Collected Stories

By Carol Shields

For the first time all of Carol Shields’ remarkable short stories – some previously unpublished – are gathered together in one volume.

‘Carol Shields’ stories have given me happiness, not just pleasure’ Alice Munro

In the Collected Stories we bring together Carol Shields’ original short-story volumes, Various Miracles, The Orange Fish and Dressing Up for the Carnival, as well as many stories not previously published in the UK, including ‘Segue’, her last work.

In these stories the author combines the dazzling virtuosity and wise maturity that won so many readers to her prize-winning novels such as The Stone Diaries and Unless.

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins UK
• Release date: Jul 29, 2010
• ISBN: 9780007290161

Carol Shields

Carol Shields’s novels include Unless; Larry’s Party, winner of The Women’s Prize; The Stone Diaries, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and shortlisted for the Booker Prize; The Republic of Love; Happenstance; and Mary Swann. Dressing Up for the Carnivaland Various Miracles, collections of short stories, were later published as The Collected Stories. Brought up in Chicago, Shields lived in Canada from 1957 until her death in 2003.

Reviews for Collected Stories

[ldvoorberg · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Not your typical short stories.
Very few had a plot or even central conflict. It's more like you're a fly and you buzz in and out of homes to witness snippets of life happening all over space and time.

Many of the characters are middle-aged, often divorced or in unhappy marriages (sometimes just co-habituating) and/or there has been infidelity in the relationships.

Some of the stories are peculiar, making me wonder if I totally missed the point once I got to the end. Perhaps I did, as I raced through many of the stories instead of slowly digesting them one by one.

I liked the one where the meterologists go on strike and there's no weather, the one where the writer avoids the letter I and narrates the experience. There were a few others, too, but on the whole, I'd say I am more of a short story traditionalist.

[nearasyouget · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Carols Shields' short stories are highly descriptive but strangely lacking in emotion.

[drfuriosa · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A diverse, if uneven, collection of short stories that run a gamut of experiences and feature an array of characters and perspectives.

[amzzz_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A wonderful collection of stories from a range of perspectives and evoking a range of responses. My favourite was "Absence", written without the use of the letter i!