Beyond Selidor

I was going to ask if anthologies and collections felt at all different to you -- I must agree with you about the unevenness of collections, though that can be an anthology problem too. I've had some luck finding editor-compilers I really respect. Navah Wolfe is one of those for me.

Like you, I'm generally a harsher critic of short stories. There's a degree of detachment, often, that I find difficult to surmount. That said, I just read an absolutely phenomenal collection in translation, From the Jewish Provinces by Fradl Shtok, which reminded me that I should never say never about a given format!