1. A Good Man Is Hard to Find and Other Stories by Flannery O’Connor
It is a collection of short stories first published in 1955. The subjects of the short stories range from baptism (The River) to serial killers (A Good Man Is Hard to Find) to human greed and exploitation (The Life You Save May Be Your Own). The majority of the stories include jarring violent scenes that make the characters undergo a spiritual change. The short stories commonly have tones of Catholicism related to life and death scenarios.
2. Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson
In this remarkable collection of short stories, Anderson delivers a series of artful and poignant character sketches through the narrative voice of George Willard, the town reporter of Winesburg, Ohio. Though its reputation waned in the 1930s, it has since rebounded and is now considered one of the most influential portraits of pre-industrial small-town life in the United States.