3152 Day 004 (2026-11-08)
Mother by Grace Paley
In Sudden Fiction
Introduction by Robert Shapard
In Sudden Fiction
The Days of Our Lives by Brian Tierney
Short story
- What stayed with me: most of the best stories don't focus too much on the story. They hit with a stream of consciousness that loops back in a subtle way that still packs a punch.
- Something to steal: less is more.
Essay
- What stayed with me: I read this first as it was the intro to Sudden Fiction. I like that Shapard defines what the book entails by telling the history of the form.
- Something to steal: Make up the phrase/definition
Poem
- What stayed with me: there is a spectrum of emotion- resignation, uncertainty, disappointment, sadness, depression but also a rewriting of masculinity exists in this uncertainty.
- Something to steal: children as mirrors of their parents