In Country, Mason's 1985 novel, centers on eighteen-year-old Samantha Hughes as she embarks on a journey to understand her father's death in the Vietnam War and to find herself.

Mason's 1989 short story collection, Love Life, features characters navigating through evolving circumstances.

Shelby Foote's Shiloh (1952) provides a fictional recounting of the Civil War battle, offering multiple perspectives.

Edited by Michael Rea, The American Story: Short Stories from the Rea Award (1993) includes works by authors like Raymond Carver, Joyce Carol Oates, Ann Beattie, Charles Baxter, and Grace Paley. This collection is ideal for students looking to deepen their understanding of the short story genre and minimalist writing.

James McDonough's The War in Kentucky: From Shiloh to Perryville (1994) examines Kentucky's crucial role in the Civil War.

New Women and New Fiction: Short Stories since the Sixties (1986) is a compilation of stories by contemporary female writers such as Cynthia Ozick, Toni Cade Bambara, Anne Tyler, Fay Weldon, and Ann Beattie.

Raymond Carver's Where I'm Calling From: New and Selected Stories (1988) is highly regarded as a collection of minimalist masterpieces.