From the author of "Independence Day", Richard Ford edits and introduces this anthology for "Granta" which has become the most cited and authoritative collection of short stories on both sides of the Atlantic. Ford in his introduction discusses, among other things, the comment of Frank O'Connor that the short-story is handled so cleverly by Americans that it is our national art form.

This collection features stories from over 40 writers including Sherman Alexie, Junot Diaz, Deborah Eisenberg, Nell Freudenberger, Matthew Klam, Jhumpa Lahiri, and Z.Z. Packer."

This collection brings together 11 contemporary American writers. It includes long stories by Edwidge Danticat, Stanley Elkin, Ernest J. Gaines, Barry Hannah, Joyce Carol Oates, Cynthia Ozick, Philip Roth, Jane Smiley, William Styron, Peter Taylor and Eudora Welty.

The Man Booker prize-winning author's critically acclaimed selection of the best Irish short stories of the last sixty years, following Richard Ford's best-selling Granta Book of the American Short Story.

29 short stories by the best new African writers, selected by one of Africa's most eminent contemporary novelists, Helon Habila.

Provides a clear introduction to the key terms and frameworks in cognitive poetics and stylistics