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posted: January 5, 2025
tl;dr: One of the best collections in the twenty-five years I’ve been reading this series...
Unlike some guest editors of the Best American anthologies, author Min Jin Lee avoided politics and focused on literary quality in the selections she made for The Best American Short Stories 2023 (BASS). This is one of the best volumes in the past quarter century, with only a few stories that didn’t resonate preventing me from declaring it the best ever. My memory is not good enough for me to identify which volume of the past twenty-five I’d rank as the best, but this one is right towards the top. Sometimes I seek out longer works by authors whose stories appear in an anthology. In this case, I may try reading one of Min Jin Lee’s books.
With the O. Henry short story anthology series having gone international in 2022, by including works from around the world that are translated into English, the differences between it and the BASS series have never been greater. Frankly, as an American, the BASS series appeals more to me now, as most people prefer artistic creations from their own culture. I will definitely still read the O. Henry series to expose myself to authors from around the world, but from a pure emotional (as opposed to intellectual) standpoint, I enjoyed BASS 2023 more than the The Best Short Stories 2023: The O. Henry Prize Winners. There are no stories that appear in both volumes, and with O. Henry’s new format, the odds of that happening in the future are reduced even further.
Here are my favorite stories in Best American Short Stories 2023:
“Do You Belong to Anybody” by Maya Binyam: An intelligent story that I found to be a bit Twilight Zone-esque, which kept me interested. It is a story of both the item created by a mold (the narrator) and the mold itself (where the narrator was raised).
“His Finest Moment” by Tom Bissell: A presumably fictional story about an author’s infidelity, which expertly describes the author’s feelings and actions as well as the impacts on himself and his family.
“Treasure Island Alley” by Da-Lin: This story seamlessly interweaves scenes from different points in time, addressing the big question of the meaning of life in an enthralling manner.
“Peking Duck” by Ling Ma: This story within a story uses the theme of “happiest moment” to recount an immigrant’s story from two perspectives, illustrating the difficulties associated with assigning authorship of a story. It also provides an insider’s peek at what transpires in a writers workshop, which is similar to what I remember from my college days in English class.