Here are 99 books that Selected Stories fans have personally recommended if you like
Selected Stories.
Book DNA is a community of 13,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.
I first became aware of the 1920s through movies such as Some Like it Hot and Thoroughly Modern Millie. I was immediately attracted to what I call the “Booze, beads, and boas.” I felt a kinship with the flappers who were experiencing freedom from the restrictions of the Victorian Era and living their best lives. They were making their own rules and doing it with style! As professor of library science, I researched the history of the American public library and of women in the 1850s-1920s. Today, I write historical cozy mysteries to live out my own glamorous flapper dreams.
I love the absolutely authentic atmosphere of this book – the clothes, the music, the booze -- and the exploration of the dark side of the 1920s.
I find some of the characters sympathetic, some repellent, and some impossible to understand, just as in real life. Regardless, I feel that I really get to know them by the end of the book, even if I still don’t understand them. I can’t help but make comparisons with that time period and now, a century later. So much has changed, yet so much remains the same.
I’ll be honest that it can be a depressing read, so I have to be in the right mood for it, but when I am, nothing else will satisfy.
As the summer unfolds, Nick is drawn into Gatsby's world of luxury cars, speedboats and extravagant parties. But the more he hears about Gatsby - even from what Gatsby himself tells him - the less he seems to believe. Did he really go to Oxford University? Was Gatsby a hero in the war? Did he once kill a man? Nick recalls how he comes to know Gatsby and how he also enters the world of his cousin Daisy and her wealthy husband Tom. Does their money make them any happier? Do the stories all connect? Shall we come to know…
A moving story of love, betrayal, and the enduring power of hope in the face of darkness.
German pianist Hedda Schlagel's world collapsed when her fiancé, Fritz, vanished after being sent to an enemy alien camp in the United States during the Great War. Fifteen years later, in 1932, Hedda…
I studied history in college and, after a few misspent years in broadcasting, worked in marketing and public relations for several companies. In my free time I wrote articles and books on historical events and people. A dozen years ago, on a trip to San Francisco and Alcatraz, I conceived of an idea for a novel. True to my background, it was based on a real historical event – the 1962 escape of three men in a raft from the prison. It wasn't until my mid-sixties when I felt ready to step out of my non-fiction comfort zone and write my first novel. Can't wait to start the next one.
It would be obscene to read this on a Kindle. This early Dashiell Hammett novel has to be read in paperback, the older a copy you can find, the better.
It has everything a great pulp novel should have; murder, crooked cops, gangs, and a rumpled too-honest-for-his-own-good hero. What I love about this book is how Hammett uses his own experience working for the Pinkerton Detective Agency (who were basically hired thugs) and a real historical event (a labor dispute in Montana that resulted in several deaths) to weave a solid crime novel.
Detective-story master Dashiell Hammett gives us yet another unforgettable read in Red Harvest: When the last honest citizen of Poisonville was murdered, the Continental Op stayed on to punish the guilty--even if that meant taking on an entire town. Red Harvest is more than a superb crime novel: it is a classic exploration of corruption and violence in the American grain.
I grew up in a small, Midwestern town where people sinned Monday through Saturday, then went to church on Sunday to stock up on absolution for the coming week. It was also a place where people wanted to be well-thought of, if thought of at all, and could be at their best when things were at their worst. I wanted to escape as soon as possible, yet now as old memories become more accessible than recent ones, I realize that I never escaped at all. I write about small towns, perhaps to avenge, perhaps as homage; perhaps because it is still, after all these years, what I best know.
With biting satire and elegiac prose, Main Street is the paragon of stories set in small towns.
Author Sinclair Lewis was obviously not enamored of small towns, and like Sherwood Anderson’s Winesburg, Ohio, is perhaps exorcising some demons from his own upbringing. Nevertheless, perhaps unable to help himself, he instills his protagonist, Carol Milford (Kennicott) with a “Never give up” small town value. At the end she is undaunted. Even though she’s been stifled at nearly every turn, in her own words she has “kept the faith.”
I love the work of Sinclair Lewis. I based the character of July Huffaker in Delphic Oracle, U.S.A. on Elmer Gantry, and when I taught in medical schools, kept copies of Arrowsmith in my office that I gave to students and residents interested in a career in academic medicine. “Read this,” I told them. “If you still want in, come talk to…
In this classic satire of small-town America, beautiful young Carol Kennicott comes to Gopher Prairie, Minnesota, with dreams of transforming the provincial old town into a place of beauty and culture. But she runs into a wall of bigotry, hypocrisy and complacency. The first popular bestseller to attack conventional ideas about marriage, gender roles, and small town life, Main Street established Lewis as a major American novelist.
The Everlasting Life of Charlie Wall
by
Paul Wilborn,
It’s 1985, and Ronald Armstrong, known in the magic mushroom trade as “Trip,” takes a “sober” job as a driver for a retired Tampa mobster. His boss, Charlie Wall, has survived four attempts on his life, the last one in 1955. When Charlie falls into depression, Trip rebuilds his boss’…
I studied history in college and, after a few misspent years in broadcasting, worked in marketing and public relations for several companies. In my free time I wrote articles and books on historical events and people. A dozen years ago, on a trip to San Francisco and Alcatraz, I conceived of an idea for a novel. True to my background, it was based on a real historical event – the 1962 escape of three men in a raft from the prison. It wasn't until my mid-sixties when I felt ready to step out of my non-fiction comfort zone and write my first novel. Can't wait to start the next one.
I could easily have all five of my picks be novels by Sinclair Lewis. I'll stop at two.
In George Babbitt, Lewis's titular lead, we have a character whose very name became synonymous with conformity. What I absolutely love about this book has a lot to do with the bold plot choices Lewis takes with Babbitt. I write this knowing that many critics did not like the book because, they complained, there really wasn't a plot! (Cripes, what book were they reading?)
These plot turns include his dalliances with socialism (which runs counter to his position as the city of Zenith's most successful realtor) and a socialist woman.
Prosperous and socially prominent, George Babbitt appears to have everything a man could wish: good health, a fine family, and a profitable business in a booming Midwestern city. But the middle-aged real estate agent is shaken from his self-satisfaction by a growing restlessness with the limitations of his life. When a personal crisis forces a reexamination of his values, Babbitt mounts a rebellion against social expectations — jeopardizing his reputation and business standing as well as his marriage. Widely considered Sinclair Lewis's greatest novel, this satire of the American social landscape created a sensation upon its 1922 publication. Babbitt's name…
I despise long-winded books with an electoral roll of characters or characters with unnecessarily complex names. Reading should be a pleasure, not a chore. High school does its best to suck the joy out of reading with its “what did the author mean here?” nonsense. If the reader has to guess what the author means, the author failed to tell their story. Symbolism and hidden meanings are a joke. I won’t read pretentious books that people only read so they can say they’ve read them. One of the reasons I started writing was to reach people who ended up as non-readers because high school ruined reading for them.
I love Tim Burton’s movies. His book of poems and short stories is just as good as his movies (don’t let the poems aspect put you off). I’m not a fan of poetry, but this collection of twisted tales is great (especially if you read them in your head in Christopher Lee’s voice).
As a bonus, the book is packed with Tim’s off-beat artwork (which matches the characters perfectly). I love the strange and unusual. To quote Lydia (from Tim Burton’s Beetlejuice), “I myself am strange and unusual.”
Twenty-three illustrated gothic tales from the dark corridors of the imagination of Tim Burton. Burton - the creative genius behind Batman, Edward Scissorhands, Sleepy Hollow and Nightmare Before Christmas, among others - now gives birth to a cast of gruesomely sympathetic children: misunderstood outcasts who struggle to find love and belonging in their cruel, cruel worlds. His lovingly lurid illustrations evoke both the sweetness and tragedy of these hopeful, yet hapless beings.
As a transplant to California, albeit more than 50 years ago, I am still fascinated by what makes this place at the edge of the Pacific so unique. It has accepted so many people, from so many places over a fairly recent period. I always feel I can deduce more history from well rendered characters set in specific times and places. Their wholeness and their meaning, as well as that of their culture, are to be found in literature.
The juxtaposition of Eve Babitz’s unabashed hedonism and her incisive ability to nail a situation are not what you normally expect.
This book ranges all over southern California of the 1960s and 1970s, always coming back to the place Eve loved best, Los Angeles, a place of “vast sprawls, smog, and luke nights: L.A. It is where I work best, where I can live, oblivious to physical reality.”
When I moved to Los Angeles, I was disposed to love it, but it was hard to find any confirmation in books! I am delighted with Eve Babitz, who, with extravagant and precise language, celebrates the place.
No one burned hotter than Eve Babitz. Possessing skin that radiated “its own kind of moral laws,” spectacular teeth, and a figure that was the stuff of legend, she seduced seemingly everyone who was anyone in Los Angeles for a long stretch of the 1960s and ’70s. One man proved elusive, however, and so Babitz did what she did best, she wrote him a book.
Slow Days, Fast Company is a full-fledged and full-bodied evocation of a bygone Southern California that far exceeds its mash-note premise. In ten sun-baked, Santa Ana wind–swept sketches, Babitz re-creates a Los Angeles of movie…
Delve into this internationally best-selling series, now complete! A fast paced laugh-out-loud mix of Urban Fantasy and Mystery.
I can tell when you’re lying. Every. Single. Time. I’m Jinx, a PI hired to find a missing university student, I hope to find her propped up at a bar–yet my gut…
My sons were both reluctant readers and that made me want to write books that they wouldn’t be able to resist reading! Reading should be a pleasure and this list is packed with books that are impossible to put down. They are perfect for young, reluctant readers, as they are not trying to be too serious or worthy or overwhelming with too much text. They pull you in and hook you from the start and you can’t help being moved by the characters as they grow and develop, fostering a love of books and fiction. I love comedy in books, but funny books also have to have heart, believable characters, and a great plot that keeps you reading till the very end.
This book made me first want to write for 7 to 11-year-olds! It is really easy to get into and the characters are fun, believable, and have heart. Baddiel’s books are all set in the real world of school and normal life but with a fantastical twist. In this story, the naughtiest boy in school accidentally swaps bodies with the very strict headteacher, and they both learn a lot about themselves while having chaotic, madcap adventures along the way.
From the million-copy bestselling author of THE PARENT AGENCY and BIRTHDAY BOY comes a wildly entertaining wish-fulfilment adventure that asks the question: what would happen if the strictest head teacher swapped bodies with the naughtiest kid in school?
Strictest head naughtiest boy = chaos.
Bracket Wood is about to be visited by the school inspectors. But there's one big problem: Ryan Ward.
The maestro of practical jokes, Ryan has played so many tricks that in the end the Head Teacher just walks out. And then the new Head Teacher, Mr Carter, arrives. A man so strict even…
I’m a comic fan first, then a comic creator. I grew up on the classics—Calvin and Hobbes and The Far Side and excitedly watched as new comics popped up online. I love comic strips and have rows of collections lining my bookshelves. The coolest part of starting my own series has been becoming a member of a cartoonist community that I have always been a huge fan of.
Joshua has a really unique sense of humor that’s accompanied by absolutely stunning art.
The comics are really worth admiring in print, not to get lost amongst the sea of online ‘content’.
Both Joshua and I write comics that give readers a glimpse into the animal kingdom and I love seeing how our interpretations of the same world can differ, through our comedic voices and art… and yes, his work is art.
Based on Joshua Barkman's popular webcomic by the same name, False Knees is animal humor taken to a very absurd, darkly delightful place.
In Barkman's debut print collection, False Knees fans will find old favorites along with an abundance of all-new material. Featuring creatures found in the author's native Ontario, this always sharp, sometimes head-scratchingly bizarre collection of comics offers a view into the secret, surprisingly insightful world of blue jays, squirrels, geese, wolves, and rabbits.
I make music. I write books. I’m drawn to scenarios in which people make music or books or art collaboratively, often spontaneously. I enjoy making music with kids because of how they can be creative spontaneously. Sometimes adults pretend to be creative in a way that a child might relate to, but a child can generally sniff out a pretender. And a pretend pretender can be unpleasant company for children and adults alike. These books were written by adults who know their inner child. Wonder, play and a tangential regard for social norms are their baseline to share the stories they’ve chosen to share.
Tim Fite is a creative dynamo who has been steadily blessing the world with his music and art for years.
This is his first children’s book and it has all the irreverence and cockeyed creativity that I love about his other work. The text of the book is a series of questions (Why Do Seals Clap? Why Are Old People Extra Wrinkly?) followed by multiple-choice answers that could only come from a genuine artist like Tim.
The answers each land in unexpected places on your body – your heart, your mind, your funny bone – and are accompanied by his full bleed hand drawn imagery, all in Black and White save for one color spread that feels like it explodes from the book. Most importantly, this book is fun to read with kids, who will learn to question answers – a skill that grows more valuable every day.
A hilarious picture book of curious questions with refreshingly quirky answers perfect for fans of Mac Barnett and Amy Krouse Rosenthal!
Why do kids lose their teeth? Why do seals clap? What is at the bottom of the ocean?
Artist and musician Tim Fite is here to almost-answer all your most important questions-and then some!-in this marvelously wacky, utterly imaginative, and irreverently playful picture book.
The authoritative but accessible history of the birth of modern American intelligence in World War II that treats not just one but all of the various disciplines: spies, codebreakers, saboteurs.
Told in a relatable style that focuses on actual people, it was a New Yorker "Best of 2022" selection and…
I’m a dog nut who loves reflecting on the powerful life lessons we can learn as we watch our furry best friends age happily and gratefully by our sides. I’ve also been working as a journalist for more than 30 years now — so that makes me one of the oldest dogs in my own newsroom. I’m a senior writer and editor for the website of NBC’s TODAY show, and the My Old Dog book stemmed from a viral TODAY.com story I wrote about photographer Lori Fusaro’s efforts to change people’s perceptions of older shelter animals. Writing that story was one of the best things that ever happened to me!
I’ve been a fan of Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist and author Dave Barry for decades, and his Lessons From Lucy book surprised me — not because it’s hilarious (of course it is!), but because it’s so profoundly moving. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it since I read it. Here’s what inspired the book: When Barry turned 70, he reflected on how unhappy he was about aging — in stark contrast with his blissed-out senior dog, Lucy. Barry noticed that Lucy was always ready for fun new adventures, eager to make new friends, and able to live in the moment. In this gem of a book, Barry explores the realities of the human condition and zeroes in on the real keys to contentment in life, all thanks to the love of a dog.
In this "little gem" (Washington Independent Review of Books), Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist and New York Times bestselling author Dave Barry learns how to age happily from his old but joyful dog, Lucy.
As Dave Barry turns seventy-not happily-he realizes that his dog, Lucy, is dealing with old age far better than he is. She has more friends, fewer worries, and way more fun. So Dave decides to figure out how Lucy manages to stay so happy, to see if he can make his own life happier by doing the things she does (except for drinking from the toilet). He reconnects…
