Reviews

Selected Short Stories by Guy de Maupassant

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sullyisreading's review

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny lighthearted mysterious reflective sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? N/A
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I've had this book to read for a while, and I'm so glad to have gone through the stories included. They are brilliant, hardly one can be pointed out as being weak. Maupassant's skill cannot be underplayed. He was a master writer.

The translation I read by Roger Colet was appropriate and strong, providing a great sense of the imagery and speech in each story.

My favourite stories that spring to mind from the selection are Boule De Suif, The Graveyard Sisterhood, Madame Tellier's Establishment, Two Friends, The Jewels, My Uncle Jules, Mother Savage, The Horla, and Mouche. It would be harder to pick stories that were my least favourite from the collection, frankly.

dontwantausername's review

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2.0

"The Graveyard Sisterhood" is also known as "Tombstones"

Content Warnings

nerual_'s review against another edition

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adventurous dark funny fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? N/A
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

biblio_lore's review

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3.0

I am late to writing this review as I was away when I finished this collection. I will say that the stories seemed to be good but hampered by a very unfortunate translation that was made even more difficult to enjoy by the faulty transcription to the ebook version that I read. I think this was an interesting collection of stories from a writer from this period and I think that there is a spark of something more in these tales and I'm disappointed that it was lost in the translation. Don't take my three stars as a critique of the writing because it was good and the stories, while a bit on the paltry side of things, I believe are less the fault of the author and more of the edition that I got saddled with. De Maupassant still deserves your attention and you should look up more, but buyer beware of your editions.