The Short Stories of Diane Oliver

Guided by spirits, one overcast morning in October I picked up a copy of Right On! from the unread section of my bookshelf. A Black writing collection edited by Bradford Chambers and Rebecca Moon in 1970, it was a recent gift from a friend who knew well my weakness for African-American fiction anthologies, especially short stories. Right On! featured the usual suspects of respected scribes including Richard Wright, Ann Petry, William Melvin Kelley, and Margaret Walker. But after opening the book to a random page, I stumbled onto Diane Oliver, a writer I’d never read or heard of, and her heartbreaking story “Neighbors.” 

Michael A. Gonzales from THE BITTER SOUTHERNER

Read more at this link: https://bittersoutherner.com/feature/2022/the-short-stories-and-too-short-life-of-diane-oliver