Hello my Straight Dope friends. I enjoy reading short stories of a group of friends sitting around telling each other stories. I’ve read
Asimov’s
Azazel fantasy stories
The Black Widower Mystery stories
The Union Club Mysteries
Clarkes
Tales from the White Hart
Spider Robinson’s
Callahan Crosstime Saloon
de Camp and Pratt’s
Tales from Gavagan’s Bar
Does anyone have other suggestions? I like mystery, science fiction, fantasy and anything in between. Thank you all.
The Draco Tavern-Larry Niven
I seem to recall a series of Star Trek novels under the collective title of “The Captain’s Table.” Each novel (sorry, not short stories) was a story told at a bar by a different starship captain.
Ah, yes. Here it is:
Are you including Time Travelers Strictly Cash and Callahan’s Secret in that?
And the stories set at Lady Sally’s bordello - Lady Slings the Blues and Callahan’s Lady.
Yes, but aren’t those novels instead of short story collections? I’m going by Wikipedia for the distinction–I’ve read them all, but it has been a long time.
Cripes, Stephen King has more than I can list.
The Breathing Method
The Man Who Would Not Shake Hands
One For The Road
[Anything from Castle Rock]
Mrs. Todd’s Shortcut
many more
“Tales From the Spaceport Bar” has some good stories. (The second installment not so much.)
I particularly recommend “Infinite Resources” by Randall Garret.
If you can find a copy, there’ a tribute volume to Arthur C. Clarke and his Tales From the White Hart conceived of shortly after his death, called Fables From the Fountain.
It’s edited by Ian Whates and includes the likes of Charles Stross, Ian Watson & Neil Gaiman.
It consists of 18 tall tales, as if told by a group of authors at their regular meet-ups in an old London pub.
Eric Brown had an episodic alien invasion novel called Kethani. The first 9 (of 12) chapters appeared first as short stories; evey chapter is set in a Yorkshire pub as the various customers relate their experiences over the years.
But maybe not quite what you’re loking for.
Niven also has “The Fourth Profession”, which pretty much starts out as an “An Alien Walks into a bar…” joke, but then goes different places.
There’s a portion of Gaimans SANDMAN comics that do that.
Hemingway’s A Clean, Well Lighted Place is set in a café where two waiters speculate about the only patron in the place, a lonely old man.
I’ve read most of the ones in the OP, and Niven’s Draco Tavern stories.
I haven’t read Tales from the Mos Eisley Cantina, but they definitely fit the pattern:
I wrote a non-bar bar story* that was published in Analog (October 2013) – “Putting Down Roots”
*It’s set in the back yard of a home brewer, who gets his friends together for a tasting. But it’s definitely in the class of “bar stories”
Robert Heinlein’s ‘All You Zombies…’ (the definitive time travel story, IMO) is set in a bar as the protagonist tells his story.
Thanks everyone for answering my question. Keep the suggestions coming. I’ll check into the books I haven’t read.
The first I remember was Tales of a Wayside Inn, a collection of short stories/poems by Longfellow. It seemed ancient to me as a kid (looked it up, published in 1863).
My dad, on a rainy night during a car trip through Vermont, found an old copy in The Eagle Tavern, and read much of it to us. We found him his own copy, and he kept it by his bed.
Come to think of it, speaking of old books…
Star Trek did a limited series called The Captain’s Table where there was a Bar inspired by Callahan’s where Captains across Time and Space could go and and drink and swap stories. Each Novel was a story a Trek Captain told at the Bar and was written in the first person from their perspective. I think there may have been framing story across all the novels but might be misremembering.
If you like vintage mysteries of the Golden Age (1930s), look at Dorothy L Sayers for several short stories set in bars:
https://www.fadedpage.com/books/20190252/html.php “A Shot at Goal” and “False Weight” in this collection
https://www.fadedpage.com/books/20111202/html.php#Page_77 “Sleuths on the Scent” in this one
You have your Decameron; there’s no bar but they are all drinking, partying, and telling each other stories.
I forgot the short story collection by Janet Asimov, Pshrinks Anonymous. Not bad.