Sticky Ends and Unexpected Twists

by Julian Barnes, Anton Chekhov, Charlie Fish

This short story collection has the very best in unpredictable endings. Prize-winning authors from Chekhov to Julian Barnes tell stories full of hermits, sacred bogs, werewolves, divine ferrets, and the unexpected.

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories, Audiobook

5 pages, Audiobook

First published March 1, 2013

About the author

Julian Patrick Barnes is an English writer. He won the Man Booker Prize in 2011 with The Sense of an Ending, having been shortlisted three times previously with Flaubert's Parrot, England, England, and Arthur & George. Barnes has also written crime fiction under the pseudonym Dan Kavanagh (having married Pat Kavanagh). In addition to novels, Barnes has published collections of essays and short stories.
In 2004 he became a Commandeur of L'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. His honours also include the Somerset Maugham Award and the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize. He was awarded the 2021 Jerusalem Prize.

Reviews

[Carol She's So Novel꧁꧂ · Rating 4 out of 5]

My review is for Death by Scrabble only which I read here
www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UB...

Short, darkly funny and not a word wasted. And a double word score for being about one of my favourite board games!

https://wordpress.com/view/carolshess...

[Jenny Baran · Rating 1 out of 5]

The narration is of astonishingly poor quality, there was at least one instance of the narrator fumbling a line and re-doing it, without the misspoken version edited out. The volume was inconsistent, occasionally to a painful degree.

The stories themselves varied in style, and some were more enjoyable (for me, anyway) than others.

[Kevin Shoop · Rating 3 out of 5]

Grade: C+

This collection contains a fantastic Chekhov story ("Kashtanka") and a few other good stories. Probably half of the stories are merely average. Most bend toward the tragic, some very darkly so, some humorously so.

[Nancy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Worth it to meet Dazzle, the dog who totally gets melancholy. And for Julian Barnes' story, which held taut gently. Love the length of these, and the connections between them.

So odd to hear an older recording, back when we thought accents had to be in-your-face, when we released recordings with flubs, and smashed in the intro and outro music cues. Makes me appreciate the careful editing we have now, and that our taste for something subtler (maybe as we became more savvy listeners?) -- something that leans further away from live theatre and early radio.

[Jean Potter · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rather gruesome.

[Merrilee Boniface · Rating 3 out of 5]

I especially enjoyed “Dazzle” by Scott Bradfield.

[A · Rating 4 out of 5]

Books of collected stories or essays by different authors are usually up-and-down as far as the interest factor for me. This collection not only had a variety of authors, but readers as well, and it kept my interest in a way that other anthologies didn't. Everything is subjective, but this one captured my attention.