A Small, Good Thing

A Small, Good Thing

"A Small, Good Thing" is a podcast about short fiction. In every episode, I get to discuss the short story form with writers, academics, publishers, and anyone who shares a passion for short stories.

Episodes

August 21, 2025 32 mins
Andrew Levy is professor of English and Creative Writing and the Edna Cooper Chair of English at Butler University in Indiana (USA). In this episode, I get to ask him a few questions about his book The Culture and Commerce of the American Short Story (Cambridge UP, 1992), a real watershed in short story criticism.

Works referenced (in order of appearance) 
 
Andrew Levy, The Culture and Commerce of the American Short Story (Cambridge ...
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How does the short story form contribute to our understanding of life and the world? To find out, listen to this episode of the podcast, in which I get to interview prof. Michael Basseler, from Justus-Liebig University, author of the monograph An Organon of Life Knowledge: Genres and Functions of the Short Story in North America.

Works cited:

Michael Basseler, An Organon of Life Knowledge: Genres and Functions of the Short Story in N...
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In this episode I get to interview Heuijung Hur on her collection Failed Summer Vacation, which has recently been published in English by Scratchbooks. Listen to Heuijung talk about her favourite stories in the collection and what it feels like to read her own work in translation.

Works cited:
Heuijung Hur, Failed Summer Vacation, trans. by Paige Aniya Morris (Scratchbooks, 2025).
George Saunders, Tenth of December (Bloomsbury, 2013).
...
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June 26, 2025 30 mins
Michael Collins is Reader in American Studies at King’s College, London and co-editor of the Cambridge Companion to the American Short Story (2024). In this episode, I ask him why the short story is so popular in the US and yet relatively underrepresented in academic research. 
 
Works cited:

Michael J. Collins, The Drama of the American Short Story, 1800-1865 (University of Michigan Press, 2016).
Michael J. Collins, “Introduction”, in...
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In this two-part episode, I have the privilege of chatting about Lucia Berlin’s short fiction with writer (and Lucia Berlin’s personal friend) Elizabeth Geoghegan. In the first part, Elizabeth tells me how she met Lucia Berlin and what kind of teacher she was; we also discuss the story “Angel’s Laundromat”. In the second part of the episode, I ask Elizabeth about the stories “A Manual for Cleaning Women,” “So Long,” and “Carmen”. A...
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In this two-part episode, I have the privilege of chatting about Lucia Berlin’s short fiction with writer (and Lucia Berlin’s personal friend) Elizabeth Geoghegan. In the first part, Elizabeth tells me how she met Lucia Berlin and what kind of teacher she was; we also discuss the story “Angel’s Laundromat”. In the second part of the episode, I ask Elizabeth about the stories “A Manual for Cleaning Women,” “So Long,” and “Carmen”. A...
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In this episode, Prof. Irwin Streight (Royal Military College of Canada) discusses the unexpected legacy of short story writer Flannery O'Connor on popular singers and songwriters such as Bruce Springsteen, U2, Lucinda Williams, and Nick Cave.


Works mentioned (in order of appearance): 
 
Lucinda Williams, “Get Right With God”, from Essence (Lost Highway, 2001). 
Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus, dir. by Andrew Douglas (UK, USA, 2003)...
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Meet Tom Conaghan, founder of Scratch Books! In this episode, I ask Tom what it takes and what it's like to run a publisher entirely dedicated to short fiction. Find out more about the origins of Scratch Books, their amazing publications and short story competition!

Works cited (in order of appearance):
John Cheever, “Reunion”, in A Vision of the World: Selected Stories, ed. by Julian Barnes (Vintage, 2021), pp. 199-203. 
Reverse Engi...
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April 29, 2025 41 secs
Intro credits: Shield, Leroy, Taylor Holmes, and Robert W Service. The shooting of Dan McGrew. 1923. Audio. Retrieved from the Library of Congress.
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