Parker Pyne, Science Writing, & Paddington

As I had planned, this month I read Parker Pyne Investigates (in the Masterpieces in Miniature collection) and finally finished The Best American Science Writing 2004. This has given me a good opportunity to talk about my thoughts on short story collections, nonfiction, and anthologies.

Parker Pyne Investigates is a short story collection by Agatha Christie. Meanwhile, The Best American Science Writing 2004 is an anthology of nonfiction pieces. (The Paddington books are a series of chapter books about an extremely cute bear; more on that later.) Although The Best American Science Writing 2004 contains some extremely impactful articles (scroll to the bottom of this story for a list + links!), to be honest I had a much better time reading Parker Pyne and I was much more motivated to read it consistently and not put it off. In this story, I will discuss why I think this is the case.

Introduction

The Parker Pyne stories are a bit weird for Agatha Christie. Although the full title of this collection is Masterpieces in Miniature: The Detectives, Parker Pyne isn't really a detective. He's actually a specialist in making people happy, which usually involves orchestrating theatrical schemes and only sometimes involves detective work. Weird, but very enjoyable.

The Best American Science Writing 2004 is a collection of the "best" pieces of science writing published in 2003 (Then the book came out in 2004, hence the slightly misleading title). It includes a wide variety of topics, including space science, biology, sociology, and medicine, but all of it is science-themed nonfiction that was selected for being (at least according to the editor) the best-written science writing of the previous year.

Why I like short story collections/anthologies in general:

I particularly enjoy reading short story collections or anthologies when I am lacking brainpower due to being busy, sick, tired, stressed, etc. When reading short stories, you don't have to remember anything for the length of a whole book; you can just read a short story in one sitting and then feel free to forget all about it. This is great for times when I'm lacking brain bandwidth.

Short story collections and anthologies are also great for reading over the course of many months. It took me about 18 months (not exaggerating) to read all of The Best American Science Writing 2004, but that was totally fine because the individual pieces are not connected, so there is nothing I had to remember in between reading the different essays.

Why I prefer short story collections (by one author):

I have realized that I much prefer reading short story collections by one author, rather than anthologies (containing multiple authors) because the collections end up being much more cohesive and consistent in quality. I really enjoyed every story in Parker Pyne Investigates, and I've had similar experiences with other Agatha Christie collections I've read. This Parker Pyne collection was even more cohesive than the average short story collection because all of the stories were about the same character and had very similar "vibes," which meant that it fit perfectly into my reading mood. But even for short story collections that aren't all about one character, the fact that they are by one author means that there is a consistently in style that makes me much more likely to enjoy all of the stories if I enjoy any of them.

Meanwhile, The Best American Science Writing 2004 was much less consistent. Although some of the pieces were extremely good (see "recommended articles" section below for links!), others were stupid, pointless, and/or boring (At least, in my opinion). This made me unmotivated to keep reading the book. Even if I had just finished an article that was so good it bordered on life-changing, I knew there was a decent chance that the next piece I read would be unpleasant, so I generally didn't really feel like continuing. To be honest, a big reason why I finally finished the book now is that I had to to complete a Read Harder prompt, and I really want to finish all of the prompts by the end of the year. Maybe not the best reason for reading a book... but one of the pieces I had to force myself to read this month (this one) did end up being among my favorites.

It is possible for anthologies to be cohesive and good enough that I consistently enjoy them (This literary magazine is a good example), but it does seem to be more risky than just reading a collection by one author I love.

Paddington ♡

The Paddington books are some of my favorites. They are also an interesting case because even though they are really novels, they are almost like short story collections. Many of the chapters from the books have been individually made into picture books (if not most or all; I'm having trouble finding a complete list), so clearly they can stand on their own with just minimal modification. Paddingtons are some of my favorite books, especially to read when I'm stressed, primarily because they are extremely adorable and sweet, but also because they combine the best of both the short story collection and novel worlds for me: Because the chapters are self-contained, I don't have to expend brain power on remembering what happened earlier in the book, yet because the books are so cohesive, there is a never a jarring feeling between the chapters, which keeps it very relaxing. And it avoids the risk of "ugh, I don't know if the next story will be good, so I'm unmotivated to keep reading...."

(I definitely recommend these books to any adults looking for relaxation! I found them overly boring as a kid, but as an adult who craves calm, I love them.)

***Recommended Articles***

Although it did take me about 1.5 years (seriously) to read all of the articles in The Best American Science Writing 2004, I highly recommend at least reading the good ones! Luckily, almost all of my favorite pieces from this book are also available online. All of the following pieces (listed in book order) were 5/5 stars for me and I have linked them when possible. In addition to the valuable science content, all of these pieces felt very meaningful about both the science and life in general:

"Stripped for Parts" by Jennifer Kahn

"Desperate Measures" by Atul Gawande

"One Cosmic Question, Too Many Answers" by Dennis Overbye

"Reading Minds" by Ian Parker

"Cracking the Harvard X-Files" by Kaja Perina

"Leashing the Rattlesnake" by Susan Milius

"What Galileo Saw" by Michael Benson

"The Patient Predator" by Kevin Patterson

"Columbia's Last Flight" by William Langewiesche

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Thank you for reading! What are your thoughts on short story collections and anthologies? Do you have any favorites to recommend? Also, if you read any of these science writing pieces, let me know what you thought of them! Stay tuned for my next post, which will be a report on the books I brought on vacation vs. what I actually read (I think most of you can probably relate to this struggle, lol). [update: here it is!]