Don't Know A Good Thing

by Kate Pullinger (Editor)

Our world has been conjured by the talented writers collected here. These wonderful and evocative stories have a truly international flavour, taking us from icy Alaska to the burnt outback of Australia, and include tales of murder, loss of innocence, revenge, heroism and hope. This vibrant collection contains new stories by Helen Dunmore, Trezza Azzopardi, Helen Simpson, Louise Doughty, Marina Warner and Lynne Truss plus twelve stories from the unpublished writers who were shortlisted for the Asham Short-Story Prize 2005. Asham House in Sussex was once home to Virginia and Leonard Woolf and is the inspiration behind the Asham Award. Launched in 1996 to support and encourage new writers, it is Britain's only prize for short stories by women.

Genres: Fiction

224 pages, Paperback

First published August 30, 2006

About the author

Kate Pullinger is an award-winning writer of novels, short stories and digital works. Her most recent book is FOREST GREEN, out in Canada in August 2020. She is Professor of Creative Writing and Digital Media at Bath Spa University.

Born in Cranbrook, British Columbia, Kate dropped out of McGill University after a year and a half of not studying philosophy and literature. She then spent a year working in a copper mine in the Yukon where she crushed rocks and saved money. She spent that money travelling and ended up in London, England, where she lives with her husband and two children.

Kate’s other books include The Mistress of Nothing, winner of the Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction 2009, Landing Gear, A Little Stranger and The Last Time I Saw Jane, as well as the ghost tale, Weird Sister, and the erotic feminist vampire novel Where Does Kissing End? These four titles have recently been re-released in new ebook editions.

Kate’s digital works include Inanimate Alice (www.inanimatealice.com), an episodic online multimedia novel and Flight Paths: A Networked Novel (www.flightpaths.net)

You can find out more about Kate and her work at www.katepullinger.com

Reviews

[Kenneth Lui · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great short stories for quick reads.

[Faith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of good stories. It kept my attention from cover to cover in a single (interrupted) sitting. I enjoyed it.

[Judy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an interesting collection of stories by the winners and runners-up for the Asham award, a British prize for short stories by women. It also includes several commissioned stories by well-known writers, such as Helen Dunmore and Lynne Truss - Dunmore's story, a historical tale set in the early years of the 20th century and weaving in references to the Shackleton Antarctic expeditions, is particularly good, I thought.
Some of the stories have rather melodramatic twists at the end, and the collection feels a bit uneven at times - but there's a lot of talent here and I'll be looking out for the new writers' names in future.