| The Best American Short Stories 2019 | |
| Editor: | Anthony Doerr and Heidi Pitlor |
| Language: | English |
| Series: | The Best American Short Stories |
| Published: | 2019 |
| Publisher: | Houghton Mifflin Harcourt |
| Media Type: | Print (hardback & paperback) |
| Isbn: | 9781328465825 |
| Isbn Note: | (hardback) |
| Preceded By: | The Best American Short Stories 2018 |
| Followed By: | The Best American Short Stories 2020 |
The Best American Short Stories 2019 is a volume in the annual Best American Short Stories anthology. It was edited by the series editor, Heidi Pitlor, and guest editor and Pulitzer Prize winner, Anthony Doerr.[1]
| Author | Title | First published | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah | "The Era" | Guernica (April 2, 2018) | |
| "Natural Light" | (vol.22, no.1) | ||
| "The Great Interruption: A Story of a Famous Story of Old Port William and How It Ceased to Be Told (1935–1978)" | Threepenny Review (no.155) | ||
| "No More Than a Bubble" | LitMag (no.2) | ||
| "The Third Tower" | Ploughshares (vol.44, no.1) | ||
| "Hellion" | The Georgia Review (vol.72, no.2) | ||
| "Bronze" | The New Yorker (February 5, 2018) | ||
| Ella Martinsen Gorham | "Protozoa" | New England Review (vol.39, no.4) | |
| "Seeing Ershadi" | The New Yorker (March 5, 2018) | ||
| "Pity and Shame" | Tin House (vol.19, no.4) | ||
| "Anyone Can Do It" | ZYZZYVA (no.113) | ||
| "The Plan" | LitMag (no.2) | ||
| "Letter of Apology" | Granta (no.145) | ||
| "Black Corfu" | Zoetrope (vol.22, no.2) | ||
| "Audition" | The New Yorker (September 10, 2018) | ||
| Alexis Schaitkin | "Natural Disasters" | Ecotone (no.24) | |
| "Our Day of Grace" | Zoetrope (Vol.22, no.1) | ||
| "Wrong Object" | Harper's Magazine (November 2018) | ||
| Jenn Alandy Trahan | "They Told Us Not to Say This" | Harper's Magazine (September 2018) | |
| "Omakase" | The New Yorker (July 18, 2018) |
In a review of The Best American Short Stories 2019 in the New York Journal of Books, Anjanette Delgado stated that the collection's stories are "unabashedly political, aware of their context, of the times we live, and understand their role in this particular time and age". She wrote that over the years critics have commented on each guest editor in the series, and their sometimes "controversial choices", but in this selection, Delgado said "the quality of the writing is never in dispute."[2]
Writing in AudioFile magazine, Leslie B. Fine remarked that the stories in this collection "provides glimpses of worlds, minds, and dreams that are tragic, wistful, disturbing, and thought-provoking." She said that the authors exploit the short form to the fullest, and Fine called their characters "outstanding" in the way they bring each story to life.[3] Kirkus Reviews described the book as "[a] fine celebration of the many guises a short story can take while still doing its essential work". It called Adjei-Brenyah's story,"The Era" the highlight of the collection.[4]