"Contes de la Becasse" by Guy de Maupassant is a short story collection published in 1883. The opening story establishes a frame narrative: during woodcock hunting season, the elderly Baron des Ravots hosts dinner parties where guests compete to eat the prized woodcock heads. The winner must then tell a story to compensate the others. The remaining tales are supposedly these dinner stories, creating a structure reminiscent of Boccaccio's Decameron. The collection contains seventeen stories in total. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
These books are free to read. Each is in the public domain in the United States; check your own country's rules before you copy or share one.
