11. Owl Creek Bridge and Other Stories

There are eight short stories in this book. Among them, I will introduce a man's pure but miserable love story, Beyond the Wall. 

Dampier is a book lover and spends all his time reading books. He has never been interested in falling in love. But one day, he comes across a girl with a bright and beautiful face. She is a niece's landlady who owns his apartment and lives next to him. Since the first meeting with her, he has no choice to concentrate on reading books and thinking about the girl. As his feeling becomes intensive to her, he is getting like a stalker. Every day he is knocking the wall between his room and her room to satisfy himself. The ultimate ending is as you expect. 

All the short stories of this book can be seen in the aspect of war and it is a bit hard to read the whole without looking into dictionaries. However, if you want to stretch your brain as a practice, I will recommend it. 

Bierce, A. (2007). Owl Creek Bridge and Other Stories. Oxford: Macmillan Readers.