Contents finalised

The contents list for The Best British Short Stories 2011 (ed Nicholas Royle) to be published by Salt:

Flora – David Rose

Winter Break – Hilary Mantel

Emergency Exit – Lee Rourke

Love Silk Food – Leone Ross

Feather Girls – Claire Massey

Foreigner – Christopher Burns

Dinner of the Dead Alumni – Adam Marek

The Swimmer – SJ Butler

So Much Time in a Life – Heather Leach

Staff Development – Alan Beard

The Rental Heart – Kirsty Logan

Notes on a Love Story – Philip Langeskov

No Angel – Bernie McGill

Slut’s Hair – John Burnside

Comma – Hilary Mantel

Moving Day – Robert Edric

Tristram and Isolde – Michèle Roberts

Looted – Dai Vaughan

When the Door Closed, It Was Dark – Alison Moore

Epiphany – Salley Vickers

More stories added

Further to the five authors listed in the previous post, we now have agreement from Christopher Burns (pictured), Alan Beard, Adam Marek, Lee Rourke, Philip Langeskov and John Burnside to reprint their stories from, respectively, the Warwick Review (twice), Riptide, Ambit, Five Dials and the Sunday Times Magazine.

I published a slightly stroppy letter in the Guardian Review at the weekend suggesting that Granta magazine could do more to support the short story in Britain. Their spring, summer and autumn numbers this year included hardly any British short stories. Plenty of short fiction from American and Pakistani writers, and no shortage of memoir, journalism, essays and novel extracts from British writers, but very few short stories. No doubt the winter issue will appear any day now stuffed with new stories by British authors and I’ll look a bit of an idiot.

Selections underway

Five stories so far. One from a long-running literary magazine, another from an online journal. One to be reprinted from a chapbook, one from a hefty anthology. And one from a UK national newspaper. The authors of these stories – Hilary Mantel, Robert Edric, Alison Moore, Claire Massey and David Rose (pictured) – have all given permission for their stories to be reprinted.

Announcing a brand-new series

Coming from Salt Publishing in April 2011 – Best British Short Stories 2011, reprinting the best short stories by British writers published during 2010. As editor, I am currently reading widely in the hope that I won’t miss too many strong contenders.