In a recent interview, when asked how he saw the role of the writer, Saunders said "To me, the writer's main job is to make the story unscroll in such a way that the reader is snared -- she's right there, seeing things happen and caring about them. And if you dedicate yourself to this job, the meanings more or less take care of themselves." In Tenth of December, the reader is always right there, and the meanings are beautiful and profound and abundant....

This anthology of short stories marks the fifteenth anniversary of The Story Prize and includes one story from each of the annual winning collections, beginning with Edwidge Danticat's The dew breaker and concluding with Elizabeth Strout's Anything is possible. The founder of The Story Prize, Julie Lindsey, and its director, Larry Dark, created this award to address the lack of one specifically for collections of stories. Together they choose three...