Women Are Strange And Other Stories

Eleven "eerie" stories by women writers from the seventeenth century to the present, including Madame d'Aulnoy, Edith Nesbit, and Shirley Jackson.

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1883 edition. Excerpt: ... a low voice. She wore at dinner the same dark grey dress with which she had travelled with me from London. No one spoke to her, and she spoke to no one; but she was not embarrassed by the isolation of her position--on the contrary, looked steadily and almost critically about her at times, as if expectant of a friend. I did not address her, on my own part, albeit strangely tempted once or twice. I was pre-ternaturally reserved by the habits of my youth, and there was a doubt in my mind whether she might not take it as an offence, and resent it. I did not believe she had recognized me as her travelling companion, and I thought she was English and more reserved than I even. Before the table d'hote was quite finished she rose and walked gracefully the full length of the dining-room, looking at the guests, as she passed on, as if half-expectant still of the friend amongst them somewhere, but betraying no emotion or embarrassment at the attention which she received in return. As she passed from the room, a short, stout man, who had sat on the other side of her, and who was to me the very personification of vulgarity, with his greasy face and coarse, broad smile, leaned across the chair left vacant between us by her departure, and said in a loud voice--" The lady in grey is back again, after all. I took odds on the event last month." I did not respond at first; then a new curiosity led. me to ask questions of this familiar being. " Is she often here? " I asked. " Oh yes, very often," he replied; " winter, .as well as summer, I run against her. Always the same stand-offish style. I can't bear stuck-up people. And always in that grey dress, or in a dress of the same colour--hanged if I know which." " Is there anything remarkable in her being here?...

Spanning a century, from Kate Chopin and Fannie Hurst to J. California Cooper and Elana Dykewomon, this bold and deeply satisfying anthology of women's stories explores women's relationships to, and perceptions of, their physical selves. Addressing the peculiarities, the pleasures, and the shames of body politics, these stories of bodies that refuse to be contained offer a variety of perspectives on fully inhabiting the flesh. Whether celebrating bodies deemed transgressive or simply daring to acknowledge that such bodies exist, these diverse literary representations of fatness render the excessive body brilliantly, unapologetically visible. Book jacket.

A ground-breaking collection of the best Weird short stories by women from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

From the Pulitzer Finalist and universally beloved author of the New York Times best sellers Swamplandia! and Vampires in the Lemon Grove, a stunning new collection of short fiction that showcases Karen Russell’s extraordinary, irresistible gifts of language and imagination. Karen Russell’s comedic genius and mesmerizing talent for creating outlandish predicaments that uncannily mirror our inner in lives is on full display in these eight exuberant, arrestingly vivid, unforgettable stories. In“Bog Girl”, a revelatory story about first love, a young man falls in love with a two thousand year old girl that he’s extracted from a mass of peat in a Northern European bog. In “The Prospectors,” two opportunistic young women fleeing the depression strike out for new territory, and find themselves fighting for their lives. In the brilliant, hilarious title story, a new mother desperate to ensure her infant’s safety strikes a diabolical deal, agreeing to breastfeed the devil in exchange for his protection. The landscape in which these stories unfold is a feral, slippery, purgatorial space, bracketed by the void—yet within it Russell captures the exquisite beauty and tenderness of ordinary life. Orange World is a miracle of storytelling from a true modern master.