Plains," a murder set at the turn of the century, to pieces with more recent settings, like "Puppy" by Richard Ford, which shows how a New Orleans couple deals--or doesn't deal--with the appearance of a stray dog. Both Jhumpa Lahiri's "Nobody's Business" and Edwidge Danticat's "Seven" deftly portray the disconnection a semi-assimilated Indian American and Haitian American couple experience both as partners and as U.S. citizens. Leonard Michael's "Nachman from Los Angeles," in contrast, adds some levity to the mix. Miller adds in her preface that maybe next year the tales will depart further from tradition, but judging from this volume no departure is necessary: the selections take the reader on a delightful journey through some of America's best contemporary writers. --Jane Hodges

From Publishers Weekly
Timeless yet time bound, these excellent stories inhabit the past as solidly as the present, ranging from Midwest murder around 1900 in E.L. Doctorow's wonderful but deadly "A House on the Plains" to the 1937 Hindenberg tragedy in Jim Shepard's ingenious "Love and Hydrogen." Almost every story concentrates on producing perfect grace notes of characterization, with individual epiphany or anti-epiphany favored over plot and experimentation. An exception is the Shepard story, which describes the love affair of two male crewmen on the doomed Hindenberg a setting that contrasts sharply with the semi-anonymous backdrops of other stories. Most entries are fairly traditional in structure, but in the semiromantic "Digging," Beth Lordan displays a talent for dynamic shifts in time and place. Multicultural voices provide moving and deeply felt, if more conventional, gems, including Edwidge Danticat's "Seven" and Jhumpa Lahiri's "Nobody's Business." The most humorous entry is Leonard Michael's "Nachman from Los Angeles," the witty story of a rich Arab prince and a ghostwritten term paper. An impressive eight of the 20 stories chosen by editor Miller come from the pages of the New Yorker; Zoetrope is in second place with two entries to its credit. But no matter where they were first published, nearly all of the stories chosen are stellar examples of each writer's work. If a comforting sense of tradition and consolidation pervades this anthology, it is cause for praise, not criticism.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
This year's edition of the popular short story anthology contains many pieces that focus on the past as either a setting or a counterpoint to the protagonist's current life. As guest editor Miller states in her introduction, the realist story seems to have taken hold as the American form of this art. There is very little experimental writing, except perhaps in the trend toward covering a surprisingly broad span of time in a short amount of space. The always reliable Alice Munro gives us a fascinating character sketch in "Family Furnishings." In Akhil Sharma's "Surrounded by Sleep," a young Hindu boy's most comforting image of God is a cardigan-clad Clark Kent. And both E.L. Doctorow ("A House on the Plains") and Melissa Hardy ("The Heifer") remind us that the American frontier was far from quaint or picturesque. Writers like Arthur Miller, Michael Chabon, and Beth Lordan are also featured. Recommended for most collections.
Christine DeZelar-Tiedman, Univ. of Minnesota Libs., Minneapolis
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Customer Reviews

The best story series, year after year
The Best American Short Stories series, edited in recent years by Katrina Kenison, remains the best source of diverse contemporary short fiction. Traditionally, the series editor selects 120 pieces from a wide range of commercial and literary publications, then passes them on to the guest editor, always a well-known writer. The guest editor - in this case Sue Miller - then selects what she believes are the best twenty. Although the guest editor is free to select stories he/she has discovered over the year and which aren't part of the package, few do. This year, the winners were filtered first through the subjective lens of Katrina Kenison, and then through that of Sue Miller. Readers should be aware that these aren't truly the "best" stories of the year, but only those judged so by two people. If you are like me, you WILL come across one or two of these stories that seem unworthy of inclusion; however, the rest will delight you.

Sue Miller wonders in her introduction if her personal imprint will be evident in her selections. She thinks not. However, there are several stories about animals, particularly cows and puppies, and about women unhappy or unsure in their new marriages. Most stories are traditionally told, rich in detail, with straightforward language. Stories from The New Yorker are well represented (eight out of the twenty), but Melissa Hardy's "The Heifer", originally published in Descant, is as engaging as those eight. Famous writers - Edwidge Danticat, Alice Munro, E. L. Doctorow - mingle with the lesser known talents of Mary Yukari Waters, Meg Mullins, and Karl Iagnemma. This is part of what makes this series so enjoyable, that new voices can stand proudly next to the masters'.

Especially when paired with the more experimental Pushcart Prize anthology, this book gives a good report on the trends of contemporary fiction. Look for forthcoming novels from some of the younger writers, as this series often brings them to the attention of book editors and agents.

I highly recommend The Best American Short Stories 2002 for anyone who enjoys reading short fiction. From Michael Chabon's "Along Frontage Road" to Richard Ford's "Puppy" to Mary Yukari Waters's "Aftermath", this book delivers, if not the promise of the title, then its spirit.

A Creeping Sameness
It feels somewhat churlish to complain about this collection of extremely well-written stories, but as it's claiming to be "America's Best," here goes...

Taken on their own, there is probably nothing wrong with any of these pieces. Michael Chabon has certainly done better work than 'Along the Frontage Road,' and Richard Russo has applied his tremendous ability to tales less pat and familiar than "The Puppy,' but these aren't bad stories. It's just that so many of them feel so similar. Reading too much of this book in one sitting creates a kind of mesmerizing monotony.

Some gems break the plodding pattern: Jhumpa Lahiri's grad student romance 'Noboby's Business,' fascinates, E.L. Doctrow's 'A House on the Plain' has more twisting plot than any three of his novels, and Beth Lordan's 'Digging' moves with wildly unexpected shifts in time and place -- an epic in miniature. Two stories about troubled mathematicians, 'Zilkowski's Theorem' and 'Nachman From Los Angeles,' also impress.

But overall this collection feels more exhausted than inspired. Perhaps this is the result of too many stories (eight out of twenty) plucked from The New Yorker, or the particular preferences of This-Year's-Name-Guest-Editor Sue Miller, but surely there must be more variety to American short fiction than the tales encountered here would indicate.

The Best Collection in Years
I read this collection every year. Usually, I wind up skipping some stories because I just can't get into them. But I didn't skip a single story in this year's volume. All the stories are diversely terrific -- each captivating in their own way.