Once the U.S. headquarters of the Ukrainian Communist Party, New York City's KGB Bar started its Sunday Fiction Reading series to great acclaim in 1994. Although it pays nothing to authors, it nonetheless attracts top names and has been described by Time Out New York as the "trendiest reading space on the rock." Editor Donner, the series' literary director, has selected 20 stories from writers who have read at KGB and whose work exemplifies its spirit as "a place where risk is celebrated and boundaries are transcended." There are traditional narratives and those that, despite nontraditional form, have strong narrative lines, like Karen McKinnon's "Kindred." Sylvia Foley's "Y's Story," being the life and love of its protagonist, the letter Y, is the most unusual. Contributors include the well known (e.g., Joyce Carol Oates, Francine Prose, Jonathan Lethem, and Mary Gaitskill) and others less famous but with solid credentials. Buy where there is interest in experimental short fiction.
- Mary Paumier Jones, Westminster P.L., CO