"Forgetting is how we survive" by David Frankel (Salt, 2023)

Stories from The Bristol Short Short Prize Anthology, Structo, London Magazine, etc. The shortest is about a page long. Most are about a dozen pages.

• Ghost story - 1 page.
• Sink rate - A woman on a beach watches a plane crash, one that she could have been on. I first saw this in the Bristol competition anthology, then in BBSS 2022 and liked it there too. It reminds me of Mark Haddon's "The Pier Falls". It's online at Barcelona Review
• Shooting season - Wayne is driving the estate's tractor to where he's mending a bridge. Niall, the owner's son, is hosting university friends for a shooting party. One guest, Lara, has caught Wayne's eye - tattoos, blazing hair. While he's working, she appears with Niall's 12 y.o. brother Lucas. She asks if he could give her car a tow, then leaves. Lucas tells him that Lara is his brother's girlfriend. Lucas takes the tractor keys and mucks about. He falls in the river. Wayne pulls him out and tried desperately, vainly, to revive him. The shooting party gather around him. Lara and Niall aren't there. [I like it. Lots of craft.]
• Downstream the water darkens - The first-person is an early teens boy on holiday on a farm with his uncle and aunt's family, including Kristin. Perhaps he has no mother. He's taking photos to show his father what he did (he has a camera with flash-cubes). In the village with Kristin he sees a teenage boy and girl kissing and takes a photo. The boy threatens him. Kristin saves him - she thinks that the "I" is a coward. He shop-lifts a pen-knife. As a dare he follows the river as far as he can. He has to paddle through the river. He sees a fabled 6 ft pike, forgets to photograph it. He sees a floating carrier bag, cuts it open with his pen-knife, photographs the bleeding, broken-boned thing inside. [I like this too. The ending may be a bit of a cop-out.]
• Meadowlands - He works on an estate, drinks (often alone) in the evenings. He finds peace in the tree plantation, a ruined croft. He lives in a caravan with Doyle, an ex-convict. They have a moody friendship. There was a problem at the local pub. He fears a woman's body (she worked at the chippy) will be found in the loch. As the police are about to question them he hopes that Doyle's past will count. Doyle asks him for stories about the townies who go at night to the loch.
• Empty rooms - Andrea's parents are estate agents. When she has keys to an empty house she calls Danny (about 17) and they sneak into it. They explore, drink, have sex, make-believe its their home. In one house the phone rings. When Andrea picks it up a man says her name. There's excitement about being caught. He suggests to her that she's having the same sort of fun with someone else. After that, he never sees her again. He moves away. 30 years later he returns. She's dead. The house they last visited is for sale - she lived there. He visits it, imagines what it was like living there, sees the children's room.
• The memory system - When the narrator was 8 her mother took her to stay with her grandfather at the top of a tower block for 2 months while the mother got better. She'd never seen him before. She didn't need to go to school. They only went out at night. 2 chains and 3 locks on the door. Blackout curtains. She wasn't allowed in his bedroom. There were rumours that he was a pervert. Each night they went out and had a picnic down the road. He's dead now. Her mother died soon after. 25 years later she uses the walk home as the basis of her locii-based memory device. He was scared on the walk back. His bedroom was a darkroom. Big photos of views from his window were on his walls. [I like this too!]
• Sink - A great sink-hole appears just when Jen leaves Roy. He loses his job. The buildings around the growing rim ("Holeside") are evacuated. Squatters, flea-markets and trendy pop-ups appear. He phones Jen when drunk, promising to reform. He meets a women who's interested in him but lets her go [I like the sink-hole-related details more than Roy's storyline.]
• The killing tree - One page. The persona buries criminal condemned to death. The relatives conduct the execution.
• Heaven - Chrissy, 17, lives on a caravan site with her mum. Her brother did 4 years before. Toby and old Annie live in a caravan too. Her boyfriend Arron has a van. When Toby accused Chrissy of killing his dog, Arron protected her. She's working hard at school so that she can leave the place. Her mum tells Chrissy that Annie had to give her kids to Social Services. Annie tells Chrissy that she killed the dogs because Toby treated them so badly. She advices Chrissy to get away and start a new life. Chrissy posts an anonymous letter to Toby. Soon, police and paramedics are outside Toby and Annie's caravan.
• The Unmaking - Christian (UK, backpacking) and Tegan (NZ), both in their early 20s, are walking along a beach after a storm. They met at a beach party weeks before. Their relationship has become a bit tense. They see a small stranded whale. While he tries to keep it alive, she runs for help. She returns with a group for people who cut the whale up. They offer him the most valuable part - the penis. Years later he remembers the incident. He's forgotten why they broke up, but he recalls for firelit face that first night, and the way she said his name. [I don't like the paragraph where he dreams he's in a commuter bus on a rainy day dreaming he's on a remote sunny beach.]
• Stay - Hollins is looking for his dog. His wife is Helen. "The boy" used to spoil the dog. The dog strays onto the neighbour's land. The neighbour goes around with a shotgun. He's tied the dog up. He warns Hollins that next time he'll protect his animals by shooting the dog. Hollins says sorry, it was the boy's dog. The neighbour lets him off. Hollins feels humiliated having to use that excuse.
• Hitler was an artist too - The narrator works in an old warehouse with Alan and Wayne. When their dictatorial boss Bert discovered that the narrator drew, he was less strict, telling the narrator that he painted. Bert tells the narrator's colleagues that it's the narrator's last day - he's been there a year. The narrator had been keeping the news secret. The narrator likes Claire. He protects her from Bert's gropes. She has a psycho boyfriend otherwise she'd be with the narrator. They've talked about a future together. But her boyfriend picks her up in his BNW. The narrator's going to start at Art College. Bert thinks it's a waste of time, full of hippies, and suggests that the narrator might one day take over his job.

Cold rivers. Watching lovers. Living in caravans. Dogs.

I much prefer this to (for example) the latest A.L.Kennedy collection.