logo
Wrong email address or username
Wrong email address or username
Incorrect verification code
James Alan McPherson
Birth date: September 16, 1943
James Alan McPherson's Books
Recently added on shelves
James Alan McPherson's readers
Share this Author
Community Reviews
pseudolibrary
pseudolibrary rated it 11 years ago
Let the author's middle initials be a lesson. These are stories of stumbling small-towners and troublemakers. There are more than a few criminals. It's in dialect, but it's fast-paced. It feels like all the buildings Pancake takes you through are falling apart, and so are the characters' lives. It's...
Lisa (Harmony)
Lisa (Harmony) rated it 11 years ago
The title is a misnomer. Not that there aren't some wonderful stories here, but they were never really chosen because they're the best American short stories of the 20th century. Rather, these are Updike's 56 picks out of the 2,000 stories originally chosen in the 84 volumes of a yearly anthology pu...
basswood
basswood rated it 12 years ago
A very beautiful and transporting writer, in which I can personally see some influence of Kerouac and Salinger, rather than the Hemingway described by Joyce Carol Oates. What a shame his life was ended so early, a shame for him, and a shame for us. The characters in Pancake's stories here remind me ...
AC
AC rated it 12 years ago
Breece Pancake, who committed suicide at the age of 27, leaving behind only a small collection of stories, seems to be "a writer's writer". That is, writers greatly admire (even to the point of awe..., they say), his technical skills. I have no reason, and am in no position to dispute that.As a rea...
tymelgren
tymelgren rated it 14 years ago
Felt like I was sitting in my truck, watching the same story happen over and over. It was an okay story, but once I heard it once, why tell me it twelve more times. "Trilobites" was my favorite version of it, and "Fox Hunters," "The Mark," and "The Honored Dead" are the other ones I'll remember a ...
see community reviews
Need help?