A more expansive and adventurous array of classic and contemporary stories, with 25 new stories (out of 85) including Raymond Carver’s “A Small, Good Thing,” Art Spiegelman’s “Prisoner on the Hell Planet: A Case History,” and Edward P. Jones’s “Bad Neighbors.”
A new emphasis on short, short fiction with 10 stories of 3 pages or less, including work by Sandra Cisneros and A. M. Homes, and a commentary about the genre by Russell Banks.
14 new commentaries, among them Anne Lamott on “Finding Your Voice” and David Foster Wallace on “Kafka’s Funniness.”
New Casebook on Jhumpa Lahiri’s “Interpreter of Maladies” featuring contextual images and commentaries.
More emphasis on graphic storytelling, with selections sprinkled throughout the anthology and a casebook of commentaries by respected writers in the field like Alison Bechdel and Joe Sacco, making the innovative form more accessible — and teachable.