As I mentioned in an earlier post, I've been boycotting short stories for the last couple of years. It's hard to explain why. I actually prefer semi-ambiguous endings, and I prefer the literary and lyrical over the straight-up entertainment type of reading. But I began to feel that every short story I read was "too writer-ly," that the author was being weird just to be weird, or that the ambiguity of the larger meaning of the story was dissatisfying rather than stirring or thought-provoking. Oh, and not to mention, too many of them were dark and depressing--and again, I *like* the darker fair most of the time.

So it was probably good timing that, when I found this series entry on a clearance table, I picked up the 2007 year, with Stephen King as edition editor. Not only were all of the stories in this edition accessible and straightforward, but also, King's intro essay actually addresses the "too writerly" trend (my words, not his. Read his essay to see what he's really trying to say. I'm doing a quick and dirty stab at this here.) Anyway, it's hard to explain how this edition is different, but I've been reading this Best Of series on and off since the mid 90s, and this book definitely had a different feel than all the others I've read--and yet the stories are still literary, and still feature some of the biggest names in contemporary literature, like Alice Munro, T.C. Boyle and Richard Russo.

That said, I didn't find many of them to be as memorable or as moving as I have with "Best Of" stories in the past. With one exception:

The story "Findings & Impressions" by Stellar Kim almost literally took my breath away. I found myself sobbing at the end, which is not something that happens often. (I might tear up fairly frequently at movies, but short stores? No.) Perhaps this one just caused me to "project" too much, since the main character is stricken with terminal cancer at my exact current age. It was so stirring I felt compelled to keep reading and yet had to stop and set it down every few minutes-- I wanted to savor it and yet was "afraid" (not in the typical sense associated with Stephen King) to know what was going to happen.