Foreword by Robert Atwan
Introduction: Stories Around a Fire by Kathleen Norris

Diane Ackerman. In the Memory Mines / from Michigan Quarterly Review
Ben Birnbaum. How to Pray: Reverence, Stories, and the Rebbe’s Dream / from Image
Charles Bowden. The Bone Garden of Desire / from Esquire
James Campbell. Travels with R.L.S. / from The New York Times Book Review
Anne Fadiman. Mail / from The American Scholar
Francine Du Plessix Gray. The Work of Mourning / from The American Scholar
Jeffrey Heiman. Vin Laforge / from The Massachusetts Review
Edward Hoagland. Calliope Times / from The New Yorker
Adam Hochschild. India’s American Imports / from The American Scholar
Barbara Hurd. Refugium / from The Georgia Review
Stephen King. On Impact / from The New Yorker
Yusef Komunyakaa. Blue Machinery of Summer / from The Washington Post Magazine
Marcus Laffey. The Midnight Tour / from The New Yorker
Lenore Look. Facing the Village / from Manoa
Rebecca McClanahan. Book Marks / from The Southern Review
Daphne Merkin. Trouble in the Tribe / from The New Yorker
David Michaelis. Provincetown / from The American Scholar
Spencer Nadler. Brain-Cell Memories / from Harper’s Magazine
Mary Oliver. Dust 218 / from Shenandoah
Reynolds Price. Dear Harper: A Letter to a Godchild About God / from Forbes ASAP
Tim Robinson. The Fineness of Things / from The Recorder
Carlo Rotella. Cut Time / from The American Scholar
Ashraf Rushdy. Exquisite Corpse / from Transition
Earl Shorris. The Last Word / from Harper’s Magazine
Bert O. States. On Being Breathless / from The Gettysburg Review
William T. Vollmann. Upside Down and Backward / from Forbes ASAP

Biographical Notes
Notable Essays of 2000