Summer Short Story Reading Program

Like previous summers, I have embarked on a short story reading program; the idea is to read (at least) one short story per day through the months of June, July, and August. I thought this year, I might update my blog, give a daily response to my short story reading. Since it's June 5th already, I obviously didn't get that going. However, here's what I've read so far:

"Pol Pot's Beautiful Daughter" by Geoff Ryman. A rather forgettable fantasy that doesn't live up to the promise of its title.

"First Kisses from Beyond the Grave" by Nik Houser. This is my favorite story thus far. It's about a young boy who may or may not be dead, who ends up being sent to a high school for dead kids. There are ghouls, ghosts, vampires, zombies, skeletons, etc. "Not much different than a regular high school," as the narrator puts it. A fun little read.

"The Last to Be Found" by Christopher Harman. A ghost story (maybe) that really does an excellent job of building suspense, but the ending was a bit of a let-down.

"Fourteen Experiments in Postal Delivery" by John Schoffstall. I really liked the format of this story -- a series of letters written by a woman to an ex-boyfriend who's trying to win her back by sending her odd gifts -- and there were a lot of nice details, but again, I felt it faded off toward the end.

"The Night Whiskey" by Jeffrey Ford. I was really looking forward to this one, since I fondly recall Ford's short story "A Night in the Tropics" but found this a little harder to get into. It's kind of creepy, and a bit gory, and it did have a slightly more satisfying ending, but I still felt a little let down.

More later...