Strange Stories Found in Strange Places

I always enjoy finding a weird tale in an unexpected place.  Here is a list of some of my favorite strange stories written by authors not usually associated with any kind of speculative fiction.

Vision by Alistair MacLeod

There are quite a lot of weird goings on in Canadian writer Alistair MacLeod's wonderful collection 'Island', but I was surprised by the supernatural elements found in one story, Vision.  Like all the stories in the book, Vision is set in Cape Breton, Nova Socia.  While sea fishing, a father recounts to his son a tale of a trip he and his twin brother took as children to Canna Island.  They were paying a surprise visit to their grandparents, but got lost and ended up in the filthy, cat-infested home of an old blind woman.  They eventually find their grandparents house, but their connection to the old blind woman runs deeper than they realise, and she will end up saving one of their lives on the beach at Normandy during World War II, many years after her own death. 

The Frozen Fields by Paul Bowles

When reading Paul Bowles collected stories, it was this tale that stood out.  While containing nothing fantastical, it does have little sprinklings of magic.  In this story, a six-year old boy called Donald who lives with his parents in New York City, visits the New England farm of his maternal grandparents at Christmas.  There, he fantasizes that a wolf smashes through a window and carries away his bullying and physically-abusive father.  Donald views the farm as an enchanted and magical place, a place where perhaps his rebellious spirit can take the form of a wolf and rid him of his father for good. 

The Axe by Penelope Fitzgerald

This is the third story in Fitzgeral's collection, The Means of Escape, and judging by the two stories I'd already read I didn't expect this story to go where it went.  Nevertheless, it was perfectly executed.  It's written as a report by a middle-manager to his superior after he's been asked to fire a number of employees.  One of the people he has to axe is his assistant, Singlebury, an elderly man who's been a fixture in the building since before anyone can remember, and a man who 'lives for his work'.  The middle manager's guilt over this particular task will manifest in a way that will, by the end, force him to lock himself in his office.