Houghton Mifflin Harcourt is honoring the centennial of its short fiction compilation Best American Short Stories with a forthcoming special anniversary edition, 100 Years of The Best American Short Stories. The special edition, edited by Lorrie Moore, will include a selection of short stories featured throughout the series, which launched in 1915.
The publisher said the book, set for October 6, will, along with the chosen stories, "celebrate key literary moments over the last one hundred years."
The stories in the collection will be chosen by Moore from more than 2,000 pieces. Authors with stories in the title will range from old masters of the form to contemporary wordsmiths; there will be contributions from, among others, George Saunders, Edna Ferber, William Faulkner, John Cheever, Jhumpa Lahiri and Sherman Alexie. Aside from the stories, the anniversary edition will also include, HMH said, "behind-the-scenes anecdotes" about the series, provided by co-editor Heidi Pitlor, and "a decade-by-decade examination of the trends captured over a hundred years."
Senior v-p and publisher of HMH Bruce Nichols said the fact that the series has reached this milestone "is astonishing" and "testifies to the enduring appeal and vigor of the short story in American writing." He added: "Styles and trends have changed and the reading public has expanded dramatically, yet short fiction has flourished in every decade of the past 100 years.”
Along with the release of 100 Years of the Best American Short Stories, on October 6, HMH will also be publishing 10 new annual titles in the Best American series, including The Best American Short Stories 2015, edited by T.C. Boyle; The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy, edited by Joe Hill; The Best American Essays 2015, edited by Ariel Levy; and The Best American Mystery Stories 2015, edited by James Patterson.
