Hi everyone!
As part of a StoryGraph challenge, I have two prompts that I’m struggling with that I need to complete by the end of the year. The prompts are:
“a play OR poetry collection”
and
“an anthology/short story collection/essay collection”
I’d love if people were able to rec me any books they’ve enjoyed that fit into either of these prompts.
I’ve never been one to read anthologies or collections of work, so I’m rather in the dark as to what I’d enjoy, and so thought to gain recs from others.
For context, I’m mostly a romance reader, though I do enjoy a bit of non-romance historical/fantasy/thriller books as well. My only experience of plays is reading King Lear and Dr. Faustus during my school days. For either prompt, I probably would prefer those that allow you to ruminate and question (if that makes sense!).
Thank you 🙂
by aailoda
2 Comments
>I probably would prefer those that allow you to ruminate and question (if that makes sense!).
I unfortunately don’t read a lot of plays or poetry, but I do read a lot of short stories! Here are some I have liked:
* Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado
* Bloodchild and Other Stories by Octavia E. Butler
* New Suns 2 edited by Nisi Shawl
* Either of the short story collections by Ted Chiang: Exhalation, Stories of Your Life and Others
* Of Tales and Enigmas by Minsoo Kang
* The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories by Ken Liu
The only short story collection I’ve read was ***I’m Fine but You Appear to be Sinking* by Leyna Krow (2017)** and tbh I only picked it up because the title is excellent and it’s got an astronaut on the cover.
One thing I liked about it was that there were three slightly longer stories that were all interconnected, so that kept me reading. Storygraph labels it as speculative fiction though so not sure how it fits in with your usual reading, but will probably allow for some rumination.
For poetry I’d take a look at **Andrea Gibson**, Colorado’s Poet Laureatefrom 2023 until they died from cancer last year. I only know their spoken work, but want to read some of it when I get the chance. Wrote a lot about identity, queerness, gender norms, politics and later illness, life and mortality.