Buttered Side Down

Buttered Side Down 

by Edna Ferber
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This collection of short stories was first published in 1912 and I picked it up because I had never read any Edna Ferber and thought I should and because I needed a book from 1912 for my Century of Books project. The copy I borrowed from the library was published in 1912 which I thought was kind of cool. (It isn't the one pictured, GoodReads didn't have the edition I got). 

I really liked these stories. They are about the part of life that is typified by the expression that "toast always falls buttered side down." The voice of the author is very much present in the stories and I found that entertaining. Most of them start off telling you what kind of a story it will be and often commenting about the likely-hood of publishers accepting or rejecting it. Ferber begins the book by explaining that she knows nothing about New York, but knows that stories are always set there and that she is telling us this to save editors the trouble of continuing to read as the stories are about Chicago. The final story in the collection, "Where the Car Turns at 18th" was sad, but all the others were wry and witty and felt true. 

"I've found out one thing, and it's a great little lesson when you get it learned. Most of us are where we are because we belong there, and if we didn't we wouldn't be." (from "That Home-town Feeling."

I will definitely read more by Edna Ferber. This book counts toward the Back to the Classics Challenge (as a classic book of short stories).