This year’s editor, Stephen King, knows his stuff.
He has this to say about the state of the American short story, in the New York Times:
The author Stephen King was the editor of “The Best American Short Stories 2007.” He writes that although he read many good short stories, many seemed “show-offy rather than entertaining, self-important rather than interesting, guarded and self-conscious rather than gloriously open, and worst of all, written for editors and teachers rather than for readers.” Obviously, Jim doesn’t fall into that category.
