"[8][9] Biographer Darlene Harbour Unrue traces the evolution in the critical appraisal of Porter's oeuvre: Several important differences are apparent between the reviews of the Collected Stories [and] those of the small volumes of 1930, 1935, 1939 and 1944.

[10]"I beg the reader one gentle favor…please do not call my short novels Novelettes, or even worse, Novellas.

Novelette is classical usage for a trivial, dime-store sort of thing; Novella is a slack, boneless, affected word…Please call my works by their right names: we have four that cover every division: short stories, long stories, short novels, novels [and] they seem very clear, sufficient, and plain English.

"—Katherine Anne Porter in the introduction "Go Little Book", June 14, 1965[11] Literary critic for The New York Times, Howard Moss comments on the relationship between Porter's style and her subject matter: The first concern of these stories is not esthetic.

[12]Moss adds that "Miss Porter is a poet of the short story, and she never confuses the issue.