Fans of Stephen King's short fiction should be grateful he was selected to edit the 2007 Best American Short Stories. That assignment rekindled his enthusiasm for the form, and the result is this richly varied collection of 13 tales that display his mastery of horror fiction.

Published originally in magazines as disparate as The New Yorker and Playboy, the stories touch on all aspects of the genre, from heart-pounding thrillers ("The Gingerbread Girl" and "A Very Tight Place") to tales of the supernatural ("Harvey's Dream" and "The New York Times at Special Bargain Rates"). The most moving story in the collection is "The Things They Left Behind," which describes an insurance company employee at the World Trade Center who's lucky enough to miss work on 9/11. When belongings of his deceased co-workers begin mysteriously turning up in his apartment, he's forced to come to terms with his loss.

There's no writer better than King at creating a story that will prickle the hairs on the back of the neck. One of those is "N.," (previously unpublished) a psychiatrist's account of an obsessive-compulsive patient whose discovery of a Stonehenge-like collection of stones in a Maine field leads to tragedy. Another is "The Cat From Hell," the chilling story of a murderous feline and the hit man hired to kill him. King's stories are not without their touches of humor, at least of the dark variety: "Stationary Bike" will appeal to anyone who's ever balked at the idea of mounting a piece of exercise equipment.

King helpfully adds what he calls "Sunset Notes" at the conclusion of the volume. These capsules provide insight into the inspiration for the stories or describe the circumstances in which they were written, and they're an entertaining enhancement for anyone interested in the creative process.

Just After Sunset is more than a volume to keep King's fans occupied while they wait for his next novel. His zest for stories that expose the terror lurking under the placid surface of daily life is evident on every page. If you're looking for some unsettling reading on a chilly November night, this book will serve quite well.

Harvey Freedenberg writes from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Copyright 2008 BookPage Reviews.

In King's latest collection of short stories (following 2002's Everything's Eventual ), he presents 14 tales that range from the philosophically themed, to one in which the author gleefully admits to playing with the gross-out factor ("A Very Tight Place"), to "The Cat from Hell," which makes its hardcover debut some 30 years after its original publication as part of a contest in Cavalier , one of the gentleman's magazines that put food on the table in King's early years as a writer. In his introduction, King cites his recent stint as guest editor for the 2007 edition of Best American Short Stories as an impetus to return to the form in his own writing. Several of the works included here were written following that experience. Finally, as King has done previously in his collections, at the end of the volume he provides the reader with brief insights into the inspirations for each tale. Recommended for all popular fiction collections. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 7/08.]—Nancy McNicol, Hamden P.L., CT

In the introduction to his first collection of short fiction since Everything's Eventual (2002), King credits editing Best American Short Stories (2007) with reigniting his interest in the short form and inducing some of this volume's contents. Most of these 13 tales show him at the top of his game, molding the themes and set pieces of horror and suspense fiction into richly nuanced blends of fantasy and psychological realism. "The Things They Left Behind," a powerful study of survivor guilt, is one of several supernatural disaster stories that evoke the horrors of 9/11. Like the crime thrillers "The Gingerbread Girl" and "A Very Tight Place," both of which feature protagonists struggling with apparently insuperable threats to life, it is laced with moving ruminations on mortality that King attributes to his own well-publicized near-death experience. Even the smattering of genre-oriented works shows King trying out provocative new vehicles for his trademark thrills, notably "N.," a creepy character study of an obsessive-compulsive that subtly blossoms into a tale of cosmic terror in the tradition of Arthur Machen and H.P. Lovecraft. Culled almost entirely from leading mainstream periodicals, these stories are a testament to the literary merits of the well-told macabre tale. (Nov.)