Thanks, everyone, that's a great help.

I've just extracted all my short fiction from among the rest of my still un-sorted books, and there's more than I thought. Chandler, Helen Dunmore, A L Kennedy. Going back a bit, anyone else adore Kate Chopin? Must actually read the Kafka...

Emma

In translation:

Guy de Maupassant
Fernando Sorrentino
Turgenev
Lu Xun


Not in translation, but still fantastic:
John Cheever

Has anybody mentioned The Summer Book and The Winter Book by Tove Jansson? I haven't actually read either of these books yet, but a friend of mine pushed them on me and they're supposed to be marvellous. And they look like short stories. (I think.)

Am reading Scoop at the moment. It's my first Waugh and it's so good I'm already trying to ration the pages.

Ooh, Sammy, isn't it glorious? Have you finished yet??

Yay! Another Scoop fan!

Naomi R

ZZ Packer
A.M Homes
Arthur Bradford
David Means
David Foster Wallace

(all from over in the US... but that's where the best short fiction lives these days methinks)

hmm, lots of goodies have already been mentioned, but i can reiterate a few, or maybe give a couple more suggestions. Let's see:

Hemingway! Read The snows of Kiliminjaro (one story), A Moveable Feast(a collection of yarns, all beautiful,) and, my favorite story, The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber.

Jhumpa Lahari: Interpreter of Maladies. Well deserved pulitzer winner. Rare that they hand those out for short story collections.

If you like David Sedaris, check out Augustin Burroughs's Possible Side Effects. Very similar in style and *almost* as funny.

As far as fiction journals, there are tons and tons to check out. The Paris Review publishes some fantastic fiction, as does Zeotrope: All Story, Glimmertrain, and The New Yorker publishes a fiction piece each week that can generally be read a their website, www.thenewyorker.com

Annie Proulx is good, and Brokeback Mountain is worth reading, as are a number of other stories by her.

John Updike is pretty much considered a god of short fiction. Check out "Trust Me," one of his first fiction books stuffed with memorable tales.

T.C. Boyle writes real nice too.

GL getting through everyone's suggestions

Fredegonde - no, not finished Scoop. Am loving it, though.

And, yes, ZZ Packer's Drinking Coffee Elsewhere was great.

Late to the party, but no one has yet mentioned Margaret Atwood, who I think is superb.

Zoe

Talking of Tove Jansson, why not re-read Moominland Midwinter. The Fillyjonk Who Was Afraid of Storms is a classic story - a pin-sharp character study, with the building menance of the storm in the background, the loneliness of the setting mirroring the fillyjonk's own loneliness, at the heart of the story is human isolation and the controlled insanity we create to try and conquer the greater madness of existence and Chaos.
She was a great children's writer, Tove Jansson...
How about Paul Bowles - A Distant Episode is my favourite short story of all time.

A M Homes is probably my favourite, but I've been reading Neil Gaiman's Smoke and Mirrors and Fragile things recently and really really enjoyed them. Reminds me how much fun it is to play on the page.

I am bit late joining this thread but has anyone here mentioned Alan Sillitoe?

Also Annie Proulx's Close Range collection is very good.

David

Did I mention Patricia Highsmith? She wrote the collection "Eleven"...

Another vote here for Annie Proulx's Close Range. Startling use of language - I plan to read it again sometime as I'm sure I will get even more out of it second time around. One of the stories does, however, have perhaps the most stomach-churning description of bodily functions I have ever read.