Spanning the late 1970s to the late 1980s, Nadia Bozak’s thirteen stories are narrated from the perspective of Shell, the only child of bohemian artisans determined to live off their handicrafts and uphold a left-wing lifestyle. At the age of five, Shell’s world is transformed when the family moves into a new house, where she grows up. Over time, she gradually trades her unconventional upbringing for junk food, rock music, and boys. All the while, Shell quietly watches her parents’ loveless marriage fall apart and learns to survive divorce, weight gain, heartache, and first love. A funny, sensitive portrayal of the innocence and uncertainty of childhood and adolescence, Thirteen Shells is a true-to-life collection that is as unforgettable as it is poignant.

Set in East Africa, the Middle East, Canada, and the U.S., Things Are Good Now examines the weight of the migrant experience on the human psyche. In these pages, women, men, and children who've crossed continents in search of a better life find themselves struggling with the chaos of displacement and the religious and cultural clashes they face in their new homes. A maid who travelled to the Middle East lured by the prospect of a well-paying job is trapped in the Syrian war. A female ex-freedom fighter immigrates to Canada only to be relegated to cleaning public washrooms and hospital sheets. A disillusioned civil servant struggles to come to grips with his lover's imminent departure. A young Muslim Canadian woman who'd married her way to California to escape her devout family's demands realizes she's made a mistake. The collection is about remorse and the power of memory, about the hardships of a post-9/11 reality that labels many as suspicious or dangerous because of their names or skin colour alone, but it's also about hope and friendship and the intricacies of human relationships. Most importantly, it's about the compromises we make to belong.

A collection of the best of the `My Word!' stories, including `You can't have your kayak and heat it' and `Upon my word'.

The collected stories of O. Henry make entertaining listening.

Two classic novels and a short story collection from the legendary Hugo and Nebula Award-winning author in one volume. This volume from an icon of the Golden Age of science fiction includes: City: In this International Fantasy Award-winning novel, millennia have passed since humankind abandoned Earth, leaving their most loyal animal companions alone. Granted the power of speech centuries earlier, the intelligent, pacifist dogs are the last keepers of human history. With the aid of Jenkins, an ageless service robot, the dogs live in harmony and peace. But now they're threatened by the reawakened remnants of a warlike race called "Man." A Heritage of Stars: More than a thousand years have passed since humankind intentionally destroyed its treacherous technology. The scant knowledge that has survived is kept in monastery-like "universities" where Tom Cushing learns of the legendary "Place of Going to the Stars." On an amazing trek across what was once America, Tom and a band of misfits seek the source of the myth, only to discover an astonishing revelation at the end of their journey. Grotto of the Dancing Deer: Ten tales of wonder, danger, and the future, including the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning "Grotto of the Dancing Deer," in which a man carrying an ancient secret finally speaks up, unable to bear any longer the loneliness he has experienced for millennia; "Over the River," where children from an embattled future are sent back for safekeeping to their ancestors in the peaceful past; "Day of Truce," about the inhabitants of a suburban subdivision who must barricade themselves against bands of roving attackers who invade when the gates open wide one day every year; and seven more stories from a master of speculative fiction.

A New York Times Notable Book: Darkly comic fables of modern life from a "major discovery" whose "writing gets in your bloodstream like a fever" (The Washington Post Book World). A housewife with a ravenous lust for the adolescent boy who mows her lawn swallows him whole. A woman nonchalantly hacks off her leg at a posh private club. A father babyproofs his house so thoroughly he never sees his wife and child. And a businessman passing through an airport risks it all to save a giant lobster from death. In these "brisk, funny, stylish, original" stories, the award-winning author of Carnivore Diet merges the mundane with the unimaginable, and peels back the squeaky-clean facade of suburbia to expose the strangeness underneath (Elle). Combining biting wit, wild imagination, and "unsettling, hallucinatory" prose, Julia Slavin masterfully satirizes the world of upscale families and young professionals as they confront their greatest fantasies and most grotesque fears in unexpected, and often hilarious, ways (The New York Times Book Review).

A follow-up to Dragons at Crumbling Castle, this second batch of storytelling gems features short stories written when Sir Terry Pratchett was a seventeen-year-old junior reporter.

Original, witty, and subtle, these stories feature characters who must navigate life in a small town, and will appeal to fans of Miriam Toews and Kathleen Winter. This collection of beautifully crafted short stories features complex characters whose internal struggles manifest in their most intimate relationships, told by a writer with a compassionate eye. A narrator watches her social sphere deteriorate after her boyfriend’s rough-housing leads to his best friend’s tragic paralysis. Childhood sweethearts, finally united later in life, find that they are not the soulmates they believed themselves to be. After her mother becomes depressed after a miscarriage, a daughter takes on the role of caregiver.Set in fictional small rural towns, these stories explore young people who grow up against a religious backdrop, mothers who baulk against society’s imposed identities, and characters who explore their individual roles within their families as they navigate sexuality, suffering, and shame. These narrators are blunt and sometimes obsessive, but bravely optimistic as they strive to be the best versions of themselves. As her characters struggle to discern deception from reality, using their limited resources to parse charm and charisma from credibility, Kuipers understated style is full of dark wit and detailed observation.

Charity takes small steps to escape her controlling father. Jasmine endures the rumors about her at school, even though no one really knows what happened last summer. The Oh! So Perfect Hair Dolly wishes for just the right child to take her home from the store. Nicola has a run-in with a classmate on her first day at a new school in the big city - or is the classmate a wolf in disguise? A squirrel ruminates on the nature of life and death. Dani fights for her dream, in spite of her father's insistence that her older brother should be the one to play hockey. Mike finds the kind of family he has longed for in his coworkers at the restaurant where he works. In these seven stories by Laurel Croza (author of the award-winning picture books I Know Here and From There to Here), five teenagers, a doll and a squirrel break out of the expectations placed upon them. Featuring beautiful black-and-white illustrations by Kelsey Garrity-Riley.