From Publishers Weekly
The Iowa Short Fiction Award, established in 1969, entails publication of the winner's first collection of stories. For this anniversary volume the director of the Iowa Writers' Workshop has gathered stories from each of the 25 prize-winning collections (there were two winners in some years). Though diverse in subject matter, the stories deliver a common immediacy developed by the authors' close observations of intimate, small-scale happenings. Susan Dodd's "Rue" finds a world of emotion in a middle-aged woman's long-postponed search for the husband who abandoned her. "Little Bear" by Robert Boswell explores a bewildered young soldier's unfulfilled search for meaning in the cold wet trenches of Korean battlefields. In "Elba" by Marly Swick, intergenerational relationships shift with news of a grandchild born to a daughter given away 25 years earlier. Philip F. O'Connor in "American Gothic" delivers a spellbinding evocation of teenage cruelty among a group of library pages. Most of these tales are contemporary in tone and format, developed in nonlinear, impressionistic fashion. While some do not live up to their authors' later work, all are skillfully told.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From School Library Journal
YA-- A collection of short fiction selected from the annual volumes of the Iowa Short Fiction Award winners. These stories have a wonderful variety of places and people, and the selections are usually so complete and compelling that readers will want to go on to more by the same author. One of the volume's strengths is that there is a statement of biography and a brief paragraph or two of critical information prior to each entry.
Copyright 1991 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
