Short Stories

[redunderthebed]

Being getting back into them got a collection of katherine mansfield's stories of which what i have read previously i've enjoyed throughly. Got a collection of anton chekhov stories that have just dried out after getting wet when i took it camping.

Any other suggestions?

[Bella Fortuna]

One of my favourite formats!

Here are some good ones by American authors of old (and other stories by same authors are also worthwhile):

The Cask of Amontillado - by Edgar Allen Poe
Eve's Diary - by Mark Twain
Regret - by Kate Chopin
The Luck of Roaring Camp - by Bret Harte
An Occurence at Owl Creek Bridge - by Amrbose Bierce
To Build a Fire - by Jack London
A Dark Brown Dog - by Stephen Crane
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow - by Washington Irving
The Monkey's Paw - by W.W. Jacobs
Young Goodman Brown - by Nathaniel Hawthorne
My Kinsman, Major Molineux - by Nathaniel Hawthorne
The Tell Tale Heart - by Edgar Allen Poe
The Lottery - by Shirley Jackson
Scarlet Stockings - by Louisa May Alcott
The Purloined Letter - by Edgard Allen Poe
The Minister's Black Veil - by Nathaniel Hawthorne

Random thoughts...
MR James did great Gothic ghost stories. If you can find collections of stories from Weird Tales magazine there are usually a few gems there. Guy de Maupassant and O. Henry are classics, too...

[hadespussercats]

I love Alice Munro, but I'm not sure she'd be your thing.

David Sedaris is fun to read.

I also like Unkempt, by Courtney Eldredge. http://www.amazon.com/Unkempt-Stories-C ... 0156032082
Contemporary, A little dark, strange. Urban twenty-somethings, mostly.

Throw Like a Girl, by Jean Thompson, is also excellent. http://www.amazon.com/Throw-Like-Girl-J ... B0017OFW6K

And I remember How To Breathe Underwater, by Julie Orringer, as being particularly good. http://www.amazon.com/How-Breathe-Under ... 1400034361

Finally, there's David Rakoff. He passed away recently. I read his book Fraud a number of years ago, and thought it was good. I think he may have written better work more recently, judging by excerpts I read in his obits. He used to work for "This American Life" on NPR, here in the States.

[Animavore]

Some Flann O'Brien collection.
The Bible.

[John_fi_Skye]

George Orwell - "essays", ostensibly non-fiction, but likely not. Interesting stuff about the British Empire.
Patricia Highsmith - eg The Snail-Watcher

[laklak]

Pretty much anything by Ray Bradbury, he was a master of the form.

[Coito ergo sum]

Being getting back into them got a collection of katherine mansfield's stories of which what i have read previously i've enjoyed throughly. Got a collection of anton chekhov stories that have just dried out after getting wet when i took it camping.

Any other suggestions?

If you're looking for Merkin writers:

Jack London -- To Build A Fire -- Up the Slide -- and a host of other short stories.
Mark Twain -- collected short stories -- Was it Heaven, Or Hell? Letters From the Earth. Diaries of Adam and Eve. Any of these: http://www.readbookonline.net/stories/Twain/2/
Edgar Allen Poe - Cask of Amontillado
Ambrose Bierce - An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge. This is one of my personal favorites of all time.
Nathaniel Hawthorne - Young Goodman Brown and the Ministers Black Veil
James Fennimore Cooper - The Eclipse.
Kate Chopin - Regret
Herman Melville - Bartleby the Scrivener
Washington Irving - the Legend of Sleepy Hollow
Isaac Asimov - Runaround, Robbie, The Last Question, Nightfall (born in Russia, but moved to US as a baby)
Robert Heinlen -- He Built a Crooked Home
Philip K. Dick -- A Little Something for us Tempunauts

....of course, don't expect much...they're Merkin, after all.

[Bella Fortuna]

Did you even read my post?

[Coito ergo sum]

Did you even read my post?

I did -- after I posted mine -- and I commented to myself how closely they fit together. Not exactly, but damn near! LOL. I meant to say something. Perverted minds think alike, eh?

[Xamonas Chegwé]

Saki

[Bella Fortuna]

Saki

Oops...

[Coito ergo sum]

Saki Saki

me love you long time...

[Bella Fortuna]

Did you even read my post?

I did -- after I posted mine -- and I commented to myself how closely they fit together. Not exactly, but damn near! LOL. I meant to say something. Perverted minds think alike, eh?

[Coito ergo sum]

"The Hell Screen" by Ryunosuke Akutagawa http://www.scribd.com/doc/222630/Rynosu ... ell-Screen

[redunderthebed]

Got for $1.50 from salvos a collection of edgar allen poe's writings including a shitload of short stories.