Fiction Literature Short Stories

Nineteen sparkling stories that weave between the lands of the living and the lands of the dead. Spirits Abroad is an expanded edition of Zen Cho’s Crawford Award winning debut collection with nine added stories including Hugo Award winner “If at First You Don't Succeed, Try, Try Again”. A Datin recalls her romance with an orang bunian. A teenage pontianak struggles to balance homework, bossy aunties, first love, and eating people.

Herman Melville’s tale of corporate discontent, Bartleby, the Scrivener, tells the story of a quiet, hardworking legal copyist who works in an office in the Wall Street area of New York City. The business where he works handles the official financial paperwork of wealthy men. One day, Bartleby’s employer requests he proofread one of the documents he has copied. Bartleby declines the assignment with the inscrutable “I would prefer not,” the first of what will become many refusals.

James Thurber is a masterful writer, humorist, and creator of enduring characters: Walter Mitty and the Lemming, included herein, have a permanent place in our culture. These 22 complete stories from Part I of My World (first published in 1942) reveal the full range of Thurber's genius, from his fanciful analysis of Shakespeare's Macbeth to his playful rendition of marital conflict and ultimately, his serious consideration of murders unsolved.

It's just townspeople picking numbers for the annual lottery...why, then, is there an ominous feeling to "The Lottery"? Find out just what this lottery is for, and listen to seven other unique stories. The collection reveals Jackson's remarkable range, from hilarious to horrifying, dealing with modern issues of alienation, empowerment, racism, and economic class.

This collection of 11 stories spans virtually the whole of Tolstoy's creative life. While each is unique in form, as a group they are representative of his style, and touch on the central themes that surface in War and Peace and Anna Karenina. Stories as different as "The Snowstorm", "Lucerne", "The Diary of a Madman", and "The Devil" are grounded in autobiographical experience. They deal with journeys of self-discovery and the moral and religious thought that characterizes Tolstoy's works of criticism and philosophy.

The correspondence between Carrie Allsop and David Mayer reveals, piece by piece, the painful details of a devastating affair between their spouses. With each commiserating scratch of the pen, they confess their fears and bare their souls. They share the bewilderment over how things went so wrong and come to wonder where to go from here. Told entirely through the letters of two comforting strangers and those of two illicit lovers, Evidence of the Affair explores the complex nature of the heart. And ultimately, for one woman, how liberating it can be when it’s broken.

Lawrence Block's 17 Matthew Scudder novels have won the hearts of readers throughout the world - along with a bevy of awards including the Edgar, the Shamus, the Philip Marlowe (Germany), and the Maltese Falcon (Japan). But Scudder has starred in short fiction as well, and it's all here, from a pair of late-'70s novelettes ("Out the Window" and "A Candle for the Bag Lady") through "By the Dawn's Early Light" (Edgar) and "The Merciful Angel of Death" (Shamus), all the way to "One Last Night at Grogan's", a moving and elegiac story never before published.

Since the 1970s, FantasticLand has been the theme park where "Fun is Guaranteed!" But when a hurricane ravages the Florida coast and isolates the park, the employees find it anything but fun. Five weeks later, the authorities who rescue the survivors encounter a scene of horror. Photos soon emerge online of heads on spikes outside of rides and viscera and human bones littering the gift shops, breaking records for hits, views, likes, clicks, and shares.

When a man is shot in the head, Bree Taggert and her new partner, veteran detective Dana Romano, respond to the call. They break the news to the victim’s ex-wife and learn the estranged couple’s five-year-old daughter was supposed to have been with him. What starts as a murder investigation quickly morphs into a desperate search for a missing child. The case stirs memories of Bree’s own traumatizing childhood. To find the little girl, Bree will have to relive her own terrifying past.

A darkly funny short story about one woman’s reflections on the routes she’s taken through life and the detours she’s made along the way. Doubts and guilt swirl through her mind as she rides the train to her fertility appointment. Each stop stirs up introspective thoughts on her marriage, the loss of her baby, and the lover who got away—contemplations that push her ever closer to wondering if she’s made the right decisions.

Herbert George Wells was one of the most prolific and visionary British writers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. H. G. Wells is now best remembered for his science fiction novels, although he wrote across many genres, including nonfiction. His fiction embraces history, science fiction, horror, satire, fantasy, and social commentary. Wells was also a futurist, foreseeing air travel, tanks (as in “The Land Ironclads” - part of this anthology) space travel, nuclear weapons, and even satellite television.

A man dies with his hand on a radio dial. A distinguished aristocrat finds murder at the opening night of a play. A cryptogram produces death in an English churchyard. Death on the Air and Other Stories serves as the perfect introduction to Ngaio Marsh and her creation, Inspector Roderick Alleyn, or as a nostalgic journey for her many fans.

Arthur Conan Doyle was the greatest genre writer Britain has ever produced. Throughout a long writing career, he drew on his own medical background, his travels, and his increasing interest in spiritualism and the occult to produce a spectacular array of Gothic tales. Many of Doyle's writings are recognized as the very greatest tales of terror. They range from hauntings in the polar wasteland to evil surgeons and malevolent jungle landscapes. This collection brings together over 30 of Conan Doyle's best Gothic tales

By day, Mark Wojcik can be found elbow-deep in engine grease, making cars and trucks safe for the highway. By night, he can be found traipsing through the wilds of Pennsylvania, making the world safe for humans. He's more than just a mechanic, he's a New Templar Knight. He travels the backroads and byways fighting weresquonks, ningen, selkies, ghosts, and . . . gnomes? Is that gnome . . . naked? (Sigh.) Season One collects the first four novellas in the Spells, Salt, & Steel series: Spells, Salt, & Steel; Open Season; Deep Trouble; and Close Encounters.

The Classic Anne of Green Gables Collection: 6 of the 8 Books in the Beloved "Anne Shirley" Series + 2 Avonlea Short Story Collections, contains: Book 1: Anne of Green Gables, Book 2: Anne of Avonlea, Book 3: Anne of the Island, Book 4: Anne's House of Dreams, Book 5: Rainbow Valley, Book 6: Rilla of Ingleside, Book 7: Chronicles of Avonlea, Book 8: In Further Chronicles of Avonlea.

A collection of intersecting stories about Indigenous love and loneliness from one of contemporary literature’s most boundless minds.

More than any writer before or since, Louis L'Amour brought the American West to life. His action-packed stories deal with eternal themes: honor, deceit, passion, betrayal, loyalty, courage, love. His settings are historically accurate, his prose riveting, and his characters colorful: good guys, bad guys, toughs, roughs, sidekicks, and saints.

How do you systematically destroy a child with love? It's not something that any parent aspires to do, yet a surprising number come perilously close to achieving it.

Two roommates stumble upon a mysterious and disturbing videotape. After watching it, one of them vanishes.... A heart transplant recipient gets much more than he bargained for when he digs into his donor's sinister past.... Mourning the death of their son, a young couple is plunged into madness after encountering something otherworldly in the wilderness.... Dreams in Black Static is a collection of eight terrifying stories by Ambrose Ibsen, author of The Haunting of Beacon Hill and Asylum.

Six short stories for younger children aged two to five years. Tested stories for a great bedtime listen! Stories include a cheetah, an ogre, an elephant, a super-duper frog, and two other animals.