DIS MEM BER and Other Stories of Mystery and Suspense

DIS MEM BER and Other Stories of Mystery and Suspense
	First edition
Author	Joyce Carol Oates
Language	English
Genre	Gothic
Publisher	The Mysterious Press
Publication date	2017
Publication place	United States
Media type	Print (hardback)
Pages	256
ISBN	978-0802126528

Last updated September 29, 2025

DIS MEM BER and Other Stories of Mystery and Suspense is a collection of Gothic genre short fiction by Joyce Carol Oates published in 2017 by The Mysterious Press.

Stories

Selected periodical or book of original publication are indicated.^[2]

"DIS MEM BER" ( Boulevard , 2016)
"The Crawl Space" ( Ellery Queen , 2016)
"Heartbreak" (Taking Aim, ed. Michael Cart HarperCollins 2015)
"The Drowned Girl" (Boulevard, 2016)
"The Situations" ( Vice , 2016)
"Great Blue Hero" (Black Feather: Bird Horror ed. Ellen Datlow, Pegasus Publications, 2017)
Welcome to Friendly Skies! ( Idaho Review , 2017)

Reception

Kirkus Reviews compares the stories favorably to those of 19th century Gothic writer Edgar Allan Poe:

Oates creates worlds and minds as overwrought and paranoid as anything a female Poe could imagine, then sprinkles her trademark exclamation points licentiously through the interior monologues to heighten the intimacy between ecstasy and madness.^[3]

Literary critic Eric K. Anderson in Bearing Witness praises the collection's skillful grafting of "psychological realism with genre writing."^[4]

"[W]hat makes these intense stories so emotionally compelling is the economically precise way in which Oates portrays the fractured states of mind of her troubled protagonists."^[5]

Anderson adds: "This collection dramatically teases out many ambiguities of human nature and confronts truth that refuses to remain hidden."^[6]

Footnotes

↑ "DIS MEM BER and Other Stories of Mystery and Suspense". Celestial Timepiece: A Joyce Carol Patchwork. Celestial Timepiece.
↑ Oates, 2017: Acknowledgments
↑ "Reviews: DIS MEM BER and Other Stories of Mystery and Suspense". Kirkus Reviews. Kirkus Reviews.
↑ Anderson, 2018
↑ Anderson, 2018
↑ Anderson, 2018

Sources

Anderson, Eric K. 2018. "Review of Joyce Carol Oates's DIS MEM BER and Other Stories of Mystery and Suspense," in Bearing Witness: Joyce Carol Oates Studies: Vol. 4 , Article 6. University of San Francisco. https://repository.usfca.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1028&context=jcostudies Accessed 21 March, 2025.
Oates, Joyce Carol. 2012. DIS MEM BER and Other Stories of Mystery and Suspense. The Mysterious Press, New York. ISBN 978-0802126528

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[1] "DIS MEM BER and Other Stories of Mystery and Suspense". Celestial Timepiece: A Joyce Carol Patchwork. Celestial Timepiece.

[2] Oates, 2017: Acknowledgments

[3] "Reviews: DIS MEM BER and Other Stories of Mystery and Suspense". Kirkus Reviews. Kirkus Reviews.

[4] Anderson, 2018

[5] Anderson, 2018

[6] Anderson, 2018

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v t e Works by Joyce Carol Oates
Short fiction
The Wonderland Quartet	A Garden of Earthly Delights (1967) Expensive People (1968) Them (1969) Wonderland (1971)
The Gothic Saga	Bellefleur (1980) A Bloodsmoor Romance (1982) Mysteries of Winterthurn (1984) My Heart Laid Bare (1998) The Accursed (2013)
Other novels	With Shuddering Fall (1964) Do With Me What You Will (1973) The Assassins: A Book of Hours (1975) Childwold (1976) Son of the Morning (1978) Cybele (1979) Unholy Loves (1979) Angel of Light (1981) Solstice (1984) Marya: A Life (1986) You Must Remember This (1987) American Appetites (1989) Because It Is Bitter, and Because It Is My Heart (1990) Foxfire: Confessions of a Girl Gang (1993) What I Lived For (1994) Zombie (1995) We Were the Mulvaneys (1996) Man Crazy (1997) Broke Heart Blues (1999) Blonde (2000) Middle Age: A Romance (2001) I'll Take You There (2002) The Tattooed Girl (2003) The Falls (2004) Missing Mom (2005) Black Girl / White Girl (2006) The Gravedigger's Daughter (2007) My Sister, My Love (2008) Little Bird of Heaven (2009) Mudwoman (2012) The Sacrifice (2015) Night. Sleep. Death. The Stars. (2020) Breathe (2021) Babysitter (2022) 48 Clues into the Disappearance of My Sister (2023) Butcher: A Novel (2024)
Novellas	Black Water (1992) First Love: A Gothic Tale (1996) Beasts (2001) The Corn Maiden: A Love Story (2005) A Fair Maiden (2010)
Short story collections	By the North Gate (1963) Upon the Sweeping Flood and Other Stories (1966) The Wheel of Love and Other Stories (1970) Marriages and Infidelities (1972) The Goddess and Other Women (1974) The Hungry Ghosts: Seven Allusive Comedies (1974) The Poisoned Kiss and Other Stories from the Portuguese (1975) The Seduction and Other Stories (1975) Crossing the Border (1976) Night-Side (1977) All the Good People I've Left Behind (1979) A Sentimental Education (1980) Last Days: Stories (1984) Raven's Wing (1986) The Assignation (1988) Where Is Here? (1989) Heat and Other Stories (1991) Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?: Selected Early Stories (1993) Haunted: Tales of the Grotesque (1994) Demon and Other Tales (1996) I Am No One You Know: Stories (2004) High Lonesome: New & Selected Stories, 1966–2006 (2006) The Museum of Dr. Moses: Tales of Mystery and Suspense (2007) Wild Nights! (2008) Dear Husband (2009) The Corn Maiden and Other Nightmares (2011) Black Dahlia & White Rose (2012) Lovely, Dark, Deep: Stories (2014) The Doll-Master and Other Tales of Terror (2016) DIS MEM BER and Other Stories of Mystery and Suspense (2017) Beautiful Days: Stories (2018) The (Other) You (2021) Extenuating Circumstances: Stories of Crime and Suspense (2022) Zero-Sum: Stories (2023) Flint Kill Creek: Stories of Mystery and Suspense (2024)
Short stories	"Sweet Love Remembered" (1960) "A Legacy" (1961) "The Fine White Mist of Winter" (1962) "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" (1963) "Pastoral Blood" (1963) "Stigmata" (1963) "Upon the Sweeping Flood" (1963) "First Views of the Enemy" (1964) "The Survival of Childhood" (1964) "Archways" (1965) "Norman and the Killer" (1965) "In the Region of Ice" (1966) "In the Warehouse" (1967) "The Voyage to Rosewood" (1967) "Accomplished Desires" (1968) "How I Contemplated the World from the Detroit House of Correction and Began My Life Over Again" (1969) "Unmailed, Unwritten Letters" (1969) "Bodies" (1970) "I Was in Love" (1970) "Where I Lived, and What I Lived For" (1970) "The Dead" (1971) "The Metamorphosis" (1971) "Blindfold" (1972) "The Lady With the Pet Dog" (1972) "Nightmusic" (1972) "Small Avalanches" (1972) "The Girl" (1974) "The Goddess" (1974) "Magna Mater" (1974) "The Sacrifice" (1975) "Daisy" (1977) "Night-Side" (1977) "A Theory of Knowledge" (1977) "The Translation" (1977) "Funland" (1983)
Young adult fiction	Big Mouth & Ugly Girl (2002) Small Avalanches and Other Stories (2003) Freaky Green Eyes (2003) Sexy (2005) After the Wreck, I Picked Myself Up, Spread My Wings, and Flew Away (2006)

DIS MEM BER and Other Stories of Mystery and Suspense

Contents

Stories

Reception

Footnotes

Sources