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The Best American Short Stories 2020
- The Best American Series
- Narrated by: Curtis Sittenfeld, Soneela Nankani, Peter Ganim, Robert Petkoff, Kevin T. Collins, Therese Plummer, Robin Miles, Gabra Zackman, Emily Woo Zeller, Tracey Leigh, Priya Ayyar, Rebecca Lowman, Ilyana Kadushin, Suzanne Toren, Cindy Kay
- Length: 16 hrs and 19 mins
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Publisher's summary
“To read their stories felt to me the way I suspect other people feel hearing jazz for the first time,” recalls Curtis Sittenfeld of her initial encounter with the Best American Short Stories series. “They were windows into emotions I had and hadn’t had, into other settings and circumstances and observations and relationships.” Decades later, Sittenfeld was met by the same feeling selecting the stories for this year’s edition. The result is a striking and nuanced collection, bringing to life awkward college students, disgraced public figures, raunchy grandparents, and mystical godmothers. To listen to these stories is to experience the transporting joys of discovery and affirmation and to realize that story writing in America continues to flourish.
The Best American Short Stories 2020 includes:
- T. C. Boyle
- Emma Cline
- Mary Gaitskill
- Andrea Lee
- Elizabeth Mc Cracken
- Alejandro Puyana William Pei Shih
- Kevin Wilson
- And others
Full narrators list: Robert Petkoff, Soneela Nankani, Peter Ganim, Curtis Sittenfeld, Kevin T. Collins, Therese Plummer, Robin Miles, Gabra Zackman, Emily Woo Zeller, Tracey Leigh, Priya Ayyar, Rebecca Lowman, Ilyana Kadushin, Suzanne Toren, Cindy Kay, Ramon De Ocampo, Michael Crouch
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What listeners say about The Best American Short Stories 2020
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- West Hansen
- 01-07-21
This is Pleasure
Really nice selection, though a few required my brain, hungry for relaxation, to work more than I appreciated. I particularly enjoyed and
was provoked by Mary Gaiteskills “This is Pleasure “.
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- James W. Kelly
- 10-17-21
Avid reader
Way too much about sex. A few of the stores were really good but there must be more to write about than gratuitous sex.
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1 person found this helpful
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- dragyn 2
- 12-15-21
Horrible. Both me and my wife tried
Need to get a new editor and speaker. I’m sorry to feel this way about it, but if I could ask for my money back I would. This is actually the most I’ve ever been disappointed in audible even though it’s not their fault.
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Not very modern collection
- By David on 11-08-08
By: Doris Lessing, and others
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The Best Short Stories 2023
- The O. Henry Prize Winners
- By: Lauren Groff - editor, Jenny Minton Quigley - editor
- Narrated by: Lauren Groff, full cast
- Length: 15 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Continuing a century-long tradition of cutting-edge literary excellence, this year's edition contains twenty prizewinning stories chosen from the thousands published in magazines over the previous year. Guest editor Lauren Groff has brought her own refreshing perspective to the prize, selecting stories by an engaging mix of celebrated names and emerging voices and including several stories in translation.
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Every story is overwhelmingly melancholy.
- By Jane S. on 10-31-23
By: Lauren Groff - editor, and others
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Classic American Short Stories, Volume 1
- By: William Faulkner, Thomas Wolfe, Edith Wharton, and others
- Narrated by: Charlton Griffin
- Length: 4 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Unlike the other arts, American literature has been a powerful, influential, and leading aspect of American culture. By turns sedate and mercurial and possessing a moral mind set of various social values, the American short story reveals in its pages the psyche of a growing, sprawling nation whose sense of destiny has always been larger than life. Here are seven masterpieces that will make you smile, make you frown, and leave you pondering the mystery that surrounds the soul of a great nation.
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Beautifully performed!
- By James on 07-08-05
By: William Faulkner, and others
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Great American Stories
- By: Mark Twain, Stephen Crane, Ambrose Bierce
- Narrated by: Patrick Fraley, Patrick Hagan
- Length: 5 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Here are 10 unabridged stories by the greatest American authors. These treasured stories from the most influential authors of the 19th and early 20th centuries were selected for their literary importance as well as their dramatic oral qualities.
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Great Classic Stories
- By kutzkai on 03-13-21
By: Mark Twain, and others
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The Mysterious Bookshop Presents the Best Mystery Stories of the Year: 2022
- By: Sara Paretsky - editor and introduction, Otto Penzler - series editor
- Narrated by: Daniel Thomas May, Rachel Perry
- Length: 22 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Under the auspices of New York City's legendary mystery fiction specialty bookstore, The Mysterious Bookshop, and aided by Edgar Award-winning anthologist Otto Penzler, international bestseller and MWA Grandmaster Sara Paretsky has selected the twenty most puzzling, most thrilling, and most mysterious short stories from the past year, collected now in one entertaining volume.
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Just average
- By RonaldWDavies on 11-05-23
By: Sara Paretsky - editor and introduction, and others
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50 Greatest Short Stories
- By: Terry O'Brien - editor, Terry O'Brien - introduction
- Narrated by: Fajer Al-Kaisi, Deepti Gupta
- Length: 22 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Selected from the best of the world's short fiction, 50 Great Short Stories brings together writings by great masters of the genre. Carefully picked for their timeless quality, listeners are sure to be delighted by the inclusion of such favourites as 'The Gift of the Magi', 'The Lady with the Dog', 'The Curious Case of Benjamin Button', 'Rain' and 'Mrs Packletide's Tiger', to name but a few.
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Very Disappointed
- By Nicole Singer on 12-14-18
By: Terry O'Brien - editor, and others
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Great Classic Stories II
- By: Edgar Allan Poe, James Joyce, Mark Twain, and others
- Narrated by: Simon Vance, Kate Fenton, Stephen R. Thorne, and others
- Length: 7 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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This wonderful collection of 18 short stories includes work by some of literature's most treasured names, including Mark Twain, Edgar Allan Poe, James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Oscar Wilde, and many more. This superlative treasury includes "The Cask of Amontillado" by Edgar Allan Poe; "A Piece of String" by Guy Le Maupassant; "The Story of an Hour" by Kate Chopin; "The Mark on the Wall" by Virginia Woolf; "Nuns at Lunch" by Aldous Huxley, and many more!
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Another great selection of stories
- By Adeliese Baumann on 02-04-13
By: Edgar Allan Poe, and others
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American Wife
- A Novel
- By: Curtis Sittenfeld
- Narrated by: Kimberly Farr
- Length: 23 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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A kind, bookish only child born in the 1940s, Alice Lindgren has no idea that she will one day end up in the White House, married to the president. In her small Wisconsin hometown she learns the virtues of politeness, but a tragic accident when she is 17 shatters her identity and changes the trajectory of her life. More than a decade later, when the charismatic son of a powerful Republican family sweeps her off her feet, she is surprised to find herself admitted into a world of privilege.
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Mesmerizing and Enchanting!
- By Summer on 10-04-08
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The Best American Mystery and Suspense 2022
- By: Jess Walter - editor, Steph Cha - series editor
- Narrated by: Desean Terry, Lindsey Dorcus, Max Meyers, and others
- Length: 12 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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A collection of the year’s best mystery and suspense short fiction selected by #1 New York Times bestselling author and guest editor Jess Walter and series editor Steph Cha.
By: Jess Walter - editor, and others
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Great Classic Stories III
- 22 Unabridged Classics
- By: Herman Melville, Kate Chopin, Willa Cather, and others
- Narrated by: Gerard Doyle, Bronson Pinchot
- Length: 7 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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A great new collection of classic short fiction, brilliantly read by a selection of narrators. Includes the following stories: "The Lightening-Rod Man" by Herman Melville, "One of the Missing" by Ambrose Bierce, "The Leopard Man's Story" by Jack London, "Tennessee's Partner" by Bret Harte, "The New Catacomb" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, "A Pair of Silk Stockings" by Kate Chopin, "My Watch" and "The Widow's Protest" by Mark Twain, "An Ideal Family" by Kate Mansfield, "A Painful Case" by James Joyce, "Small Fry" by Anton Chekhov, and more!
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WARNING- It is missing half of the stories!
- By Mountain man on 12-06-21
By: Herman Melville, and others
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The Best Mystery Stories of the Year: 2021
- By: Lee Child - editor and introduction, Otto Penzler - series editor
- Narrated by: Matt Godfrey, Emily Sutton-Smith
- Length: 14 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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Lee Child selects the 20 best mystery short stories of the year, including tales by Stephen King, Sara Paretsky, and many more. Under the auspices of New York City's legendary mystery fiction specialty bookstore, The Mysterious Bookshop, and aided by Edgar Award-winning anthologist Otto Penzler, international best seller Lee Child has selected the 20 most suspenseful, most confounding, and most mysterious short stories from the past year, collected now in one entertaining volume.
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Very disappointing collection.
- By STEFANY C. on 11-27-21
By: Lee Child - editor and introduction, and others
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Inappropriately Human
- 21 Short Stories
- By: Andrew Heaton
- Narrated by: Andrew Heaton
- Length: 7 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Award-winning comedian Andrew Heaton brings wit and warmth to his vision of humanity, the supernatural, and bureaucrats in his debut short story collection. Learn the pitfalls of settling resurrected Neanderthals in Detroit. Explore the work-life balance of a professional who assumes other people’s hangovers. Or the travails of a State Department diplomat posted to a planet with relentless boredom and allergies. Discover the challenges time-travel regulators face when everyone tries to kill Hitler.
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What A Wonderful Collection By A Fantastic New Author
- By vurnt22 on 07-20-22
By: Andrew Heaton
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High Crime Area
- Tales of Darkness and Dread
- By: Joyce Carol Oates
- Narrated by: Julia Whelan, Ray Chase, Donna Postel, and others
- Length: 7 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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In the title story, a white aspiring professor is convinced she is being followed. No need to panic - she has a handgun stowed away in her purse, just in case. But when she turns to confront her black male shadow, the situation isn't what she expects. In "The Rescuer" a promising graduate student detours to inner-city Trenton, New Jersey, to save her brother from a downward spiral. But she soon finds out there may be more to his world than to hers.
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Dark, Disturbing, Thought provoking.
- By Matthew S. Hill on 03-18-17
Related to this topic
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Fault Lines
- A Novel
- By: Emily Itami
- Narrated by: Lydia Wilson
- Length: 5 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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