New Stories from the Southwest — 2008

Edited by D. Seth Horton

Foreword by Ray Gonzalez

“A bold collection.... Mr. Horton picked well; these stories so assuredly conjure the Southwest the authors' pens might as well have been dipped in cactus juice, tobacco spit or tequila. The traditions of American Indians, Tejanos, even the occasional Yankee transplant are documented with a tempered mix of reverence and impudence.”

Dallas Morning News

“As varied and bold as the colorful landscape of the American Southwest.... New Stories from the Southwest is an amazing collection. Grade: A”

Tucscon Citizen

“D. Seth Horton’s excellent New Stories From the Southwest is a satisfying departure from the usual in that all 19 of its authors have something to say about how their stories came about.... In this collection, emerging voices tell the tales. They are stories of the Southwest but not necessarily by authors who live here.”

Albuquerque Journal

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The beauty and barrenness of the southwestern landscape naturally lends itself to the art of storytellers. It is a land of heat and dryness, a land of spirits, a land that is misunderstood by those living along the coasts.

New Stories from the Southwest presents nineteen short stories that appeared in North American periodicals between January and December 2006. Though many of these stories vary by aesthetics, tone, voice, and almost any other craft category one might wish to use, they are nevertheless bound together by at least one factor, which is that the landscape of the region plays a key role in their narratives. They each evoke and explore what it means to exist in this unique corner of the country.

Selected by editor D. Seth Horton, the former fiction editor for the Sonora Review, from a wide cross-section of journals and magazines, and with a foreword by noted writer Ray Gonzalez, New Stories from the Southwest presents a generous sampling of the best of contemporary fiction situated in this often overlooked area of the country. Swallow Press is particularly pleased to publish this wide-ranging collection of stories from both new and established writers.

Contributors to New Stories from the Southwest are:
- Alan Cheuse
- Matt Clark
- Lorien Crow
- Kathleen De Azvedo
- Alan Elyshevitz
- Marcela Fuentes
- Dennis Fulgoni
- Ray Gonzalez
- Anna Green
- Donald Lucio Hurd
- Toni Jensen
- Charles Kemnitz
- Elmo Lum
- Tom McWhorter
- S. G. Miller
- Peter Rock
- Alicita Rodriguez
- John Tait
- Patrick Tobin
- Valery Varble

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D. Seth Horton was born in San Diego and graduated from the University of Arizona with an MFA in creative writing. A former fiction editor for the Sonora Review, he currently lives in Tucson with his wife.