Best Short Reading 2017

I put an emphasis on reading short stories this year, and keeping track of the best ones. Here they are, in no particular order.

Anthologies:

• Tender: stories by Sofia Samatar. This collection is among the two best things I read all year. Each is a truly immersive fantasy and effortless prose.
• Three Messages and a Warning edited by Eduardo Jimenez-May & Chris N. Brown. Contemporary Mexican Short Stories of the Fantastic. This book was a give-away for my purchase of Tender at the Small Beer Press booth at the World Fantasy Convention this year. It was an unexpected gem filled with so many talented Mexican authors.
• Red Dust and Dancing Horses and Other Stories by Beth Cato. The Souls of Horses captured me with its humanness and its ‘horseness.’ I think the author would know what I mean as would any reader.
• Dreams of Distant Shores by Patricia A. McKillip. Patricia McKillip makes writing feel simple and elegant at the same time. The stories are full of imagination.

Uncollected Stories:

• The Dead Father Cookbook by Ashley Boom: http://www.ashleyblooms.com/
• What if I Fall by Anne Dafeta http://omenana.com/2017/04/06/what-if-i-fall/ Anne Dafeta: https://ajdafeta.wordpress.com/
• Ten Thousand Sleeping Beauties by Jocelyn Koehler: http://www.teamblood.org
• Ghostling by E. Catherine Tobler: http://ecatherine.com
• The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, by Eugenia Triantafyllou https://eugeniatriantafyllou.wordpress.com