Book picks similar to
Hardware River Stories by Alyson Hagy


american
covered-and-read
graywolf-press
short-story

A Fancy-Dress Death: A Sherlock and Lucy Short Story


Anna Elliott - 2019
    Holmes and Lucy are away, and Flynn wants to handle a dangerous situation all on his own. But appearances can be deceiving, and lurking threats aren't always visible. Fortunately, Becky, Jack, and Watson are still in town. The Baker Street team goes from the rough section of Whitechapel to a posh London mansion for a fancy dress ball. Flynn, of course, doesn't have an invitation. All too soon he discovers that death is also an uninvited guest. The Sherlock and Lucy adventures combine gripping intrigue with classic Holmes. Becky and Flynn take turns with the narrative viewpoints in this story. If you like cozy mysteries, historical mysteries, or historical fiction, you'll love this series. Get it now!

The Strange Case of Rachel K


Rachel Kushner - 2015
    Written prior to the publication of Kushner’s acclaimed debut novel Telex From Cuba, these stories, like Roberto Bolaño’s Antwerp, burst forth with the genesis of her fictional universe. From the mythical “Great Exception,” to the ominous “Debouchment”—originally published in her too-short-lived journal Soft Targets—to the sexy and noirish title story, Kushner saddles up for a journey into the wilds of modern fiction.

The Patagonia


Henry James - 1888
    You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.

Stranded Poolside With The Billionaire's Son


Susanne Ash - 2019
    He doesn’t want to be hurt again. But their attraction to each other is undeniable. Caroline’s job as personal assistant to billionaire Evelyn Sutton takes her to the family beach house on Palmer Island. She’s looking forward to a few quiet days getting the house ready. She didn’t expect to find her boss’s youngest son swimming in the pool. Pete Sutton plays the spoiled rich guy well. It affords him the privacy to do the charity work that’s important to him. He likes his mother’s PA too much for a quick fling, but dating anyone is out of the question. He’s still licking his wounds from his one and only serious relationship. Neither one of them is looking for love, but can they ignore the chemistry between them when they are stuck together on beautiful Palmar Island? This is a 20,000 word sweet romance novella with no cliff hangers and a HEA. it's the first of the Clean Beach Billionaire series.

Something Evil This Way Comes: Haunted House (The Haunting of Briar Park Book 1)


Carrie King - 2018
    Journey to Briar Park if you dare... Brother Nicholas is tempted by evil forces to read from an ancient book. His fellow monks are the first victims of this awful and irreversible act. Brother Nicholas is taken from the monastery to live in a remote house Briar Park, compelled to live out the rest of his days in tormented solitude. Constantly tortured by the whispering voices, he is instructed to commit a terrible crime. Can anything end the evil hold on the house in Briar Park? How far will the unholy acts reach? And can anything silence the whispering voices? Keep your wits about you and look carefully over your shoulder as you learn the history of the house in Briar Park…. What was that sound? Is that a faint whispering you can hear in the dark of the night? Scroll up now to read for FREE on Kindle Unlimited or just 0.99 do it before your nerve breaks. Also available With Wicked Intent Silent Screaming The Darkness in the Shadows

Under Ground


Megan Marsnik - 2015
    Her parents have died, her food is dwindling and the rent is due. When a stranger arrives bearing a note from an uncle, inviting Katka to join him and his wife in America, she leaves all that she has held dear to rebuild her life across the ocean. On the voyage to New York, she becomes friends with the stranger and begins to fall in love. But at Ellis Island, they are separated when he is detained by authorities as a suspected anarchist. Alone, Katka continues her journey to her uncle’s house on the rough and tumble Iron Range in northern Minnesota. Soon she is immersed in a lively community of iron miners and begins publishing an underground newspaper about their struggles and the heroism of the women on the Iron Range, as they are swept into a tumultuous strike that will change their lives forever. “Under Ground” is a work of fiction inspired by true events.

Leelyn


Ally Crew - 2020
    LeelynGrandpa Smith's pumpkin farm has always held great memories.And now it's mine and my sister's to take run and hopefully bring to the 21st Century.When the neighbor, Judson Renner, decides he's going to withhold water for our pumpkins, he's in for a fight.The scrawny boy from my youth has grown up--muscles and a cut jaw that I want to run my finger along, just to see if it cuts me.And when I get in his face about the issue, I find myself leaning in when he leans down.I can't be falling for the country boy next door, I've got too much on the line right now.JudsonI let Joe Smith use the small part of my family's land to have access to water the pumpkins.That business is long gone and I'm done with being the nice neighbor.Leelyn with her golden highlighted auburn hair, teal eyes, and pouty lips makes my boots start dancing when they should be stomping away.She might have other plans, but if she wants access to that water, she's going to have to come to my side of the fence...for dinner.I'm not that awkward boy from my youth. I'm a man.And I'm ready to show her that it's better to love than to fight...but it sure does make for some good country fun.

Their Christmas Miracle


Misty Shae - 2017
    He never thought he’d find love again after the death of his wife and son. Natalie Porter and her son, Tommy are traveling to Chicago so that she can give birth to a child that she can’t keep. When Tommy goes missing on the train, Natalie and Ken cross paths in the search to find her son, but end up finding so much more in each other. When Natalie is forced to get off the train after going in labor, Kenneth decides to go with her, offering her a whole new life if she’ll only let him. Will Natalie accept his offer to be her husband and adopt the baby she so desperately wants to keep? Could the love that bloomed between them in such a short amount of time, be real?

Christmas Car Kerfuffle


Jessie Gussman - 2021
    Her surprise soon gives way to panic when they figure out that an employee gave her car to the wrong person and it is now five hundred miles away. All the Christmas gifts that she’d carefully budgeted out for her children since July were in the trunk.Zayden Crile can’t believe his employee made such a huge mistake. And of all people it had to be his former sister-in-law. She’s still upset that his brother ran off with the nurse, leaving her with two small children. She has struggled, and to make things a little easier Zayden takes care of her car as a favor. He certainly never intended to make a mistake which could ruin Christmas for his niece and nephew.Forced to ride together to get her car, Blythe starts to see Zayden in a new light and realizes that maybe she married the wrong brother. Could one honest mistake patch a new family together?

Wait Till You See Me Dance


Deb Olin Unferth - 2017
    Her stories are revered by some of the best American writers of our day, but until now there has been no stand-alone collection of her short fiction.Wait Till You See Me Dance consists of several extraordinary longer stories as well as a selection of intoxicating very short stories. In the chilling “The First Full Thought of Her Life,” a shooter gets in position while a young girl climbs a sand dune. In “Voltaire Night,” students compete to tell a story about the worst thing that ever happened to them. In “Stay Where You Are,” two oblivious travelers in Central America are kidnapped by a gunman they assume to be an insurgent—but the gunman has his own problems.An Unferth story lures you in with a voice that seems amiable and lighthearted, but it swerves in sudden and surprising ways that reveal, in terrifying clarity, the rage, despair, and profound mournfulness that have taken up residence at the heart of the American dream. These stories often take place in an exaggerated or heightened reality, a quality that is reminiscent of the work of Donald Barthelme, Lorrie Moore, and George Saunders, but in Unferth’s unforgettable collection she carves out territory that is entirely her own.

The O. Henry Prize Stories 2003


Laura Furman - 2003
    Henry Prize stories collection has offered an exciting selection of the best stories published in hundreds of literary magazines every year. Such classic works of American literature as Ernest Hemingway’s The Killers (1927); William Faulkner’s Barn Burning (1939); Carson McCuller’s A Tree. A Rock. A Cloud (1943); Shirley Jackson’s The Lottery (1949); J.D. Salinger’s For Esme with Love and Squalor (1963); John Cheever’s The Country Husband (1956) ; and Flannery O’Conner’s Everything that Rises Must Converge (1963) all were O. Henry Prize stories. An accomplished new series editor--novelist and short story writer Laura Furman--has read more than a thousand stories to identify the 20 winners, each one a pleasure to read today, each one a potential classic. The O. Henry Prize Stories 2003 also contains brief essays from each of the three distinguished judges on their favorite story, and comments from the prize-winning writers on what inspired their stories. There is nothing like the ever rich, surprising, and original O. Henry collection for enjoying the contemporary short story.The Thing in the Forest A. S. Byatt The Shell Collector Anthony Doerr Burn Your Maps Robyn Jay Leff Lush Bradford Morrow God’s Goodness Marjorie Kemper Bleed Blue in Indonesia Adam Desnoyers The Story Edith Pearlman Swept Away T. Coraghessan Boyle Meanwhile Ann Harleman Three Days. A Month. More. Douglas Light The High Road Joan Silber Election Eve Evan S. Connell Irish Girl Tim Johnston What Went Wrong Tim O’Brien The American Embassy Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Kissing William Kittredge Sacred Statues William Trevor Two Words Molly Giles Fathers Alice Munro Train Dreams Denis Johnson

Aliens in the Prime of Their Lives


Brad Watson - 2010
    In “Vacuum,” three young brothers make trouble when they call on the seedy neighborhood doctor to cheer up their underappreciated mother. Originally published in The New Yorker, “Visitation” follows a down-and-out, divorced father as he spends a weekend with his son at a California motel. A husband shoots himself in the foot in “The Terrible Argument,” letting down not only his wife but his dog as well. In the masterful title novella, a freshly married, disastrously mismatched, and expectant young couple are visited by an unusual pair of inmates from a nearby insane asylum, who just might be—or might as well be—aliens from another planet.Brad Watson writes with such an all-seeing, six-dimensional view of human hopes and inadequacies that his talent must come from another planet. With wry humor and otherworldly grace, he reminds us how alien we humans really are—to each other and to ourselves.

Adrift in New York


Horatio Alger Jr. - 1902
    As a young man, that secret took hold of his life, and he left the life and the life's work he had made for himself in Boston, to take up residence among the poor in New York City. Ensconced there, he worked among the poor -- and took to writing tales of their success. His novels captured the imagination of a nation bursting with a new wave of immigrants who'd come to our shores -- come to the very port of New York City that was Alger's new home. He used the wealth that came to him to help the poor folks who he loved, and took his secret to the grave. It escaped from there, of course. You can find it if you look a bit. But for the purpose of this fine novel of the rise to riches, it will remain unstated . . .Alger wrote approximately one hundred thirty-five "dime novels." His forte was rags-to-riches stories, describing how boys might be able to achieve the American Dream of wealth and success through hard work, courage, determination, and concern for others. His characters don't achieve great wealth, but rather stability, security, and a place in society which they earn through their efforts. He is considered significant figure in the history of American cultural and social ideals. Bestsellers in their own time, Alger's books rivaled those of Mark Twain in popularity.Adrift in New York involves the disappearance of a son from the household of his wealthy father, John Linden. The boy has been kidnapped by the villainous Curtis Waring, John Linden's nephew, who hopes to inherit the family fortune. Grown up, the youngster lives a precarious life on the streets of New York. When Linden's ward Florence rejects the unwanted attentions of Waring, she is disinherited, forced to live in a tenement and work in a sweatshop . . . until it is discovered that the young man who befriends her is, in reality, Linden's long-lost son.

This Tower of Ashes


George R.R. Martin - 1976
    R. Martin's "The Thousand Worlds" setting.

A Tryst At Midnight (The Alesi Men)


Serenity King - 2012
    The title, some content, and publisher have changed. Piero Alesi is back in the states after being away in Italy for two years. At a family get-together he’s decided that Adanna Washington will be his. Piero is known for getting what he wants both in business and his personal life. He's never envisioned himself in competition with his own cousin, Nicco for Adanna’s attention. Nicco believes he has the upper hand—Adanna’s his sister’s best friend, and he’s been in contact with Adanna far longer than Piero. However, Piero is willing to chance that the love he has for Adanna will far outweigh Nicco’s lust. He only has to convince her. Adanna Washington writes about love but doesn’t have the time for romance in her life. She is far too busy. Adanna is late on a deadline with her editor — attending her best friend, Carina’s Alesi’s family outing is the last place she should be. Imagine her surprise when at the outing she attracts the attention of not only Carina’s brother, Nicco, but also of Carina’s elusive cousin, Piero. Not wanting to be a pawn in this game the Alesi men seem to want to play—she rebuffs them both, or so she thought.