The Best of the West 4: New Stories from the West Side of the Missouri - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 039330793X ISBN 13: 9780393307931

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company, 1991

Synopsis

“We’re seeing a reinvention of our regional storytelling. It is our great good fortune. James and Denise Thomas are to be praised and praised.” ―William Kittredge

The Imaginary West, the Real West, the New West, and the Old West converge in this celebration of that fascinating landscape. Selected from over 100 periodicals, 16 contemporary stories by both established writers and relative newcomers tell of the contradictions of a landscape where cowboys may wear tennis shoes and limos park near pickups, but it's still a long way between towns.

About this title

About the Author:

James Thomas has received a Stegner Fellowship, a Michener Fellowship, and two NEA grants. He lives in Xenia, Ohio.

James and Denise Thomas live in Ohio, where he teaches at Wright State University.

Ron Hansen is the author of more than 20 books, stories, and anthologies. He received the Award in Literature from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters for his book Nebraska, a collection of short fiction, in 1989. Some of his other works include Mariette in Ecstasy; the children's book The Shadowmaker; Desperadoes; The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, which won the John Edgar Wideman Award in 1984; and the novel Atticus, a suspenseful murder mystery detailing a father's fierce love for his son. Atticus was a finalist for the National Book Award in 1996. Among the anthologies written by Hansen are The Sun So Hot I Froze To Death, Can I Just Sit Here For A While?, and True Romance. His short stories, with titles ranging from "His Dog" to "Playland," have appeared in the Stanford Alumni Magazine, Atlantic Monthly, the Iowa Review, Esquire, and many others. Besides holding Guggenheim and National Endowment for the Arts fellowships, Hansen has received a Lyndhurst Foundation Grant and is a fellow of the University of Michigan Society of Fellows. Hansen has also held the position of Gerald Manley Hopkins S.J. Professor of Arts and Humanities at Santa Clara University.

From Kirkus Reviews:

Fourth edition of the annual collection, now coming from Norton: 15 inventive and diverse stories, all set in the West and all published in 1990 in a variety of literary magazines. Here, old western myths encounter contemporary realities and human frailties. The best include Gladys Swan's ``The Old Hotel,'' in which Jewel comes of age in her parents' run-down, debt-ridden hotel patronized by only two boarders--Mr. Ferrill, a high-toned drifter, and Viny Trilling, not quite all there. After Ferrill deserts a pregnant Viny, Jewel, in an apt epiphany, sees ``a time when the hotel would be gone without a trace and she'd be out somewhere in the world.'' Ken Smith's ``The Government Man'' is a taut drama where the political and personal converge when FDR, in the 1930's, wants to kill off excess cattle to increase the price of beef (``a hare-brained scheme''), while rustlers, following the government man, want to use the beef to feed families. In Robert Day's ``My Father Swims His Horse At Last,'' a ritual joke between a folk- philosopher father and a son who sells mortgage insurance turns into an affectionate fictional memoir. Other noteworthy pieces: Antonya Nelson's ``The Mud Season,'' about an estranged couple ``fated to continue for a while longer, on a different path'' after the sudden death of their daughter; Ron Tanner's ``Jackpot,'' about three near-crazed people in the desert who hunt for mustangs; and poet Joy Harjo's short ``The Flood,'' a Louise Erdrich-like mystical account: ``When I walk the stairway of water into the abyss, I return as the wife of the watermonster....'' The strongest edition yet: it transcends its regional emphasis by using place to take the measure of loneliness and mortality. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

About this edition

• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Publication date: 1991
• ISBN 10: 039330793X
• ISBN 13: 9780393307931
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 268
• Editor: Thomas James, Thomas Denise