Leslie M. Pockell, you have my thanks. Because you remain true to the second word in the collection you’ve edited, 21 ESSENTIAL AMERICAN SHORT STORIES, I can clear my shelves of several other anthologies I was keeping around for a single tale or two. You have excellent taste.
Chances are, many readers will be familiar with most of the stories in this volume; several are all-time favorites of mine since being taught them in school. I can recall being a student who didn’t particularly care much for reading, but experiencing a jolt of joy in English class when introduced to Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery.” Talk about an eye-opener.
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A couple of years ago, while the mainstream world was posthumously discovering the science fiction works of Philip K. Dick (mostly through a slew of movie adaptations), the Library of America published its first collection of Dick’s work, FOUR NOVELS OF THE 1960S. It added Dick’s legacy to their roster of “America’s best and most significant writing” and solidified his reputation as an underappreciated author. And it quickly went on to become one of LOA’s biggest selling editions.
The third LOA edition, VALIS AND LATER NOVELS, collects four books mostly from a time in Dick’s career when religion and religious revelation went from being of his many secondary themes to a dominant concern in his fiction and his life. As with the previous editions, novelist Jonathan Lethem serves as editor, providing both the detailed chronology and text notes at the end.
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I knew that reading those classic novels in high school and college would pay off someday. Because I was able to get most of the jokes in R. Sikoryak’s MASTERPIECE COMICS collection. Although it’s not the New York-based artist’s only gig, he’s made a name for himself marrying modern-day cartoon characters to the plots of literature’s most famous works, and the result is brilliant, brainy parody.
Having read several here and there over the years, I was pleased to see them all collected in a sturdy, handsome hardback from Drawn and Quarterly. One need not have a degree in English Lit to enjoy the contents, but those with no familiarity with the books being spoofed will be unable to grant it the deep appreciation it deserves.
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For those who followed the yellow brick road and found it led straight into their hearts, Rebecca Loncraine’s THE REAL WIZARD OF OZ: THE LIFE AND TIMES OF L. FRANK BAUM is for you. The biography of the WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ dreamer is certainly the most complete and final word on its subject, who, for whatever reason, remains infinitely overshadowed by his own creation, whereas other fantasy authors — say, C.S. Lewis or J.R.R. Tolkien — never were.
While I’m generally drawn to bios of players among the entertainment industry, no matter their medium of play, I’m turned off by having to slog through names and dates unimportant to the work and the story it chooses to tell. I read REAL WIZARD to learn about L. Frank Baum, not his ancestors, which mires the opening chapters.
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From 1892, THE FATE OF FENELLA is an odd novel with something — but not much — for enthusiasts of Victorian sensation fiction; fans of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Bram Stoker; and readers interested in literary experiments.
Magazine publisher Joseph Snell Wood, who edited “a newspaper de luxe, indispensable to every Gentlewoman” called, well, THE GENTLEWOMAN, came up with a publicity gimmick that he thought would stimulate sales: He would sign 24 popular authors — 12 men and 12 women — to write a single novel, with each person writing one chapter. The writer who began the book would have no idea where the story and characters would end up.
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