A Wooded Shore
and Other Stories
- Author: Thomas McGuane (United States)
- Book type: American stories
- Publisher: Knopf
- Released: 14 October 2025
- Length: 336 pages
- Format: hardcover / ebook
- Prize: $ 27,00
- Order book from: Amazon / Bol
Thomas McGuane A Wooded Shore review
- “At 85, the Montana-based writer Thomas McGuane—known for antic tales of misbehaving men— has earned the right to do whatever he wants, and his latest collection, A Wooded Shore, has a delightful no-brakes spirit. Here are short, ribald stories of men on the downslope of middle age who are having affairs, or hunting for mistresses, or indulging in mild heroics solely to make a buck. McGuane’s mode is headlong comedy, but his sentences are well worked and musical.” (Vogue)
- “A stellar collection … McGuane’s ruminative protagonists are frequently preoccupied by mortality and the strange ways their lives have turned out . . . . As always, McGuane stuffs his stories with offbeat plots, as when an insurance salesman’s life changes after he rescues a cat from a burning house, and darkly funny moments, such as a character dying from a dream … McGuane is one of America’s greatest living writers.” (Publishers Weekly)
Blurb of the new book with stories by Thomas McGuane
Nine shattering, hilarious tales of men on the outskirts of America, habituating the motels, hot dog stands, and dive bars time forgot, grappling with a world that is swiftly changing, and dreaming of a return to the wooded shores of their youth.
In these nine peerless stories, a family boating trip veers into emotional disaster while very narrowly avoiding the physical; a would-be cheater hands over his car—his prized possession—for a shot with a pretty girl; a furniture magnate and his filmmaker daughter visit his impoverished hometown; a doctor’s long-ago affair returns with a bitter pill. Crackling with wry humor, shot through with both wisdom and pain, these are stories of grifters and dreamers, of the lovelorn and the lawless, stories of the ongoing dissonance between the lives we want and the lives this world will allow.
Thomas McGuane was borm 11 December 1939 in Wyandotte, Michigan. He lives on a ranch in McLeod, Montana and is the author of ten novels, including the National Book Award-nominated Ninety-two in the Shade, three works of nonfiction, and four collections of stories. His work has won numerous awards, including the Rosenthal Award of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, and has been anthologized in the Best American Stories, Best American Essays, and Best American Sporting Essays.