This story by O. Henry takes recent events in America, where parents have been found partly responsible when their child commits murder, to a new level. A young man boasts to friends that he will teach his fiancée a lesson by taking another girl to a dance. The fiancée makes good her promise to kill him if he does, then flees and commits suicide. A heavenly court absolves her of the crime, blaming a red-haired, unshaven, untidy man, sitting by a window reading while his children play in the streets.. Themes include guilt and innocence, parental neglect, love, betrayal, redemption. More…
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To the Man On the Trail
In this Jack London story, a group of Alaskan miners celebrating Christmas greet a stranger warmly. The man is in a hurry. He shares a drink, passes around a picture of his family, and asks to be awakened in four hours to be on his way. Shortly after he leaves, a policeman arrives claiming the stranger had stolen $40,000. The men are initially angry at being deceived. However, when they learn he had only stolen money owed to him, they drink to the stranger’s good luck and “confusion to the police”. Themes include camaraderie, betrayal, morality, wilderness justice. More…
The Witch
Although very short (just over 1,400 words), there are enough dark elements in this Shirley Jackson story to unsettle most readers. An imaginative four-year-old travelling on a train with his mother and infant sister attracts the attention of a man who recounts how much he loved his own sister. The man then relates how, after killing and dismembering his sister, he fed her head to a bear. The story turns on who or what the man is, and what effect his story may have on the boy. Themes include parental inattention, boredom, imagination, witchcraft, innocence and its possible manipulation, violence. More…
Last Courtesies
This story by Ella Leffland contrasts the way the protagonist, a widow in her late fifties, handles life’s challenges with the approaches taken by her dignified, “old-fashioned” aunt and an eccentric, sometimes mentally unstable friend of her aunt who has appointed himself her “protector”. Unable to cope with noisy neighbors and daily problems following the death of her aunt and long-time companion, the woman suffers a nervous breakdown. After an argument with her “protector”, she falls prey to a vicious serial killer. Themes include alienation and isolation, eccentricity, judgement, passivity vs. assertiveness, rudeness vs. civility, fear, violence. More…
Where I’m Calling From
This Raymond Carver story describes how a friendship that develops between two strangers attending an alcohol drying-out retreat puts both on the road to recovery. The story’s message is that while acceptance that you have an alcohol problem is an important first step, true recovery begins when you acknowledge the damage it has caused to the lives of yourself and your loved ones, and are prepared to face up to your demons. The story also recognizes that, post-recovery, there is a high likelihood of a relapse. Themes: substance abuse, alienation, loneliness and the need for human connection, self-awareness, fear, hope.