A collection of stories by Sandra Cisneros, the winner of the 2019 PEN/Nabokov Award for Achievement in International Literature.The lovingly drawn characters of these stories give voice to the vibrant and varied life on both sides of the Mexican border with tales of pure discovery, filled with moments of infinite and intimate wisdom.

    In this ebullient collection, virgins escape from being sacrificed, witches refuse to be burned, whores aren't ashamed, and every woman gets a chance to be a radioactive cockroach warrior who snaps back at catcallers. Gwen E. Kirby experiments with found structures--a Yelp review, a WikiHow article--which her fierce, irreverent narrators push against, showing how creativity within an enclosed space undermines and deconstructs the constraints themselves. When these women tell the stories of their triumphs as well as their pain, they emerge as funny, angry, loud, horny, lonely, strong protagonists who refuse be secondary characters a moment longer. From "The Best and Only Whore of Cym Hyfryd, 1886" to the "Midwestern Girl [who] is Tired of Appearing in Your Short Stories," Kirby is playing and laughing with the women who have come before her and they are telling her, we have always been this way. You just had to know where to look.

    In Saul Bellow’s masterly translation, the title story follows the exploits of Gimpel, an ingenuous baker who is universally deceived but who declines to retaliate against his tormentors. Gimpel and the protagonists of the other stories in this volume all inhabit the distinctive pre–World War II ghettos of Poland and, beyond that, the larger world created by Singer’s unforgettable prose.

    A restless young mulatto tries desperately to find a comfortable place in a world in which she sees herself as a perpetual outsider. A mother's confrontation with tragedy tests her loyalty to her race.The gifted Harlem Renaissance writer Nella Larsen wrote compelling dramas about the black middle class that featured sensitive, spirited heroines struggling to find a place where they belonged. Passing, Larsen's best-known work, is a disturbing story about the unraveling lives of two childhood friends, one of whom turns her back on her past and marries a white bigot. Just as disquieting is the portrait in Quicksand of Helga Crane, half black and half white, who can't escape her loneliness no matter where and with whom she lives. Race and marriage offer few securities her or in the other stories in a collection that is compellingly readable, rich in psychological complexity, and imbued with a sense of place that brings Harlem vibrantly to life.

    "Norma had run off with Guy Dupree and I was waiting around for the credit card billings to come in so I could see where they had gone." The fussbudget is assailed by tropical storms, grifters, hippies, car trouble, and candy wrappers at high speed "wind came up through the floor hole in such a way that the Heath wrappers were suspended behind my head in a noisy brown vortex". Leech Dr Reo Symes is a font of dubious financial schemes and fluff such as a circus "fifty-pound rat from the sewers of Paris, France. Of course it didn't really weigh fifty pounds and it wasn't your true rat and it wasn't from Paris, France, either. It was some kind of animal from South America."

    A highpoint of the collection is Thomas's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog, a vivid collage of memories from his Swansea childhood that combines the lyricism of his poetry with the sparkle and sly humor of Under Milk Wood. Also here is the fiction from Quite Early One Morning, a collection planned by Thomas shortly before his death.Altogether there are more than forty stories, providing a rich and varied literary feast and showing Dylan Thomas in all his intriguing variety-somber fantasist, joyous word-spinner, comedian of smalltown Wales. The book includes an entertaining, informative reflection on Thomas by another Welsh poet and storyteller, Leslie Norris, as well as a brief listing of publication details by Professor Walford Davies, editor of Dylan Thomas: Early Prose Works.After the fair --Tree --True story --Enemies --Dress --Visitors --Vest --Burning baby --Orchards --End of the river --Lemon --Horse's ha --School for witches --Mouse and the woman --Prospect of the sea --Holy six --Prologue to an adventure --Map of love --In the direction of the beginning --Adventure from a work in progress --Portrait of the artist as a young dog: Peaches --Visit to Grandpa's --Patricia, Edith and Arnold --Fight --Extraordinary little cough --Just like little dogs --Where Tawe flows --Who do you wish was with us? --Old Garbo --One warm Saturday --Adventures in the skin trade: Fine beginning --Plenty of furniture --Four lost souls --Quite early one morning --Child's Christmas in Wales --Holiday memory --Crumbs of one man's year --Return journey --Followers --Story --Appendix: early stories: Brember --Jarley's --In the garden --Gaspar, Melchior, Balthsar --List of sources

    Henry Prize Stories 2011 contains twenty unforgettable stories selected from hundreds of literary magazines. The winning tales take place in such far-flung locales as Madagascar, Nantucket, a Midwestern meth lab, Antarctica, and a post-apocalyptic England, and feature a fascinating array of characters: aging jazzmen, avalanche researchers, a South African wild child, and a mute actor in silent films. Also included are essays from the eminent jurors on their favorite stories, observations from the winners on what inspired them, and an extensive resource list of magazines.  Your Fate Hurtles Down at YouJim Shepard Diary of an Interesting YearHelen Simpson MelindaJudy Doenges NightbloomingKenneth Calhoun The Restoration of the Villa Where Tibor Kálmán Once LivedTamas Dobozy IceLily Tuck How to Leave HialeahJennine Capó Crucet The JunctionDavid Means Pole, PoleSusan Minot Alamo PlazaBrad Watson The Black Square Chris Adrian Nothing of ConsequenceJane Delury The Rules Are the RulesAdam Foulds The Vanishing AmericanLeslie Parry CrossingMark Slouka Bed DeathLori Ostlund WindeyeBrian Evenson SunshineLynn Freed Never Come BackElizabeth Tallent Something You Can’t Live WithoutMatthew Neill Null For author interviews, photos, and more,  go to www.ohenryprizestories.com   A portion of the proceeds from this book will go to support the PEN Readers & Writers Literary Outreach Program.

    When the second Iraq war breaks out, it is only natural that their newest generations should be represented in the ranks of British officers: at 24, Lieutenant Susie Anderson delays her wedding to handsome fellow-officer Callum and joins her regiment on the hot sands of Kuwait. Brother Francis, meanwhile, continues his cabaret career as Madam Fanny Fantoni, drag chanteuse and net-stockinged vamp, with a stinging line in repartee and the most remarkable falsetto top C in Clapham. As the neighbours agree, it must be terribly difficult for their poor parents, especially the General. Real difficulties come, though, when Callum comes home injured, altered and bitter, and Susie and her family feel as though their lives are shattered. The solution to this tangle comes from the most unlikely source of all. Set against a background of desert war, seedy clubs, a hippie sailing-ship and quiet English village life, Libby Purves' latest novel is a commentary on changing social roles, the nature of courage and the futility of prejudice.

    This series features classic tales retold with color illustrations to introduce literature to struggling readers. Each 64-page eBook retains key phrases and quotations from the original classics. You'll be kept in suspense with these four Edgar Allan Poe short stories! The Pit and the Pendulum, The Fall of the House of Usher, The Cask of Amontillado, The Murders in the Rue Morgue.