Short Stories Included
| Author | Story | Where story previously appeared |
| T. C. Boyle | "Admiral" | Harper's Magazine |
| Kevin Brockmeier | "The Year of Silence" | Ecotone |
| Karen Brown | "Galatea" | Crazyhorse |
| Katie Chase | "Man and Wife" | The Missouri Review |
| Danielle Evans | "Virgins" | Paris Review |
| Allegra Goodman | "Closely Held" | Ploughshares |
| A. M. Homes | "May We Be Forgiven" | Granta |
| Nicole Krauss | "From the Desk of Daniel Varsky" | Harper's Magazine |
| Jonathan Lethem | "The King of Sentences" | The New Yorker |
| Rebecca Makkai | "The Worst You Ever Feel" | Shenandoah |
| Steven Millhauser | "The Wizard of West Orange" | Harper's Magazine |
| Daniyal Mueenuddin | "Nawabdin Electrician" | The New Yorker |
| Alice Munro | "Child's Play" | Harper's Magazine |
| Miroslav Penkov | "Buying Lenin" | The Southern Review |
| Karen Russell | "Vampires in the Lemon Grove" | Zoetrope |
| George Saunders | "Puppy" | The New Yorker |
| Christine Sneed | "Quality of Life" | The New England Review |
| Bradford Tice | "Missionaries" | The Atlantic Monthly |
| Mark Wisniewski | "Straightaway" | The Antioch Review |
| Tobias Wolff | "Bible" | The Atlantic Monthly |
Read more about this topic: The Best American Short Stories 2008
Famous quotes containing the words short, stories and/or included:
“Makin’ a long stay short is a great aid t’ popularity.”
—Kin Hubbard (F. [Frank] Mckinney Hubbard)
“If you like to make things out of wood, or sew, or dance, or style people’s hair, or dream up stories and act them out, or play the trumpet, or jump rope, or whatever you really love to do, and you love that in front of your children, that’s going to be a far more important gift than anything you could ever give them wrapped up in a box with ribbons.”
—Fred M. Rogers (20th century)
“The developments in the North were those loosely embraced in the term modernization and included urbanization, industrialization, and mechanization. While those changes went forward apace, the antebellum South changed comparatively little, clinging to its rural, agricultural, labor-intensive economy and its traditional folk culture.”
—C. Vann Woodward (b. 1908)