Reference Reviews

Reference for Students

Short Stories for Students: Presenting Analysis, Context, and Criticism on Commonly Studied Short Stories. Vol. 25. Edited y Ira Mark Milne. Detroit, Mich.: Gale, 2007. 1 vol. 336 p. $100.00. ISBN 10: 1-4144-3271-2; 13: 978-0-7876-8905-6

With an 8^th grade granddaughter bemoaning the study short stories in her class, this reviewer feels that teachers will be grateful for the editor’s approach to studying short studies. This book is designed "to provide readers with a guide to understanding, enjoying, and studying short stories by giving them easy access to information about the work." Rather than a test over the characters, the teacher might assign the student or a group of students to develop similar "Topics for Further Study," "Compare and Contrast," or "What Do I Read Next?" using as models the inset boxes in this volume. Another assignment could be to write an essay based upon one of the elements in each entry. In the foreword, the reader will find how to cite short stories in the introduction and a one-page "Literary Chronology" beginning with 1896 and the birth of Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald and ending with the publication of Joy Williams’ "The Girls" in 2004. Each entry begins with the title of the story, the author’s name, and the date of publication, an introduction, the author’s biography, a plot summary, the characters, theme, style, historical context, critical overview, criticism, sources, and further reading. Authors included are Baida, Bender,  Danticat, Doerr, Fitzgerald, Helprin, Highsmith, Lee, McCracken, Packer, Powell, Salter, Silver, and Williams. A few black and white photographs illustrate the text. The appendix includes a glossary of literary terms, a cumulative author and title index and a nationality and ethnicity index which show teachers where to find short stories if your library has the entire set. The subject and theme index is specific to the single volume. Your literature teachers should welcome this addition to your collection