{"title":"Short Stories","description":"","products":[{"product_id":"amiebarrodaleyouarehavingagoodtimestories","title":"Amie Barrodale - You Are Having a Good Time Stories","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Amie Barrodale. Themes include Fiction, Short Stories (single author).\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eNamed A Best Book of 2016 by \u003ci\u003eWall Street Journal, Vulture, \u003c\/i\u003eRefinery29, \u003ci\u003eFinancial Times, \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eThe Guardian\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn \u003ci\u003eYou Are Having a Good Time\u003c\/i\u003e, Amie Barrodale’s collection of highly compressed and charged tales, the veneer of normality is stripped from her characters’ lives to reveal the seething and contradictory desires that fuel them. In “Animals,” an up-and-coming starlet harbors a complicated attraction toward her abusive director. In “Frank Advice for Fat Women,” an ethically compromised psychiatrist is drawn into the middle of a dysfunctional mother-daughter relationship. And in “The Imp,” a supernatural possession ruins a man’s relationship with his pregnant wife.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBarrodale’s protagonists drink too much, say the wrong things, want the wrong people. They’re hounded by longings (and sometimes ghosts) to the point where they are forced to confront the illusions they cling to. They’re brought to life in stories that don’t behave as you expect stories to behave. Barrodale’s startlingly funny and original fictions get under your skin and make you reconsider the fragile compromises that underpin our daily lives.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. 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Love that defies the strictures of race and class. In prose that slips between lush sensuality and electric melancholy, Kathleen Collins has gifted us a universe of lovers.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57933243122038,"sku":null,"price":6.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9781783783410.jpg?v=1767524893"},{"product_id":"andredubuswedontlivehereanymore-threenovellas","title":"Andre Dubus - We Don't Live Here Anymore: Three Novellas","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Andre Dubus. Themes include Fiction_Short Stories (single author).\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn these three stories—two of which form the basis of the award-winning film We Don’t Live Here Anymore—literary master Andre Dubus traces the lives of two couples who married too young, and who are intricately entwined by love and friendship, jealousy and understanding.\u003cbr\u003eHank and Jack have been best friends since high school. Hank married Edith, the prettiest girl Jack had ever seen, and Jack married Terry, whom he thinks he may no longer love. But Hank and Edith’s adultery didn’t begin or end with Jack and Terry. Moving, perceptive, rendered in clear-eyed prose, We Don’t Live Here Anymore maps with preternatural insight the often separate lands of love and marriage.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57933243384182,"sku":null,"price":6.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/33882.jpg?v=1779442204"},{"product_id":"helendunmoreicecream","title":"Helen Dunmore - Ice Cream","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Helen Dunmore. Themes include Fiction.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis text is a collection of stories from Helen Dunmore, ranging from Victorian tragedy to the tale of a dinner-lady's love, from the death of a lighthouse keeper's wife to the birth of babies from the Superstock catalogue.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. 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Longlisted For \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe 2022 National Book Award For Fiction.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFinalist for the 2023 Pen\/Faulkner Award, the Dublin Literary Award, the Southern Book Award, and the Gordon Burns Award. Nominated for\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e the 2022 National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Prize, the 2023 Pen\/Jean Stein Open Book Award, the 2023 Pen\/Bingham Prize, the 2022 Story Prize, the Dublin Literary Prize, the 2023 Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction, the 2023 Brooklyn Library Prize, and the 2023 Aspen Words Literary Prize. National Bestseller. Indienext Pick. 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As each character searches for a foothold, they never forget the profound danger of climbing without a safety net.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePulsing with vibrant lyricism and inimitable style, sly commentary and contagious laughter, Escoffery’s debut unravels what it means to be in between homes and cultures in a world at the mercy of capitalism and whiteness. With \u003ci\u003eIf I Survive You\u003c\/i\u003e, Escoffery announces himself as a prodigious storyteller in a class of his own, a chronicler of American life at its most gruesome and hopeful.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Hardcover\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. 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Themes include Fiction, Short Stories (single author), Classics, Literary.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eFrom one of the 20th century's greatest voices comes the complete chronological anthology of his short stories featuring Nick Adams, Ernest Hemingway's memorable character, as he grows from child to adolescent to soldier, veteran, writer, and parent—a sequence closely paralleling the events of Hemingway's life.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe complete collection of Ernest Hemingway's Nick Adams two dozen stories are gathered here in one volume, grouped together according to the major time periods in the protagonist's life. Based on Hemingway's own experiences as a boy and as a member of the Red Cross ambulance corps in World War I. The collection follows Nick's life as a child to parent, along with soldier, veteran, and writer and feature some of Hemingway's earliest work such as \"Indian Camp\" and some of his best-known short stories, including \"Big Two-Hearted River.\" Perfect for longtime Hemingway fans and as an introduction to one of America's most famous writers.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. 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These are some of the questions dealt with in the eight stories in this collection. The stories, by important modern authors, have been specially edited for upper-intermediate and more advanced students of English. Vocabulary explanations and notes are provided in order to help comprehension.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57933248364918,"sku":null,"price":6.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9780521224482.jpg?v=1767524893"},{"product_id":"peterhoegtalesofthenight","title":"Peter Hoeg - Tales of the Night","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Peter Hoeg. Themes include Subjects.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThese stories, which vary in theme but all bear the mark of Peter Høeg's graceful and thoughtful prose, are set in eight separate corners of the world. On this fateful night, a young mathematician encounters Joseph Conrad during a train ride through the war-torn Congo in \"Journey into a Dark Heart;\" a pair of star-crossed lovers in Lisbon dance through their memories of the Danish ballet in \"Hommage to Bournonville;\" a seaside community struggles with the threat of a smallpox epidemic in \"Pity for the Children of Vaden Town;\" and in \"The Verdict of Ignatio Lanstad Rasker,\" an idealistic young writer is prosecuted for his homosexuality by the conservative Lord Chief Justice of Denmark. Illuminating, acrobatic, and enriched with historical fact and foreshadowing, the stories in Tales of the Night should \"consolidate Høeg's reputation as one of the world's most versatile authors\" (Seattle Times).\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Hardcover\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57933248397686,"sku":null,"price":12.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9781860464201.jpg?v=1779440783"},{"product_id":"p-d-jamesthemistletoemurderandotherstories","title":"P. D. James - The Mistletoe Murder and Other Stories","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by P. D. James. 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All set around Christmas and all expertly planned, written and executed!' 5* reader review\u003cbr\u003e 'Perfect for a dark wintry evening.' 5* reader review\u003cbr\u003e 'Very entertaining, and I loved it.' 5* reader review\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57933249020278,"sku":null,"price":3.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9780571331352.jpg?v=1767524892"},{"product_id":"johnkeenecounternarratives","title":"John Keene - Counternarratives","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by John Keene. 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Love is a complicated, addictive, volatile, scary, wonderful thing. Many of the stories in this collection started out as gifts for the author's friends. From the happy-ever-after to the unrequited, they explore the many aspects of the emotion that has at some time turned us all inside out and upside down. David Levithan is no stranger to exploring love in all its complexity and variety as showcased in Boy Meets Boy, Every Day, Another Day, and Two Boys Kissing. \"Every Day is a wonder: a wholly original premise racing along with a generous heart towards a perfect ending. The best Ya makes a place for its readers, and there are few writers as warmly generous as David Levithan.\" (Patrick Ness, award-winning author of the Chaos Walking trilogy and A Monster Calls). David is the New York Times best-selling author of Boy Meets Boy and Marly's Ghost. 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In stories of linguistic verve and absurdist wit, Yevgenia Belorusets writes of trauma amidst the mundane, telling surreal, unsettling tales of survival in a shattered country.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57933261570422,"sku":null,"price":6.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9781782278726.jpg?v=1767524893"},{"product_id":"ruthrendellpiranhatoscurfy","title":"Ruth Rendell - Piranha to Scurfy","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Ruth Rendell. Themes include Fiction, Mystery \u0026amp; Detective, Short Stories (single author), Crime.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe long title story is about a man whose life, in a sense, is a book. There are shelves in every room, packed with titles which Ambrose Ribbon has checked pedantically for mistakes of grammar and fact. Life for Ribbon, without his mother now, is lonely and obsessive, filled with psychoses and neuroses, with the ever-present possibility of a descent into violent madness. He still keeps his mother's dressing table exactly as she had left it, the wardrobe door always open so that her clothes can be seen inside, and her pink silk nightdress on the bed. There is one book too that he associates particularly with her - volume Viii of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, Piranha to Scurfy. It marked a very significant moment in their relationship. In the other stories, Ruth Rendell deals with a variety of themes, some macabre, some vengeful, some mysterious, all precisely observed. The second novella, \u003ci\u003eHigh Mysterious Union\u003c\/i\u003e, explores a strange, erotic universe in a dream-like corner of rural England, and illustrates very atmospherically what range Ruth Rendell has as a writer, expanding beyond her famous sphere of crime writing.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Hardcover\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57933446709622,"sku":null,"price":9.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9780099414995.jpg?v=1779441407"},{"product_id":"katherineheinysingle-carefree-mellow","title":"Katherine Heiny - Single, Carefree, Mellow","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Katherine Heiny. Themes include Fiction, Literary, Short Stories (single author), Women, Satire.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Katherine Heiny's work does something magical: elevates the mundane so that it has the stakes of a mystery novel, gives women's interior lives the gravity they so richly deserve and makes you laugh along the way Lena Dunham\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn the title story, we meet Maya, who is torn between her wryly funny boyfriend and the allure of her veterinarian. In \"Andorra,\" a woman's lover calls her every Thursday as he drives to meet his wife at marriage counselling. \"How to Give the Wrong Impression\" shows us a woman pining for her roommate, a man who will hold her hand but then tell her that her palm is sweaty. In \"The Dive Bar\" a girl agrees to have a drink with her married lover's wife. Revisiting Maya in several stories, chronicling her various states of love, this is a collection about how we are unfaithful to each other, both wilfully and unwittingly. Populated with unwelcome house guests, disastrous birthday parties, needy but loyal friends, and flirtatious older men, the stories are emotionally astute, sexy, and disarming-and they introduce us to a tart, and marvellous, new voice.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57933446742390,"sku":null,"price":6.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9780008105549.jpg?v=1779441407"},{"product_id":"luciaberlinamanualforcleaningwomenselectedstories","title":"Lucia Berlin - A Manual for Cleaning Women Selected Stories","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Lucia Berlin. Themes include Fiction, Literary, Short Stories (single author).\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"Stories from a lost American classic \"in the same arena as Alice Munro\" (Lydia Davis) \"In the field of short fiction, Lucia Berlin is one of America's best kept secrets. That's it. Flat out. No mitigating conditions.\" ... Paul Metcalf A Manual for Cleaning Women compiles the best work of the legendary short-story writer Lucia Berlin. With her trademark blend of humor and melancholy, Berlin crafts miracles from the everyday ... uncovering moments of grace in the cafeterias and Laundromats of the American Southwest, in the homes of the Northern California upper classes, and from the perspective of a cleaning woman alone in a hotel dining room in Mexico City. The women of Berlin's stories are lost, but they are also strong, clever, and extraordinarily real. They are hitchhikers, hard workers, bad Christians. With the wit of Lorrie Moore and the grit of Raymond Carver, they navigate a world of jockeys, doctors, and switchboard operators. They laugh, they mourn, they drink. Berlin, a highly influential writer despite having published little in her lifetime, conjures these women from California, Mexico, and beyond. Lovers of the short story will not want to miss this remarkable collection from a master of the form.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Hardcover\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57933446775158,"sku":null,"price":12.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9781447290438.jpg?v=1779441407"},{"product_id":"petertaylortheroadandothermodernstories","title":"Peter Taylor - The Road and other Modern Stories","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Peter Taylor. Themes include Reference, Foreign Language Study \u0026amp; Reference, English as a Second Language, Education \u0026amp; Teaching, Schools \u0026amp; Teaching.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57933446807926,"sku":null,"price":3.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9780521225939.jpg?v=1779441407"},{"product_id":"9780374290252","title":"Michael Cunningham - A Wild Swan And Other Tales","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Michael Cunningham. Themes include Fiction, Fairy Tales, Folk Tales, Legends \u0026amp; Mythology, Literary, World Literature, American.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eFairy tales for our times from the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of \u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe Hours\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003eA poisoned apple and a monkey's paw with the power to change fate; a girl whose extraordinarily long hair causes catastrophe; a man with one human arm and one swan's wing; and a house deep in the forest, constructed of gumdrops and gingerbread, vanilla frosting and boiled sugar. In \u003ci\u003eA Wild Swan and Other Tales\u003c\/i\u003e, the people and the talismans of lands far, far away—the mythic figures of our childhoods and the source of so much of our wonder—are transformed by Michael Cunningham into stories of sublime revelation. \u003cbr\u003e Here are the moments that our fairy tales forgot or deliberately concealed: the years after a spell is broken, the rapturous instant of a miracle unexpectedly realized, or the fate of a prince only half cured of a curse. The Beast stands ahead of you in line at the convenience store, buying smokes and a Slim Jim, his devouring smile aimed at the cashier. A malformed little man with a knack for minor acts of wizardry goes to disastrous lengths to procure a child. A loutish and lazy Jack prefers living in his mother's basement to getting a job, until the day he trades a cow for a handful of magic beans.\u003cbr\u003e Reimagined by one of the most gifted storytellers of his generation, and exquisitely illustrated by Yuko Shimizu, rarely have our bedtime stories been this dark, this perverse, or this true.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Hardcover\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58012833481078,"sku":null,"price":12.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9780374290252.jpg?v=1780502377"},{"product_id":"9780571386086","title":"Diane Oliver - Neighbors and Other Stories","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Diane Oliver. Themes include Fiction, Classics, African American \u0026amp; Black, Women, Urban \u0026amp; Street Lit.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eAs Celebrated On Bbc Front Row\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e 'This breathtaking collection is a marvel.' \u003cb\u003eTayari Jones\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e 'Astute, brilliantly observed, timeless:' \u003cb\u003eJackie Kay\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e 'Her precocious and brilliant talent hasn't aged at all.' \u003cb\u003eDamon Galgut\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e'Exquisite ... These stories are all gems.' \u003cb\u003eMendez\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e 'You hold your breath, completely at her mercy.' \u003cb\u003eLucy Caldwell\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e And she was becoming frightened too, looking at all those white faces pressed against the windowpanes.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e One Black family comes under attack as their little boy prepares to start at an all-white school.\u003cbr\u003e Friends plan a protest sit-in at the Rose Crest Tea Room, only to be arrested.\u003cbr\u003e The first Black student - always the 'Experiment' - retreats into her closet at a newly integrated college.\u003cbr\u003e And when a social worker enters a secluded woodland cabin, she meets the fate of all visitors . . .\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e Tragically killed aged twenty-two in 1966, Diane Oliver's masterly stories resonate today with renewed urgency. Steeped in the nightmarish horror of life for the Black community in the Jim Crow-era American South, these chilling tales explore toxic racism and the human toll of activism for 'the cause' with heartbreaking empathy and wisdom. Depicting African American families whole and broken, daily injustices and life-threatening political struggle, \u003ci\u003eNeighbors\u003c\/i\u003e restores a lost star to the twentieth-century literary canon.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58012835578230,"sku":null,"price":8.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9780571386086.jpg?v=1780502377"},{"product_id":"9781784702106","title":"Daisy Johnson - Fen","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Daisy Johnson. Themes include Fiction, Literary, Short Stories (single author), Magical Realism.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eRevisit the haunting debut short story collection from the Booker-shortlisted author of \u003ci\u003eEverything Under.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e'Full of unabashedly, refreshingly angry women... In a year that made me furious, Daisy Johnson's \u003ci\u003eFen\u003c\/i\u003e was a howl I didn't know I needed' Celeste Ng\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003eThe Fen is a liminal land. Real people live their lives here. They wrestle with sex and desire, with everyday routine. But the wild is always close at hand, ready to erupt.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e This is a place where animals and people commingle and fuse, where curious metamorphoses take place, where myth and dark magic still linger. So here a teenager may starve herself into the shape of an eel. A house might fall in love with a girl. A woman might give birth to a, well, what?\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e'Instant classic...a bold, take-no-prisoners collection situated somewhere between Angela Carter and Deborah Levy' Jeff Vandermeer\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58012838297974,"sku":null,"price":8.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9781784702106.jpg?v=1780502378"},{"product_id":"9780811228015","title":"Franz Kafka - The Lost Writings","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Franz Kafka. Themes include Fiction, Classics, Literary, Short Stories (single author), Absurdist.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSelected by the preeminent Kafka biographer and scholar Reiner Stach and newly translated by the peerless Michael Hofmann, the seventy-four pieces gathered here have been lost to sight for decades and two of them have never been translated into English before. Some stories are several pages long; some run about a page; a handful are only a few lines long: all are marvels. Even the most fragmentary texts are revelations. These pieces were drawn from two large volumes of the S. Fischer Verlag edition Nachgelassene Schriften und Fragmente (totaling some 1100 pages). \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"Franz Kafka is the master of the literary fragment,\" as Stach comments in his afterword: \"In no other European author does the proportion of completed and published works loom quite so...small in the overall mass of his papers, which consist largely of broken-off beginnings.\" In fact, as Hofmann recently added: \"'Finished' seems to me, in the context of Kafka, a dubious or ironic condition, anyway. The more finished, the less finished. The less finished, the more finished. Gregor Samsa's sister Grete getting up to stretch in the streetcar. What kind of an ending is that?! There's perhaps some distinction to be made between 'finished' and 'ended.' Everything continues to vibrate or unsettle, anyway. Reiner Stach points out that none of the three novels were 'completed.' Some pieces break off, or are concluded, or stop--it doesn't matter!--after two hundred pages, some after two lines. The gusto, the friendliness, the wit with which Kafka launches himself into these things is astonishing.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Hardcover\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58012838887798,"sku":null,"price":12.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9780811228015.jpg?v=1780502378"},{"product_id":"9780307474964","title":"Lorrie Moore - Birds of America Stories","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Lorrie Moore. Themes include Fiction, Short Stories (single author), Literary, Family Life.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e“Fluid, cracked, mordant, colloquial…. Stand[s] by itself as one of our funniest, most telling anatomies of human love and vulnerability.” —\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times Book Review \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe celebrated collection of twelve stories from one of the finest authors at work today.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e Book of the Year \u003cbr\u003eA National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist\u003cbr\u003eWinner of the \u003ci\u003eSalon \u003c\/i\u003eBook Award\u003cbr\u003eA \u003ci\u003eVillage Voice \u003c\/i\u003eBook of the Year\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A marvelous collection…. Her stories are tough, lean, funny, and metaphysical…. \u003cb\u003eBirds of America\u003c\/b\u003e has about it a wild beauty that simply makes one feel more connected to life.” —\u003ci\u003eThe Boston Globe\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“At once sad, funny, lyrical and prickly, \u003cb\u003eBirds of America \u003c\/b\u003eattests to the deepening emotional chiaroscuro of her wise and beguiling work.” —\u003ci\u003eThe New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e“Stunning…. There’s really no one like Moore; in a perfect marriage of art form and mind, she has made the short story her own.” —\u003ci\u003eMilwaukee Journal Sentinel \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“\u003cb\u003eBirds of America\u003c\/b\u003e stands as a major work of American short fiction…. Absolutely mastered.” —\u003ci\u003eElle \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Wonderful…. These stories impart such terrifying truths.” —\u003ci\u003ePhiladelphia Inquirer \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Lorrie Moore soars with \u003cb\u003eBirds of America\u003c\/b\u003e.... A marvelous, fiercely funny book.” —\u003ci\u003eNewsweek\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Fifty years from now, it may well turn out that the work of very few American writers has as much to say about what it means to be alive in our time as that of Lorrie Moore.” —\u003ci\u003eHarper’s Magazine\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58013051847030,"sku":null,"price":6.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9780307474964.jpg?v=1780505050"},{"product_id":"9780374504649","title":"Flannery O'connor - Everything That Rises Must Converge","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Flannery O'connor. Themes include Fiction, Literary, Short Stories (single author), World Literature, American.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFlannery O'connor was working on \u003ci\u003eEverything That Rises Must Converge\u003c\/i\u003e at the time of her death. This collection is an exquisite legacy from a genius of the American short story, in which she scrutinizes territory familiar to her readers: race, faith, and morality. The stories encompass the comic and the tragic, the beautiful and the grotesque; each carries her highly individual stamp and could have been written by no one else.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58013052600694,"sku":null,"price":8.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9780374504649.jpg?v=1780505050"},{"product_id":"9780571260850","title":"Lorrie Moore - Self-help","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Lorrie Moore. Themes include Fiction, Classics, Short Stories (single author), Women.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis absorbing, ironic, bitter-sweet collection of nine stories marked Lorrie Moore's talented debut. Sharp, cruel and funny, the stories are presented as a highly idiosyncratic guide to female existence: 'How to be an Other Woman', 'How to Talk to Your Mother (Notes)', 'How to Become a Writer', 'The Kid's Guide to Divorce'.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58013055091062,"sku":null,"price":8.0,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9780571260850.jpg?v=1780505050"},{"product_id":"9780997366648","title":"Leonora Carrington - The Complete Stories","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Leonora Carrington. Themes include Fiction, Short Stories (single author), Feminist, Absurdist.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e“\u003ci\u003eComplete Stories\u003c\/i\u003e, a collection of Carrington’s published and unpublished short stories—many newly translated from their original French and Spanish—is a terrific introduction to her bizarre, dreamlike worlds.” —Carmen Maria Machado, \u003ci\u003eNpr \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Surrealist writer and painter Leonora Carrington (1917–2011) was a master of the macabre, of gorgeous tableaus, biting satire, roguish comedy, and brilliant, effortless flights of the imagination. Nowhere are these qualities more ingeniously brought together than in the works of short fiction she wrote throughout her life. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePublished to coincide with the centennial of her birth, \u003ci\u003eThe Complete Stories of Leonora Carrington\u003c\/i\u003e collects for the first time all of her stories, including several never before seen in print. With a startling range of styles, subjects, and even languages (several of the stories are translated from French or Spanish), \u003ci\u003eThe Complete Stories\u003c\/i\u003e captures the genius and irrepressible spirit of an amazing artist’s life.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFormat:\u003c\/strong\u003e Paperback\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll books at Vastela are pre-owned. Condition varies from good to near-new. No book is sold in unacceptable condition.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Vastela Books","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":58030349255030,"sku":null,"price":5.9,"currency_code":"CHF","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0707\/7144\/1981\/files\/9780997366648.jpg?v=1780660873"},{"product_id":"9780007367726","title":"Anthony Doerr - Memory Wall","description":"\u003cp\u003eWritten by Anthony Doerr. Themes include Fiction, Fairy Tales, Folk Tales, Legends \u0026amp; Mythology, Literary, Short Stories (single author), Family Life.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAnthony Doerr's brilliant new collection of stories is about memory: the source of meaning and coherence in our lives, and the fragile thread that connects us to ourselves and to others.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eNow includes 'The Deep', which was awarded the 2011 Sunday Times Short Story Award.\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cp\u003eIn the luminous title story, a young boy in South Africa comes to possess an old woman's secret, a piece of the past with the power to redeem a life. In 'The River Nemunas', a teenaged orphan moves from Kansas to Lithuania, and discovers a world in which myth becomes real. 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Themes include Literature \u0026amp; Fiction, Genre Fiction, Family Life, Short Stories \u0026amp; Anthologies, Anthologies.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eWinner of the 2025 International Booker Prize\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eWinner of a Pen Translates Award\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eA monumental first collection in English from Banu Mushtaq: lawyer, activist, champion of Muslim women, and winner of India's highest literary honors.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eIn the twelve stories of \u003ci\u003eHeart Lamp\u003c\/i\u003e, Banu Mushtaq exquisitely captures the everyday lives of women and girls in Muslim communities in southern India. Published originally in the Kannada language between 1990 and 2023, praised for their dry and gentle humor, these portraits of family and community tensions testify to Mushtaq's years as a journalist and lawyer, in which she tirelessly championed women's rights and protested all forms of caste and religious oppression. \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eWritten in a style at once witty, vivid, colloquial, moving and excoriating, it's in her characters--the sparky children, the audacious grandmothers, the buffoonish maulvis and thug brothers, the oft-hapless husbands, and the mothers above all, surviving their feelings at great cost--that Mushtaq emerges as an astonishing writer and observer of human nature, building disconcerting emotional heights out of a rich spoken style. 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