Heidi Pitlor

Edited by the award-winning, best-selling author Richard Russo, this year's collection boasts a satisfying "chorus of twenty stories that are by turns playful, ironic, somber, and meditative" (Wall Street Journal). With the masterful Russo picking the best of the best, America's oldest and best-selling story anthology is sure to be of "enduring quality" (Chicago Tribune) this year.

Edited by critically acclaimed, best-selling author Alice Sebold, the stories in this year's collection serve as a provacative literary "antenna for what is going on in the world" (Chicago Tribune). The collection boasts great variety from "famous to first-timers, sifted from major magazines and little reviews, grand and little worlds" (St. Louis Post-Dispatch), ensuring yet another rewarding, eduring edition of the oldest and best-selling Best American.

This brilliant collection, edited by the award-winning and perennially provocative Salman Rushdie, boasts a "magnificent array" (Library Journal) of voices both new and recognized.With Rushdie at the helm, the 2008 edition "reflects the variety of substance and style and the consistent quality that readers have come to expect" (Publishers Weekly). "We all live in and with and by stories, every day, whoever and wherever we are. The freedom to tell each other the stories of ourselves, to retell the stories of our culture and beliefs, is profoundly connected to the larger subject of freedom itself."--Salman Rushdie, editor The Best American Short Stories 2008 includes KEVIN BROCKMEIER - ALLEGRA GOODMAN - A. M. HOMES - NICOLE KRAUSS - JONATHAN LETHEM - STEVEN MILLHAUSER - DANIYAL MUEENUDDIN - ALICE MUNRO - GEORGE SAUNDERS - TOBIAS WOLFF - and others

On an island off the coast of Maine, the Miller family reunites to celebrate the father's seventy-fifth birthday. Each of the adult children is expecting a first child, and at the same time each is at a major crossroads in life. The eldest, Daniel, still reeling from a car accident that has left him a paraplegic, is also grappling with the fact that his wife had to be artificially inseminated. Jake, the middle child, discovers that his wife is carrying twins after many trying years of fertility treatments. Hilary - the free-spirited youngest daughter - arrives in Maine five months pregnant with no identifiable father in sight. As the family gathers, something shattering happens from which no one will emerge the same. "The Birthdays" deftly explores the myriad ways of seeking sustenance after disappointment or loss. Reading group guide included.