The Story Behind the Story: 26 Stories by Contemporary Writers and How They Work

by Andrea Barrett

Book Overview

This big, beautiful anthology of short fiction is for readers, writers, and anyone curious about the mysterious processes of literary minds. All contributors have been recent faculty members of the prestigious Warren Wilson Low Residency Program, including such literary favorites as Margot Livesey, Charles Baxter, Robert Boswell, Jim Shepard, Antonya Nelson, David Shields, and the editors themselves.

Each writer was asked to submit an original...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0393325326
• ISBN13: 9780393325324
• Release Date: January 2004
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Length: 480 Pages
• Weight: 0.95 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.5" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

intriguing background material

The first story in this collection, "Strike Anywhere" by Antonia Nelson, left me breathless at the thought of a little boy eating matches. Even when the scene moved into a bar where a pregnant woman was drinking and smoking, and I wanted to forcibly push her out of the bar, even then I could not stop thinking about the little boy sitting in the pickup out front eating matches while his father drank in the bar. The irony of the story is that the father is angrily indignant about the way the strange woman is treating her unborn child, while completely unconcerned about his own family, one of which is poisoning himself a few feet away. In the 'behind the story' section, Nelson reveals that a student told her this story, that her brother had told her, and said Nelson could have it to do with as she pleased. The result of that priceless gift is "Strike Anywhere." When I bought this book, I expected it to be like a writing class, but I think it is more like a workshop. Many of the stories impressed me as world-class, while others left me cold. All of the 'behind the story' sections were interesting, as I thought they would be, some were a lot more helpful than others. Steven Dobyns' "Part of the Story" is a page turner in which a sixty-three year old woman must meet the five children she gave up for adoption at birth, now adults who have tracked down her and each other. She is reluctant to admit that they all have different fathers, none of which she was married to. Further complicating things, on the morning they are all coming to her trailer to meet her, her current boyfriend dies in her bed. Only some well-chosen lies can save the day. Not only is the story brilliant, but Dobyns' comments about creating it are fascinating and instructive. C.J. Hribal's story "Morton and Lilly, Dredge and Fill" is good, but his behind the story is great, with in-depth discussion of point-of-view and how he used it. Robert Boswell wraps up the book beautifully with "A Walk in Winter," in which a man must relive the disappearance of his mother when a body is discovered twenty-two years later. The story, both the then and the now, is riveting, and the behind the story section is as well. With only a few exceptions, I found the stories here more than satisfying, and the background material intriguing.

Drop Everything & read now. You don't have to be a writer to read!

The book's premise & organization is clear & straightforward. None of the writers blather on about themselves; the pacing of each essay is perfect & importantly, no writer in the book has a bloated sense of self-importance. There is a humility and a thoughtfulness in process found here. Perhaps most significantly, the stories are blisteringly good!

Best Short Story Anthology Ever

The Story Behind the Story is the first collection of short stories I greeted with a whoop of joy. The more you enjoy reading a particular short story, the more you want to know about the writer. How different is the writer from me? you wonder. How did the writer actually write the story? Answers are hard to come by. If you're lucky, you'll find a measly author min-bio buried in the small print. Anthologies are the worst: one good story after another raises your curiosity, but lack of additional information leaves you deflated. Complain no more. The Story Behind the Story is exactly what the title promises: a collection of masterfully written contemporary short stories, each partnered with a fascinating essay revealing the creative process behind the story. The stories are by 26 writers who have taught in Warren Wilson College's famous MFA Program for Writers. The simple format (so beautifully basic you're astonished it really hasn't been done before) was created by the book's two editors, Peter Turchi (long-time director of the Writers program) and Andrea Barrett, winner of the 1996 National Book Award for her story collection, Ship Fever.Subject matter and style are as wide-ranging and dissimilar as work from that many talented writers could be. There's an unhappy boy who eats matches. A deranged fascist who roams Venice. A kidnapped woman who buys a hat. A man who runs over a cat. The images are unforgettable: a wedding cake in the street, a door floating in a river, a pile of bones found in the snow. Most of the stories are set in present day, with many of them telling the concerns of parents, such as Mrs. Dimbleby, Wilton Barnhardt's sympathetic portrait of a mother who's not sure how much she loves her snotty little daughter. A few are historical, such as Jim Shephard's haunting tale of male lovers aboard the doomed Hindenburg airship, appropriately entitled Love and Hydrogen. Absurd comedy reigns in Stephen Dobyns' Part of the Story, in which a clueless older woman is visited by the five grown children she gave up for adoption. The range of voices makes a thrilling melting pot, for although they've taught at Warren Wilson, the writers come from all over the country. There's the bold poetic cadence of Michael Martone's The Moon Over Wapakoneta, the mesmerizing lyricism of Andrea Barrett's tale of lost love, Out There, and the "Mexicanized English" Karen Brennan uses in Sacha's Dog. In each "story behind the story," the writers relate the source of their inspiration, what writing goals they tried to accomplish, and how the story evolved from idea to published page. The result is that each story/essay unit becomes a vivid "window on creativity," as Richard Russo (2002 Pulitzer Prize for his novel Empire Falls) comments in his inspiring introduction to the collection. Readers always want to know how autobiographical a writer's stories are. About City Codes, his poignant story of a family's attempt to save a historic building, Tracy Daughe

An innovative resource and great fiction

An innovative resource and great fictionAh, the writing life. We envision the author working compulsively, never satisfied, anxious to capture his ideas on paper before they disappear, a bottle of liquid inspiration and glass at hand. In the public imagination, the writer exists in some remote setting, isolated in his rarified world of complicated thoughts and clever phrases, perhaps a tragic and difficult personality. While there is cachet in such perceptions, writing actually involves a great deal of hard work. A story must be nurtured, carefully pruned from inception into the finished pages. Yet the writers in this anthology are distinctly human and accessible, certainly generous, stimulating the reader's imagination with their experiences.In this anthology, a series of writers, all teachers on the faculty of Warren Wilson College MFA Program for Writers, have contributed twenty-six short stories, each followed by a section named "About the Story". Each About the Story details the author's creative process involved in his particular story, whether it be personal experience, an idea gleaned from research or a series of incidents that resulted in a tale to tell. The pivotal question about writers: is this talent genetic or are these skills that can be learned? In his introduction, Richard Russo addresses the problem ambiguously: Writers are both the same and different than others, says Russo. Good writing cannot be readily taught, but those who want to write can learn to do it well. With authors as mentors, advising aspiring writers, they may master the needed skills. However, "artists seldom progress in a predictable, linear fashion". It is possible for a writer to be good before he is competent; clearly, craft and experience can turn a writer into an author. Thanks to the generosity of these veteran authors, sharing their experience and guiding the apprentice through the necessary elements of the craft, this volume is especially valuable. The shared ideas and discussions on problem solving build an energy that inspires the novice writer to experiment with a variety of approaches and each new story provides an opportunity for discovery. Yet each author has his own method, his own path. Russo refers another phenomenon, "cross-fertilization": when the solution to the story pays off by suggesting yet another, or stimulating a thought process that leads to a completed story. The contributing authors are some of the finest names in contemporary fiction, including Margaret Livesey, Charles Baxter, Judith Grossman, Stephen Dobyns, Pablo Medina and Andrea Barrett. The authors' generosity is extraordinary in this literary treasure. Setting the tone with the first story, Antonya Nelson's "Strike Anywhere", a student "gives" Nelson the story, which "hangs in her mind like a Christmas ornament", until it is born. And Nelson "gives" the story to the reader in this anthology.A few lines from each "About the Story", or one specific author's thoughts may trigg