===[[Going To The Last: Short Stories About Horse Racing by K D Knight]]===
[[image:4.5star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Short Stories|Short Stories]]
In the opening story a man whose wife has deserted him visits Sandown with little money, but comes away with cash in his pocket - and his wife. In ''A Grey Day'' an owner struggles with the problem of whether or not to run his horse in the Gold Cup when the ground is against him. My favourite was ''The Story of H'', the story of Foinavon. H is depicted as a kind horse who only wanted to please people. After changing hands on various occasions he came to the yard of John Kempton. H (or Foinavon) was entered in the Grand National and considered a no-hoper. In one of the most dramatic runnings of the race, a pile up occured at the 23rd fence. Foinavon, who had been many lengths adrift, cleared the fence and galloped to the line, winning the race at odds of 100/1. [[Going To The Last: Short Stories About Horse Racing by K D Knight|Full Review]]
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We here at The Bookbag liked this author's fairly recent collection of short stories, [[Vertigo by Joanna Walsh|Vertigo]]. I myself missed out, but that seemed to be vignettes from one character's narration – here we get homosexual male narrators and a host more, as well as much less of the sadness prevalent before. Having had a brief encounter with this author courtesy of her entry into the [[Bookshelf (Object Lessons) by Lydia Pyne|Object Lessons]] series, I was intrigued by her name being stamped on a selection of shorts. Was it the ideal calling card? Let's face it, the very short story itself can be a postcard – let's say, from a specific hotel or two, as we see here. Perhaps I should have geared myself up, however, for such intricate writing on said postcards – and for the exotic locations from which they came… [[Worlds from the Word's End by Joanna Walsh|Full Review]]
===[[Some Possible Solutions by Helen Phillips]]===
[[image:4star.jpg|link=Category:{{{rating}}} Star Reviews]] [[:Category:Short Stories|Short Stories]]
Picture a world where you, a new mother, move to a town where you slowly start to realise that every other woman seems a replica of you – dressing and doing as you do. Consider a place where you have a perfect other half – most literally – but it's only to be found on an alien planet. Or how about the woman who suddenly finds she can see everything and everyone else alive as having no skin, just organs, tissue and bone as if everyone was having a Gunther von Hagens plastination job? A lot of these stories are hard to summarise without dropping into the voice of the Twilight Zone narration, but they're not specifically genre works – they're just further examples of this author's unsettling look at the bizarre elements of life. [[Some Possible Solutions by Helen Phillips|Full Review]]