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Summary: What is in this book?
Review: I've read Everything that Rises Must Converge and A Good Man is Hard to Find. Both were excellent, but I thought those were her only two story collections. Is there anything else in this book besides those collections. Could someone e-mail me the answer. Thanks
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Summary: The Best American Short Story Writer
Review: If you love O'Connor, you should own this, and if you have never read O'Connor, buy this book and begin ASAP! O'Connor's stories expose the complexities and frailties of being human, and you'll be struck by their profundity, a profundity that I find sorely missing in modern short stories (I've been reading the fiction issue of "The New Yorker"). But perhaps what I love most about O'Connor is her sense of humor. One of her most anthologized stories, "A Good Man is Hard to Find," is as funny as it is dark (I'm thinking of the scene when "a horrible thought" occurs to the grandmother in the car). O'Connor is simply one of the best short story writers of the 20th century.
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Summary: Catholicism
Review: It is important to know that Flannery was a faithful Catholic and also a conservative. She was widely read and thought deeply about her faith. Some important influences include Weaver(Ideas have Consequences ) and Jacque Maritain. Her stories spring from her faith and from the reality of being a catholic living in a bible thumping red necked south. Read Habit of Being. She is truly one of the greatest Catholic writers this country has ever produced. Margaret Schmidt
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Summary: Maupassant watch out! The greatest short story teller -ever
Review: Many white writers have tried (and continue) to capture the black experience, the oppression of the blacks in the South, but none come close to Flannery O'Connor. I did not have any idea about Flannery O'Connor's race when I started reading her some years ago and after a few books, I still did not know. Her writing is not subjected to any race or country of origin. It is on such a subconscious human level - just change the names and physical descriptions of the characters and you have a story that will take you inside the minds and bodies of the oppressed and the elite from every/any culture and before you know it, you will see yourself in a different light. Shakti Gawain and Deepak Chopra try to teach lessons that Flannery O'Connor presents to us - take from her books what you can, read them again and take more. Maupassant's short stories were unsurpassable, atleast I never thought anyone could come close to making strong statements in such few words, but I had yet to introduce myself to Flannery O'Connor. If you haven't read 'Everything that rises must converge' and 'A good man is hard to find' you are missing out on self growth and the tie that binds you to other humans.
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Summary: Darkly funny and scarily true
Review: O'Connor's work is the South-- through a glass darkly. I remember in a literature class being read a letter where O'Connor wrote of some klansmen who spent the night in her hometown giving out baskets for the poor, dressed up in their white gowns riding in convertibles decorated with Christmas lights-- she then added "I don't make this stuff up." Having grown up in the south and actually seen folks walking down the highway with a big wooden cross on their backs, I am always amazed by the fact that though O'Connor paints a story that is funny, she isn't laughing AT anyone, rather, she is showing more how we all can be ridiculous, especially without self-awareness. Moments of grace, of dark awareness, of sudden self-knowledge (and sometimes that's not what we think it ought to be). O'Connor is a genius of Southern Gothic, and of American writing. These short stories should be devoured, then re-read over and over again.
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Summary: These stories are plain wonderful.
Review: Read these stories--all of them--at once if you can. The previous reviewer seems to have them all figured out, and maybe he or she is right in a narrow and inaccurate kind of way. The question to answer for yourself is what these stories are *also* about--and that is where much of the fun starts in reading O'Connor.
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Summary: Bloody Genius
Review: Since I couldn't afford to go back to school to get my Masters, I thought it might be wise to obtain the required reading list and read myself through an alternate education. One on the list was Flannery O'Connor. After reading through this book, I had an epiphany as to why so many writers win the big prizes such as the Pulitzer for fiction--you take average or stupider than average people, throw a common sense question or decision (to be made) in the mix, and watch the characters make the wrong decision and come out at the end either wiser, still stupid, or scratching their heads not knowing what the hell hit them. In many of Flannery O'Connor's stories, this is essentially the plot. Many, if not all, of the characters are from the South, call African-American's the 'N' word without apology or hesitation, defines the era in which the story was written, and certainly perpetuates the myth folks from the South are illiterate, stupid, and don't have the common sense God gave a gnat. A critic praised her (quote) 'stories that burn bright, and strike deep.' Flannery O'Connor wrote stories where stupid people make stupid mistakes and I was pretty disappointed in the whole set of stories overall. While her story-telling abilities are a little higher than average, I don't agree that her plots or story lines are as valuable as the kudos give her from other literary critiques. If you are interesting in 'entertainment' type reading, this book is definitely not for you. If you are interested in The South as it used to be, from a native Southerner's point of view, and some interesting stories (overall) with deep literary and moral undertones that you have to re-read more than once to grasp, then this type of book will definitely appeal to your academic standards. While her stories may have been 'important' half a century ago by reflecting the sad, uneducated, and prejudiced thinking of the people of the South, I believe that the world has made broad strides in their thinking, education, and literacy and has moved beyond her stories and her way of thinking.
Rating: 
Summary: Why Stories Like This are Considered Literary
Review: Since I couldn't afford to go back to school to get my Masters, I thought it might be wise to obtain the required reading list and read myself through an alternate education. One on the list was Flannery O'Connor. After reading through this book, I had an epiphany as to why so many writers win the big prizes such as the Pulitzer for fiction--you take average or stupider than average people, throw a common sense question or decision (to be made) in the mix, and watch the characters make the wrong decision and come out at the end either wiser, still stupid, or scratching their heads not knowing what the hell hit them. In many of Flannery O'Connor's stories, this is essentially the plot. Many, if not all, of the characters are from the South, call African-American's the 'N' word without apology or hesitation, defines the era in which the story was written, and certainly perpetuates the myth folks from the South are illiterate, stupid, and don't have the common sense God gave a gnat. A critic praised her (quote) 'stories that burn bright, and strike deep.' Flannery O'Connor wrote stories where stupid people make stupid mistakes and I was pretty disappointed in the whole set of stories overall. While her story-telling abilities are a little higher than average, I don't agree that her plots or story lines are as valuable as the kudos give her from other literary critiques. If you are interesting in 'entertainment' type reading, this book is definitely not for you. If you are interested in The South as it used to be, from a native Southerner's point of view, and some interesting stories (overall) with deep literary and moral undertones that you have to re-read more than once to grasp, then this type of book will definitely appeal to your academic standards. While her stories may have been 'important' half a century ago by reflecting the sad, uneducated, and prejudiced thinking of the people of the South, I believe that the world has made broad strides in their thinking, education, and literacy and has moved beyond her stories and her way of thinking.
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Summary: There Is No Better Collection Of Short Stories Available
Review: The first half of the 20th century. Ask yourself about the short stories. Everybody wrote them. Ask yourself abut the best: Eudora Welty, Fredric Brown, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Carson McCullers, Dorothy Parker, Ernest Hemingway. And there is one name that is simply the best, against any competitors, against any subject matter, against any sex: Flannery O'Connor. I only hope that she knows that 35 years after her death her "The Complete Stories" is still is a best selling compilation and one of the most recommended books I have ever seen. They try to tie her to the south. They try to label her a woman's writer. They haven't read her. Flannery O'Connor is the best 20th century short story writer. Period. AND, she also wins the prize for best final lines in her stories. Didn't know there was a prize for best final lines? I have invented it. "Then she recognized the feeling again, a little roll. It was if it were not her stomach. It was if it were out nowhere in nothing, out nowhere, resting and waiting, with plenty of time." "The sherrif's brain worked instantly like a calculating machine. As he scrutinized the scene, further insights were flashed to him. He was accustomed to enter upon scenes that were not as bad as he had hoped to find them, but this one met his expectations." "Mr. Paradise's head appeared from time to time on the surface of the water. Finally, far downstream, the old man rose like some ancient water monster and stood empty-handed, staring with his dull eyes as far down the river as he could see."
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Summary: Bloody Genius
Review: There's a famous saw (that some attribute to the English evangelist David Watson) to the effect that, "The Holy Spirit is a gentleman." One will not get that impression from Flannery O'Connor. Thomas Merton allegedly said she didn't belong in the same class as Faulkner and other great American writers, but that she was up there with Sophocles. I think he probably had it right. I am convinced that anyone who classifies her as merely Twentieth Century, or Southern, or American, or Catholic, or woman, does not fully appreciate her, though it no doubt helps to be (or try to understand) all of these as well as what Jesus might have thought when He heard, "all the people," say, "His blood shall be on us and on our children!"
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