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Book details

The Story and Its Writer

An Introduction to Short Fiction

by Ann Charters

Published 1995926 pagesISBN 978-0-3121-1170-0

Civil peace / Chinua Achebe The last lovely city / Alice Adams Dominoes / Jack Agueros The Kugelmass episode / Woody Allen And of clay arewe created / Isabel Allende Death in the woods ; Hands / Sherwood Anderson Happy endings / Margaret Atwood My first goose / Isaac Babel Sonny's blues / James Baldwin The lesson / Toni Cade Bambara Lost in the funhouse / John Barth The Indian uprising / Donald Barthelme Janus / Ann Beattie [Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL14863196W/An_Occurrence_at_Owl_Creek_Bridge) / Ambrose Bierce The garden of forking paths / Jorge Luis Borges This way for the gas, ladies and gentlemen / Tadeusz Borowski The eye / Paul Bowles Black boy / Kay Boyle Stones in my passway, hellhound on my trail / T. Coraghessan Boyle A good scent from a strange mountain / Robert Olen Butler The feathered ogre / Italo Calvio The guest / Albert Camus The erl-king / Angela Carter Cathedral / Raymond Carver Errand / Raymond Carver What we talk about when we talk about love / Raymond Carver Paul's case / Willa Cather The swimmer / John Cheever The darling / Anton Chekhov The lady with the little dog / Anton Chekhov The sheriff's children / Charles Chesnutt [Désirée's baby](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL20078777W) / Kate Chopin [The story of an hour](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL20078864W) / Kate Chopin Little miracles, kept promises / Sandra Cisneros Heart of darkness / Joseph Conrad Axolotl / Julio Cortázar The open boat / Stephen Crane The sailor-boy's tale / Isak Dinesen Battle royal / Ralph Ellison King of the bingo game / Ralph Ellison The red convertible / Louise Erdrich [A rose for Emily](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL82884W) / William Faulkner [That evening sun](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL20080863W) / William Faulkner Babylon revisited / F. Scott Fitzgerald A simple heart / Gustave Flaubert 1933 / Mavis Gallant A very old man with enormous wings / Gabriel García Márquez The yellow wallpaper / Charlotte Perkins Gilman The overcoat / Nikolai Gogol Town and country lovers / Nadine Gordimer My kinsman, Major Molineux / Nathaniel Hawthorne [Young Goodman Brown](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL455569W) / Nathaniel Hawthorne Life / Bessie Head Hills like white elephants / Ernest Hemingway The gilded six-bits / Zora Neale Hurston Spunk / Zora Neale Hurston Sweat / Zora Neale Hurston The lottery / Shirley Jackson The beast in the jungle / Henry James A white heron / Sarah Orne Jewett Menagerie, a child's fable / Charles Johnson [Araby](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL20570121W) / James Joyce [The dead](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL15073437W) / James Joyce A hunger artist / Franz Kafka The metamorphosis / Franz Kafka Girl / Jamaica Kincaid The hitchhiking game / Milan Kundera Odour of chysanthemums / D.H. Lawrence The rocking-horse winner / D.H. Lawrence Braids / David Leavitt The ones who walk away from the Omelas / Ursula K. Le Guin Debbie and Julie / Doris Lessing Half a day / Naguib Mahfouz Black is my favorite color / Bernard Malamud Bliss / Katherine Mansfield The garden-party / Katherine Mansfield The dog of titwal / Saadat Hasan Manto Shiloh / Bobbie Ann Mason The necklace / Guy de Maupassant [Bartleby, the scrivener](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL102732W) / Herman Melville Fountains in the rain / Yukio Mishima How to become a writer / Lorrie Moore Mrs. Plum / Es'kia Mphahlele The management of grief / Bharati Mukherjee Walker brothers cowboy / Alice Munro Heat / Joyce Carol Oates Where are you going, where have you been / Joyce Carol Oates The things they carried / Tim O'Brien Everything that rises must converge / Flannery O'Connor Good country people / Flannery O'Connor A good man is hard to find / Flannery O'Connor Guests of the nation / Frank O'Connor In the shadow of war / Ben Okri I stand here ironing / Tillie Olsen The shawl / Cynthia Ozick A conversation with my father /

Beyond its central premise, the book can be read through the connected lenses of Fiction, Nonfiction. Those themes offer useful points of attention as the characters, ideas, or world develop, especially where the book complicates the expectations of its primary category.

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Full BookenDeX details

What the reading experience may hold

A fuller profile for choosing with more confidence—not just another copy of the preview.

Themes to notice

Fiction · Nonfiction

Use these as starting points rather than limits; the most memorable books often stretch beyond their catalog labels.

Content notes

Catalog signals suggest warfare and conflict, violence, death, or criminal harm, grief and loss. These notes may not be complete; consult a publisher or reader-supplied guide when detailed warnings matter.

These notes are inferred from available catalog information and may not be complete. Check a publisher or reader-supplied guide if you need comprehensive warnings.

Reading experience

Dark tone · Steady pace

Best when you want to settle into a longer reading experience.

Who it may suit

A good fit if…

Readers looking for a substantial, immersive commitment with room for a world or argument to unfold.

At a glance

This book's DNA

A visual estimate based on this edition's categories, description, and length. Select a star to explore the signals.

ToneDark
LuminousDark

This signal is descriptive, not a rating. It helps compare the kind of reading experience this edition may offer.

No plot details

Spoiler-Free Emotional Arc

A broad estimate of the book’s emotional rhythm, shown without story events or outcomes.

Spoiler-free
12345
PeakRelative emotional intensity
The Story and Its WriterAnn Charters
Powerful5/5

This visualization is an interpretive estimate based on catalog description, categories, tone, pace, and content signals. It does not describe specific scenes.

Before you choose

A quick reading snapshot

Edition facts and catalog signals to help you decide whether this book fits what you want to read next.

Reading lengthA longer, immersive read926 pages in this edition
Publication eraModernFirst published or edition dated 1995
Primary categoryFictionAlso cataloged under Nonfiction
ISBN-13
978-0-3121-1170-0
Language
English
Edition record
OL10385900M
BookenDeX editorial lens

A more thoughtful way into this book

This guide uses the edition details and category signals above to help you choose deliberately. It does not replace the author's work or a full review.

Good to know

Best when you want to settle into a longer reading experience.

Begin with its place in Fiction, then notice where the book resists that label.

Try this reading approach

Read for connection, not completion.

Mark one passage that sharpens the book's central concern and one that complicates it. That tension often reveals more than a quick summary.

Three questions to carry with you

  1. What does the central character want, and what do they misunderstand about that desire?
  2. Which detail or relationship changes how you interpret the story?
  3. What feeling or question does the book leave with you after the plot moves on?

Editorial framework by Wesley Bryan, BookenDeX Founder and Editor.