Armchair BEA - Short Stories/Novellas

I am participating in Armchair BEA this year. Armchair BEA is a chance for book lovers' who cannot attend BookExpo America (BEA) to join in the fun from the comfort of their own homes.

Expanding Blogging Horizons

As a new blogger, I don't feel like I have a lot to contribute to this topic, but I have enjoyed looking at other people's responses and I like looking at other people's blogs to see what they are doing. Some people vlog or do BookTube, other people incorporate GIF, and I think both are fun. 

I have a couple things that I like to do that I think make my blog a little different. I try to recommend a readalike after every review. When people ask me for book recommendations, I always ask what books they like because there just aren't that many books out there that will appeal to everyone. The last book that I read that I think almost anyone could appreciate was The Book Thief. But books like The Fault in Our Stars or Gone Girl are just not going to appeal to everyone.

The other thing is my pet project: The First 50 Pages, where I try to read at least the first 50 pages of every book that I own. It's my own solution to buyers' guilt. 

Short Stories/Novellas

As an English major, I have read quite a few short stories, but for the most part they are not something I seek out. Here are a few of my favorites from school:

• The Awakening by Kate Chopin 
• The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
• Rape Fantasies by Margaret Atwood
• Raymond Carver
• A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
• Signs & Symbols by Vladimir Nabokov
• The Pedestrian by Ray Bradbury

And of course

• Bartleby the Scrivener by Herman Melville

And more recently, I strongly recommend Jhumpa Lahiri's collection, The Interpreter of Maladies, George Saunders's collection, Tenth of December, and Tim O'Brien's, The Things They Carried.