Debut Short Story Collections

I have been remiss to be this late in diving into the online celebrations, reflections, interviews, reviews, and musings about short stories this month (Dan Wickett offers a great overview of what's happening, amidst his own on-the-ball coverage, here). But there's no time like now to pipe up with my own thoughts on short fiction. Here is the first of several distilled lists about short stories that are, for me, triggers to an explosive love affair I have with the genre.

Debut Short Story Collections: Favorites
(in no particular order)

1. Self-Help, by Lorrie Moore
2. Say You're One of Them, by Uwem Akpan
3. Ship Fever, by Andrea Barrett
4. Drown, by Junot Diaz
5. Ficciones, by Jorge Luis Borges*
6. Ellis Island & Other Stories, by Mark Helprin
7. The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven, by Sherman Alexie
8. A Good Man is Hard to Find & Other Stories, by Flannery O'Connor
9. White People, by Allan Gurganus
10. The Little Disturbances of Man, by Grace Paley
11. The Girl in the Flammable Skirt, by Aimee Bender
12. Fireworks: Nine Profane Pieces, by Angela Carter
13. Reasons to Live, by Amy Hempel
14. Nine Stories, by J.D. Salinger
15. CivilWarLand in Bad Decline, by George Saunders
16. All Over, by Roy Kesey

*Technically, Borges' first collection of short stories was The Garden of Forking Paths (1941). However, this 1941 volume was included as the first part of Ficciones (1944). And so, for the purposes of this list, I'm just going with it. Sue me.