Reading Short Story Collections

As I was reading Catherine Chanter's enticing collection of short fiction (which I would again urge you to read!) I realised something about my reading habits.

I currently have bookmarks in four separate short story collections. Women Who Did: Stories by Men and Women 1890-1914 and Daughters of Decadence: Women Writers of the Fin-de-Siecle both have page markers around about story one. The Collected Stories of Katherine Mansfield dispensed with the bookmark for some reason unknown to me, although I think I was about half way through the mammoth 779 pages and The New York Stories of Edith Wharton has a nice solid receipt marking page 230 out of 459. Add to this the fact that I'm reading three separate collections for my PhD and it seems I'm drowning in short story collections.

I think it stems from the fact that I only allocate myself an hour of pleasure reading per day. Eleven until midnight is the only time I really switch off and allow myself to do something fun. Not that PhD research and writing my socks off isn't fun, it's just it's... work. So during my hour I like to bury myself in a story and, unfortunately, short stories don't drag me back for more. If I finish one tonight then where's the incentive for me to return to the collection tomorrow? More to the point, why should I pull myself away from whatever I may be doing at eleven o'clock when I'm not anxious to know if Person A betrays Person B? There's a reason serialised fiction in periodicals was intensely popular in the nineteenth century. (Note PhD encroaching on my blog posts now!)

Do I have a solution? Well, I think short stories are the most delicate and intriguing form known to writers. Writing them is so difficult that I want to marvel at the ingenuity of Catherine Chanter or the expressive detail of Edith Wharton or the quiet contemplation of Katherine Mansfield. I think that somewhere in my schedule I need to allocate 'short story reading time' and enjoy one collection at a time.

Suggestions on where I can fit that into my full schedule happily received on a postcard.

Catherine Chanter

I'd like to draw your attention to an excellent short story writer.

Catherine Chanter has published a collection of stories which truly blew my socks off. I went through the terrible ordeal of desperately wanting to read each story but dreading what would happen when I'd finished the book. As it happened, I managed to spread it over a luscious five day period and several of the stories are still haunting me anyway.

The collection is called Rooms of the Mind and the title piece is a lengthy tale that takes the reader around each room of a house as the owner prepares to sell it. As each room is uncovered so is the disturbing life of the owner. Chanter isn't reluctant to play around with form - 'Rooms of the Mind' is set out under the headings of each room and another story, 'A Summary of Findings', has a colloquial tone but contains welfare-style notes at the bottom commenting on the case.

In the shorter tales Chanter immediately plunges you into the world of the character but without revealing anything that may impede enjoyment of the tale. Reading the stories is a delicious exercise - you may have your suspicions about where it's headed but you don't want to ruin your enjoyment of the way it unfolds. One such story is 'The Prologue', a tale that deals with modern themes and preoccupations, as do most in the book.

The collection is off-kilter and strange as the blurb suggests. Out of the eleven stories I only had trouble accessing one. 'You Come Here' is the tale of a woman who gave her daughter up for adoption forty years ago. What makes it difficult to read are the introverted ramblings of the protagonist but, far from being a disposable accessory, these are integral to the unravelling of the woman's story. I personally found it a little difficult to access, even though I enjoyed it in the end.

I bought this book after seeing the cover and very short description in the Inpress Catalogue. For some reason it jumped out at me and I'm exceptionally grateful it did. I'm looking forward to reading these stories again in the not-too-distant future.

Rooms of the Mind is available to buy here.