The Best American Short Stories 2019

By: Anthony Doerr, Heidi Pitlor

Narrated by: Robert Petkoff, Heidi Pitlor, Scott Shepherd, Gabra Zackman, Kevin R. Free, Sullivan Jones, Christine Lakin, Brittany Pressley, Zach Villa, Saskia Maarleveld, Ali Ahn, Robin Miles, Roxana Ortega, Wilson Bethel, Jefferson Mays

#1 New York Times best-selling, Pulitzer Prize–winning author Anthony Doerr brings his“stunning sense of physical detail and gorgeous metaphors” (San Francisco Chronicle) to selecting The Best American Short Stories 2019. Doerr and the series editor, Heidi Pitlor, winnow down twenty stories out of thousands that represent the best examples of the form published the previous year.

Read by a full cast including:

Kevin R. Free

Gabra Zackman

Scott Shepherd

Sullivan Jones

Christine Lakin

Brittany Pressley

Zach Villa

Saskia Maarleveld

Ali Ahn

Robin Miles

Roxana Ortega

Wilson Bethel

Robert Petkoff

Jefferson Mays

Dariush Kashani

Megan Tusing

Christopher Ryan Grant

Therese Plummer

Criena House

Emily Woo Zeller

Another great year of Shorts

I have been reading this series since the 1980s and look forward to the new volume each year.
Although there are only a few GREAT stories in each volume, I have found this series has the best curation of any of the annual short story collections I read. Each volume has 20 of the best American short stories of the year. Audible now has all the volumes since 2019.

RANT: This is a curated collection of American shorts. It is not really a “Best” collection because diversity and inclusion appear to be an important editorial factor. Inclusive curated collections are great but are a different thing from a true “best of” collection.

This year I really liked The Great Interruption by Windell Berry and Hellion by Julia Elliott. There are about a six other very good stories and a dozen others ranging from OK to Good.
The narration varies but overall good to excellent.

Not the best

Stories were not what you would expect to be considered the best. 2019 must have been a bad year for writers.

a lovely blend of stories well read

so nice to have full stories in digestible size. each story is not only new but presented with unique new Talent

Excellent writing and performance

However I did not find the stories very clever or interesting. Perhaps that's me being dull.

stories include vulgarity I wasn't prepared for

beware- I actually want a refund of my credit. I am shocked some of the ones I have heard so far are considered acceptable and mainstream. definite triggers for some I am sure.