Top Ten Tuesday: Short Story Collections I’ve Read

This week’s Top Ten Tuesday prompt is Favorite Novellas/Short Stories. I can’t recall reading that many novellas, so I’m going to focus on short stories this week. However, I don’t usually remember individual stories enough to make a list, so I’m just going to list all of the short story collections I’ve read, which happens to be exactly ten.

A Tyranny of Petticoats edited by Jessica Spotswood: I picked this up because it sounded badass. All the stories are about various ladies over the history of America kicking butt and taking names (or, I suppose, in some cases trying to survive) by female YA authors. While I didn’t like every story in this collection, as a whole it was good and I need to read the follow-up collection, The Radical Element.

My True Love Gave to Me edited by Stephanie Perkins: This collection includes winter holiday themed love stories by popular YA authors. Some of these stories were a lot of fun and others not so much, but it’s a good selection of authors and genres that I think any YA reader could find at least one story to enjoy.

Summer Days and Summer Nights edited by Stephanie Perkins: This is a follow-up collection to My True Love Gave to Me but instead of winter themed stories, these all take place in the summer. Again, I didn’t enjoy every story in this collection, but there’s enough variety for every reader.

The Language of Thorns by Leigh Bardugo: This is a collection of short stories from the Grishaverse of Leigh Bardugo’s fantasy series. Some are clearly inspired by well-known fairy tales such as Hansel and Gretel and The Little Mermaid, while others take on their own form. The best part about this collection, though, is the beautiful illustrations that actually help tell the story as you read.

The Blue Fairy Book by Andrew Lang: There are tons of these fairy books out there, and I set out to read them all until I learned a lot are hard to find available. So I’ve only read The Blue Fairy Book so far. I found a lot of the well-known stories to be weird in this collection. Disney definitely changed a lot.

Tales of Mystery and Madness by Edgar Allan Poe and illustrations by Gris Grimly: A short story collection list would be incomplete without something by Poe. I like the darker side to his tales and can appreciate the focus on mayhem and madness in his stories.

The Complete Tales of Winnie-the-Pooh by A.A. Milne: Winnie-the-Pooh has always been a favorite of mine since I was little. I absolutely love the original stories and illustrations. (More than I will ever like Disney’s version.) The simplicity and fun of imagination always hits home.

A Thousand Beginnings and Endings edited by Ellen Oh and Elsie Chapman: These short stories focus on retellings of East Asian and South Asian myths and folklore. This is one collection I enjoyed thoroughly. Yes, some stories didn’t grip me as much as others, but I was intrigued by every story, eager to learn about lesser known myths and stories.

Time Lord Fairy Tales by Justin Richards: This collection was kind of a disappointment at times. It was advertised as a collection of fairy tales that little Time Lords and Time Ladies heard growing up, but it was really just retellings of famous fairy tales but with a Doctor Who spin. The Big Bag Wolf is a Zygon or the three little pigs are three little Sontarans. The illustrations, however, in this book are absolutely gorgeous. I think I would have enjoyed it better if it had been advertised as is.

The Little Mermaid and Other Stories by Hans Christian Andersen and illustrated by MinaLima: I’m reading this book right now, and while some of the stories are a bit odd, I’m thoroughly enjoying the beautiful writing style and the gorgeous illustrations. The thing I like about Hans Christian Andersen is that his stories end on a hopeful note, even when sad things happen earlier in the stories.

What short story collections have you read? Leave me a recommendation in the comments and don’t forget to join the link-up!

 

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