The lives of South Africans have always been interwoven in complex ways. There is a long history of division; but also of profound (and often surprising) instances of mutual recognition. Recognition is an exciting anthology of short stories in which twenty-two South African writers render these intricate connections.

The writers whose stories have been selected use the transformative power of the imagination and the unique appeal of the short story to illuminate aspects of our past and present. Cumulatively their stories tell of a history tainted by misrecognition but not, finally, bound by it. Amongst the twenty-two contributors are some of our best-known short story writers: Pauline Smith, Herman Charles Bosman, H.I. E. Dhlomo, Can Themba, Nadine Gordimer, Alex La Guma, Dan Jacobson, Miriam Tlali, Ahmed Essop, Njabulo Ndebele, Mandla Langa, Chris van Wyk, Damon Galgut, Achmat Dangor and Zoe Wicomb. And there is also a selection of vibrant newer voices: Makhosazana Xaba, Nadia Davids, Mary Watson, Lindiwe Nkutha, Wamuwi Mbao and Kobus Moolman.

Chronologically the collection ranges from the 1920s to the twenty first century. It builds on its predecessor, Encounters, but devotes significant attention to the transitional and post-apartheid years: almost half the stories were published after 1994. The anthology includes a generous and detailed introduction, written by David Medalie. It traces the motif of recognition, discusses the general characteristics of short stories and the narrative devices used by writers, and includes a brief analysis of each short story.

Recognition will appeal to teachers and students of literature. It will be enjoyed by all those who love short stories and appreciate the craftsmanship involved in telling a memorable tale.

From a domestic noir to a suspicious missing persons case and a family forced into hiding, The House Next Door is packed with three suspenseful stories.

The House Next Door (with Susan DiLallo):
Married mother of four Laura Sherman was thrilled when her new neighbour invited her on some errands. But a few quick tasks became a long lunch – and now things could go too far with a man who isn't what he seems...

The Killer's Wife (with Max DiLallo):
Six girls have gone missing. Detective McGrath knows the only way to find them is to get close to the suspect's wife... maybe too close.

The Witnesses (with Brendan DuBois):
The Sanderson family has been forced into hiding after one of them stumbled upon a criminal plot. Or so they think. No one will answer their questions. And the terrifying truth may come too late...

Nearly a decade after his last volume of short stories was published, Jeffrey Archer returns with his eagerly-awaited, brand-new collection TELL TALE, giving us a fascinating, exciting and sometimes poignant insight into the people he has met, the stories he has come across and the countries he has visited during the past ten years.

Find out what happens to the hapless young detective from Naples who travels to an Italian hillside town to find out Who Killed the Mayor? and the pretentious schoolboy in A Road to Damascus, whose discovery of the origins of his father's wealth changes his life in the most profound way.

Revel in the stories of the 1930's woman who dares to challenge the men at her Ivy League University in A Gentleman and A Scholar while another young woman who thumbs a lift gets more than she bargained for in A Wasted Hour.

These wonderfully engaging and always refreshingly original tales prove not only why Archer has been compared by the critics to Dahl and Maugham, but why he was described by The Times as probably the greatest storyteller of our age.

In these stories, seventeen writers from around the globe tell of dark doings in sunny places.

Join them in the Dominican Republic, the Sonoran Desert of Arizona, chic Mykonos, Seville at midnight, and on the morning beachfront of Ghana where a man has revenge on his mind. Follow an NGO worker kidnapped in Yemen, an engineer repairing a dam in turmoil-torn Ethopia, a foolish young Englishman hitchhiking across the Sahara. You will visit historic instabul and Mombasa and learn the secrets of family conflicts in Singapore, in Puerto Rico, in New Orleans.

The authors of these tales will convince you that evil under the sun makes for the most compelling, most entertaining crime fiction anywhere on earth.

The stories, blogs and poetry in this anthology explores the stark divides that exist in our communities and our country, South Africa.

Written by a range of writers – from published authors to talented school students – these powerful narratives give voice to those who are poor and discriminated against, and are threaded through with hope and resistance.

Connected by more than their exquisite prose, Nick Mulgrew’s new stories delve into a world of killer eagles, tattoo removal parlours, hardcore punk guitarists-cum-auditors, turtle sanctuaries, plane crashes, amateur pornographers and biltong-makers – a world concurrently too strange and too familiar for comfort. A collection of startling imagination and sympathy – set primarily in South Africa’s least fashionable cities and suburbs – these stories maintain a precarious balance between rich comedy and despair throughout their explorations of grief, spectacle, sex, nostalgia, and the lives of animals, both human and not. With audaciousness met by trademark spiritual undercurrents and poetic flourish, The First Law of Sadness is confirmation of Mulgrew’s status as one of South Africa’s best contemporary exponents of short fiction.

Hierdie omnibus-uitgawe is ’n versameling van die gewildste verhale uit die bekende Storieman-reeks. Dit sluit die oorspronklike voorlesings op twee oudio-CD’s in, sodat almal heerlik saam kan lees en luister! By die huis, of in die motor ... Storieman is daar!

In hierdie uitgawe verskyn gunstelinge soos “Wikus te Goede”, “Die astrante snyertjie”, “Die standvastige bliksoldaatjie” en “Die keiser se nuwe klere.” Kom lag lekker saam met stories soos “Liewe Heksie en die Koekoekie” en “Spokie van Boosgelegen” en word betower deur sprokies soos “Elf wilde swane”, “Die tonteldoos” en “Die Groen Jonkvrou van die meer”.

Nearly a decade after his last volume of short stories was published, Jeffrey Archer returns with his eagerly-awaited collection of fourteen short stories, Tell Tale, giving us a fascinating, exciting and sometimes poignant insight into the people he has met, the stories he has come across and the countries he has visited during the past ten years.

Find out what happens to the hapless young detective from Naples who travels to an Italian hillside town to find out Who Killed the Mayor? and the pretentious schoolboy in A Road to Damascus, whose discovery of the origins of his father's wealth changes his life in the most profound way. Revel in the stories of the 1930s woman who dares to challenge the men at her Ivy League University in A Gentleman and A Scholar while another young woman who thumbs a lift gets more than she bargained for in A Wasted Hour.

These wonderfully engaging and always refreshingly original tales prove not only why Archer has been compared by the critics to Dahl and Maugham, but why he was described by The Times as probably the greatest storyteller of our age.

Die enigmatiese digter, verteller en wetenskaplike Eugène N. Marais bly een van die boeiendste en raaiselagtige figure in die Afrikaanse letterkunde.

Vir elke leser wat sy pragtige gedig “Winternag” of die weergalose Dwaalstories ken, is hy die skrywer van werke wat jou lank bybly.

In hierdie bundel verskyn die skrywer se beste en mees onderhoudende kortverhale, soos uitgesoek deur Merwe Scholtz. Soos Marais se lewe self, wentel die meeste van hierdie verhale om raaisels. Baie van hulle is trouens speurverhale. Hierdie boek is die perfekte geskenk vir lesers van alle ouderdomme.

Verhale uit die hartland.

Al die Karoostories wat Etienne van Heerden tot op hede geskryf het, word vir die eerste keer in een bundel versamel. Dit sluit onder andere in “Die gas in Rondawel Wilhelmina”, een van sy heel sterkste tekste.

Heerlike verhale wat Van Heerden se suiwer aanvoeling vir die woord en sy vermoë tot knap karakterisering en situasietekening demonstreer, almal geplaas binne ’n landskap wat hom besonder na aan die hart lê.

Counterfeiter. Dishwasher. Prostitute. Attorney. Sculptor. Mercenary. Elephant. Corpse. The fascinating characters that roam across the pages of Emma Donoghue's latest short story collection have all gone astray: they are emigrants, runaways, drifters. They cross other borders, too: those of race, law, sex and sanity. They travel for love or money, incognito or under duress.

Donoghue describes the brutal plot hatched by a slave in conjunction with his master's wife to set them both free; she draws out the difficulties of gold mining in the Yukon, even in the supposedly plentiful early days, and she takes us to an early Puritan community in Massachusetts unsettled by an invented sex scandal.

Astray also includes "The Hunt", a shocking confession of one soldier's violent betrayal during the American Revolution, which has been shortlisted for the 2012 Sunday Times Short Story Award.

Astray is a sequence of fourteen stories by the prize-winning author of Room and The Sealed Letter. These intriguing tales light up four centuries of wanderings, offering a past made up of deviations, and a surprising and moving history for restless times.

Footprints in the Quag highlights the occurrence and effects of domestic violence, rape and sexual harassment in the township of Soweto.

Yet her women characters are not victims – they fight back, physically or through educating their communities. They carve out for themselves social spaces where they are able to organize against such abuse.

Richard Bausch is a master of the intimate moment, of the ways we seek to make lasting connections to one another and to the world. Gew writers evoke the complexities of love as subtly, and few capture the poignancy of the sudden insight or the rhythms of ordinary conversation with such delicacy and humor. To read these twelve stories--of love and loss, of families and strangers, of small moments and enormous epiphanies--is to be reminded again of the power of short fiction to thrill and move us, to make us laugh, or cry. In these profound glimpses into the private fears, joys, and sorrows of people we know, we find revealed a whole range of human experience, told with extraordinary force, clarity, and compassion.

An anthology of short stories, The Fall explores different visions of the apocalypse.

Ancient prophecies, technological Armageddon, failures of government, a distracted deity, and yes, zombies all have their moments in this collection, but so do love, yearning, hope, and humor.

In the end, the apocalypse offers a path to new beginnings, even if it takes a course through death, despair, and destruction to find them.

Op 'n Eiland - Karel Schoeman
’n Welkome heruitgawe van een van Schoeman se bekendste en gewildste vroeë romans (1971). Hy beeld die wondbaarheid van mense in hul verhouding tot mekaar, asook hul wesenlike eensaamheid, met groot helderheid uit. Die fokus is op vier mense wat ’n tyd lank saam op ’n Griekse eiland bly: die verteller Ruud gaan kuier by die jong Suid-Afrikaanse skilder Johan en sy vrou Hilde, en ’n ruk later kom ’n vriendin van Hilde ook daar aan. Hulle leef eenkant en geïsoleerd van die eilanders omdat hulle nie Grieks praat nie, en die emosionele wisselwerking wat tussen mens en mens ontstaan, verkry algaande ’n verwikkeldheid wat uiteindelik móét uitrafel. Schoeman het aan hierdie roman die sensitiewe, indringende toonaard gegee wat hom ’n Hertzogpryswenner gemaak he

Ander Lewens - Andre P. Brink
Hierdie boeiende drie novelles word op intrigerende wyse aan mekaar verbind deur oorvleuelende karakters en plekke, asook tematiese ooreenkomste. Die drie vertellers is al drie kunstenaars – ’n skilder, ’n argitek, ’n pianis. Die blou deur begin met ’n droom en ’n verwysing na Kafka se Metamorfose. In hierdie verhaal vervaag die grense tussen die droomwêreld en die realiteit ook soos by Kafka. Kunstenaar David het ’n kothuis wat hy as ateljee gebruik en waarheen hy gaan om te skilder. En op ’n dag wanneer hy daar aankom, bevind hy hom in ’n ander werklikheid: ’n donkerkop vrou en twee kinders heet hom welkom asof hy deel is van hulle gesin... In Spieël maak argitek Steve een oggend die ontdekking dat hy nou swart is. Daardie dag ervaar hy dinge en mense telkens op ’n heel ander wyse, en word hy gekonfronteer met die probleem van identiteit. Totdat alles tot ’n keerpunt kom die aand toe hy en sy vrou Carla saam met ander mense in ’n restaurant deur ’n groep gemaskerde mans oorval word. In Appassionata raak pianis Derek Hugo betrokke in ’n verhouding met sangeres Nina Rousseau – ’n verhouding wat egter op haar aandrang platonies bly. Maar alles verander na ’n gewelddadige voorval in ’n restaurant, toe Nina daarop aandring dat hulle vir ’n paar dae na haar ou familieplaas toe gaan – ’n plek met ’n donker geskiedenis. Soos sy lesers van André Brink kan verwag: hier is weer eens die meesterverteller aan die woord!

Desembers - Petra Muller
Wanneer die dag net een oomblik het vir lees, is ’n kortverhaal van Petra Müller altyd ’n goeie keuse. Sy vertel met ’n helder vaart. Eerlik en verstaanbaar. Sy hou jou in die holte van haar skrywershand en los jou nie vir ’n oomblik nie. Elke lig laat sy vir jou brand dat jy nie oor een sin in ’n storie struikel nie. En jy glo elke woord wat jy lees, want jy lees oor jouself. Sy bemoei haar – soos die beste skrywers oor al die eeue – met ons almal se ordinêre verdriet, skelmstreke, nukke, liefdes, luste en eienaardighede. Sy trek dit in dié versamelbundel byeen en hou dit byeen in ’n fyn balans tussen detail en gevoel. Bowenal is haar stories tydloos wat styl én inhoud betref. Nou nog kan ons ons intens inleef in die mees onvergeetlike verhale van die Russiese skrywer Anton Chekhov (1860-1904) of die Nieu-Seelander Katherine Mansfield (1888-1923) omdat letterkunde nuus is wat nuus bly, het die digter Ezra Pound destyds gesê. Net so is elkeen van Petra Müller se verhale net so ‘nuuswaardig’ as wat dit was die dag toe sy dit geskryf is. Nog voordat Müller die Hertzogprys vir poësie gewen het, het sy vier bundels verhale gepubliseer: Werf in die Rûens (1980), Voëls van die hemel (1982), Die dwerg van die Infanta (1993) en In die omtes van die hart (1995). Dié keur, met die hand uitgesoek deur Rachelle Greeff, is ’n goeie verteenwoordiging van haar eerste verhale uit haar grootwordwêreld, die Rûens, stories van haar voormense, haar stads- en reisvertellings, haar bemoeienis met outsider-figure en die stories wat amper sprokies wil word. Gun jouself die tyd om weg te raak in die tydlose vertellings wat in Desembers opgeneem is. Geen boekrak van enige kortverhaalliefhebber behoort sonder Petra Müller se eiesoortige oeuvre te wees nie.

Written in epistolary form and drawn from actual events, Brown’s The Power of Sympathy (1789) and Foster’s The Coquette (1797) were two of the earliest novels published in the United States. Both novels reflect the eighteenth-century preoccupation with the role of women as safekeepers of the young country’s morality.

This anthology includes the work of numerous authors such as Marge Piercy, Harlan Ellison, S. J. Rozan, Nancy Richler, Moe Prager (Reed Farrel Coleman), Wendy Hornsby, Charles Ardai, and Kenneth Wishnia. The stories explore such issues as the Holocaust and its long-term effects on subsequent generations, anti-Semitism in the mid- and late-20th-century United States, and the dark side of the Diaspora (e.g., the decline of revolutionary fervor, the passing of generations, the Golden Ghetto, etc.).

The stories in this collection include “Trajectories,” Marge Piercy’s story of the divergent paths taken by two young men from the slums of Cleveland and Detroit in a rapidly changing post–WW II society; “Some You Lose,” Nancy Richler’s empathetic exploration of the emotional and psychological challenges of trying to sum up a man’s life in a eulogy; and “Yahrzeit Candle,” Stephen Jay Schwartz’s take on the subtle horrors of the inevitable passing of time.

These works include many “teachable moments” about the history of prejudice, the contradictions of ethnic identity, and assimilation into American society and culture.

Credited with inventing the modern horror tradition, H. P. Lovecraft remade the genre in the early twentieth century, discarding ghosts and witches and instead envisaging mankind at the mercy of a chaotic and malevolent universe.

This selection of stories ranges from early tales of nightmares and insanity such as ‘The Outsider’ and ‘Rats in the Walls’, through the grotesquely comic ‘Herbert West – Reanimator’ and ‘The Hound’, to the extra-terrestrial terror of ‘The Call of Cthulhu’, which fuses traditional supernaturalism with science fiction. Including the definitive corrected texts, this collection reveals the development of Lovecraft’s mesmerizing narrative style and establishes him as a hugely influential – and visionary – American writer.

Edited with an Introduction by S. T. Joshi.

This is a complete collection of moving, elegant and often witty short stories from one of America's most respected writers. Here, David Leavitt covers a range of challenging themes such as illness, grief and betrayal with his inimitable graceful touch. He takes the reader from Switzerland to San Francisco, and from a young man's attempt to contract the HIV virus to American tourists being startled by the local conventions in Italy. Bringing together "Family Dancing" (a finalist for both the National Book Award and the PEN/Faulkner Prize), "A Place I've Never Been" and "The Marble Quilt", this edition affirms David Leavitt's mastery of the short-story form.

Chosen by Paul Auster out of the four thousand stories submitted to his radio programme on National Public Radio, these 180 stories provide a wonderful portrait of America in the twentieth century. The requirement for selection was that each of the stories should be true, and each of the writers should not have been previously published. The collection that has emerged provides a richly varied and authentic voice for the American people, whose lives, loves, griefs, regrets, joys and sense of humour are vividly and honestly recounted throughout, and adeptly organised by Auster into themed sections. The section composed of war stories stretches as far back as the Civil War, still the defining moment in American history; while the sequence of 'Meditations' conclude the volume with a true and abiding sense of transcendence. The resultant anthology is both an enduring hymn to the strange everyday of contemporary American life and a masterclass in the art of storytelling.

Available to American readers for the first time, this landmark collection gathers four groundbreaking fantasy classics from the acclaimed author of" Light." Set in the imagined city of Viriconium, here are the masterworks that revolutionized a genre and enthralled a generation of readers: "The Pastel City, A Storm of Wings, In Viriconium, "and "Viriconium Nights." Back in print after a long absence, these singular tales of a timeless realm and its enigmatic inhabitants are now reborn and compiled to captivate a whole new generation.

In David Sedaris's world, no one is safe and no cow is sacred. A manic cross between Mark Leyner, Fran Lebowitz, and the National Enquirer, Sedaris's collection of essays is a rollicking tour through the national Zeitgeist: a do-it-yourself suburban dad saves money by performing home surgery; a man who is loved too much flees the heavyweight champion of the world; a teenage suicide tries to incite a lynch mob at her funeral; a bitter Santa abuses the elves.

David Sedaris made his debut on NPR's Morning Edition with "SantaLand Diaries," recounting his strange-but-true experiences as an elf at Macy's, and soon became one of the show's most popular commentators. With a perfect eye and a voice infused with as much empathy as wit, Sedaris writes stories and essays that target the soulful ridiculousness of our behavior. Barrel Fever is like a blind date with modern life, and anything can happen.

Selected as one of the Village Voice Literary Supplement's Favorite Books of the Year.

Nearly a decade after his last volume of short stories was published, Jeffrey Archer returns with his eagerly-awaited, brand-new collection TELL TALE, giving us a fascinating, exciting and sometimes poignant insight into the people he has met, the stories he has come across and the countries he has visited during the past ten years.

Find out what happens to the hapless young detective from Naples who travels to an Italian hillside town to find out Who Killed the Mayor? and the pretentious schoolboy in A Road to Damascus, whose discovery of the origins of his father’s wealth changes his life in the most profound way.

Revel in the stories of the 1930’s woman who dares to challenge the men at her Ivy League University in A Gentleman and A Scholar while another young woman who thumbs a lift gets more than she bargained for in A Wasted Hour.

These wonderfully engaging and always refreshingly original tales prove not only why Archer has been compared by the critics to Dahl and Maugham, but why he was described by The Times as probably the greatest storyteller of our age.