Christian Short Stories is an anthology, not of stories written by great Christians, but of stories written by great writers who have been inspired by Christianity. The challenge of such themes as God's miraculous intervention, divine justice and the mysterious workings of Grace, here lead the short story to some of its most ingenious and deeply-felt effects. They range in style from the gentle comedy of Thomas Hardy's 'Old Mrs Chundle', through the robust wit of GK Chesterton's Father Brown adventure, The Blue Cross', to the dramatic portrayal of evil in Graham Greene's The Second Death. Some stories, such as Robert Louis Stevenson's 'Markheim' (with its unexpected twist in the last paragraph) and Oscar Wilde's The Selfish Giant', are acknowledged masterpieces, while others, such as Oliver Goldsmith's The Man in Black' and Flannery O'Connor's The Artificial Nigger, though less well known, are equally delightful.