Short Story Anthologies with Class (for my homework)

By Patricia Stoltey

I just finished reading the complete Crossing Colfax anthology from Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers, then headed off to Goodreads and Amazon to post my comments and rate the book a big beautiful five stars.

Writers who can produce quality stories with unique ideas, imaginative twists, and great characters, and fit all of that into 500 to 10,000 words, deserve our applause. It’s hard! The story ideas that appear in Crossing Colfax are very clever. I think I’ve learned a few things from the fifteen authors whose works are published here. I look forward to many more anthologies from RMFW. To learn more about the individual stories, read Mark Stevens’ story-by-story review from January 6th.

Reading in the same genre we write is part of our education process. The more we read, the more we learn about what hooks the reader and what fails. We marvel at the creativity of those who find new ways to tell an old story. That works for short story writing as well. I recently had my first traditionally published short story, “Three sisters of Ring Island” (a retold folk tale) accepted and included in Double Dragon‘s Tales in Firelight and Shadow. The editor of that anthology is Alexis Brooks de Vita.

The taste of publication was sweet. I want more. Reading a variety of anthologies in a variety of genres is how I’m going to study.

As I looked for the best of the best, I discovered a whole big world of writers and publications. For crime lovers, local chapters of Sisters in Crime offer collections like SoWest: Crime Time from SinC Desert Sleuths. RMFW member Shannon Baker is one of the authors you’ll find in that group. You’ll find many more if you search on “Sisters in Crime” at your favorite online bookseller.

Mystery Writers of America produces quality crime anthologies on a bigger scale. Manhattan Mayhem is coming in 2015. The 2014 publication was called Ice Cold: Tales of Intrigue from the Cold War.

There’s a group of authors in Minnesota called the Minnesota Crime Wave that published an anthology called Fifteen Tales of Murder, Mayhem, and Malice. Colorado Gold favorite William Kent Krueger is one of the crime writers in that collection.

I have a copy of Open Doors: Fractured Fairy Tales on my coffee table as well. Katherine Valdez, a member of my critique group, wrote Little Red Riding Hood Seeks Vengeance for this book.

Winners and finalists for the Northern Colorado Writers fiction and non-fiction contests earn publication in the annual Pooled Ink anthology. The 2014 edition released in November. Reading Pooled Ink should help a writer learn what it takes to final in or win top prize in the NCW contests, so I plan to add the 2014 collection to my stack of homework.

If you have been published in such an anthology in any genre, please leave the anthology name and a buy link below in the comments. I need to round out the genres with a bit of romance, a little sci fi, and some great YA tales.