Showing titles in Short Stories

Exploring childhood ambition, youthful desire, midlife reinvention and the unsparing clarity of old age, Ozeki brings us eleven richly imagined stories of characters standing at life’s thresholds. A college student falls for her professor and learns to transmute longing into language. A...

The publication of a new book by William Trevor is a true literary event. One of our finest chroniclers of the human condition, Trevor's precise and unflinching insights into the lives of ordinary people are evidenced once again in this stunning collection of twelve stories. Subtle yet powerful, these exquisitely nuanced tales of regret, deception, adultery, aging, and forgiveness are a rare pleasure, and they confirm Trevor's reputation as a master of the form.

Everyday Kindness is a charity anthology of short, fictional stories of kindness, edited by LJ Ross. These uplifting tales of hope and of small, everyday kindnesses are intended to support wider, positive mental health goals and foster wellbeing through the act of reading tales of goodwill inspired by others. Featuring authors across the spectrum of literature, some international bestsellers and award-winning writers amongst them, this is a unique collection of words.

More Cumbrian Ghost Stories brings you 16 ghost stories, horror stories, weird tales, and dark fairy tales set in the English county of Cumbria and the Lake District by Tony Walker, author of Cumbrian Ghost Stories and narrator of the Classic Ghost Stories Podcast. From "The Milk-White Child of Ravenglass" to "A Brief Stop in Barrow in Furness", "The Screaming Skulls of Calgarth", and "The Dalston Vampire", these stories dance around the county of Cumbria to horrify, scare, terrify, and also make you smile and even laugh a bit, depending on the tale.

When pest controller Nick Grieves and his wife Samantha are called to sleepy Seadale's dockyard in the dead of night, they expect a rat infestation, or maybe an unclaimed exotic pet. But what they find instead is a nightmare from another continent: a terrifying and unnatural creature with a hunger that can’t be contained.

The fourteen short stories in To Cut a Long Story Short show Jeffrey Archer’s great skills with a wide variety of character, of subject and of setting, but all with that trademark twist in the tale. Every reader will have their own favourites: the choices run from love at first sight across the train tracks to the cleverest of confidence tricks, from the quirks of the legal profession - and those who are able to manipulate both sides of the Bar - to the creative financial talents of a member of Her Majesty’s diplomatic service - but for a good cause.

Beloved naturalist and author Gerald Durrell introduces an eccentric cast of characters in this entertaining collection of stories, first published in 1991. Which of these stories is true and which is semi-true I have, of course, not the slightest intention of telling you, but I hope this will...

Let go of overthinking, make peace with uncertainty, and discover a calmer way of living—without needing to attend meditation retreats, follow rigid philosophies, or master complicated teachings. The Monkey and the Way of Zen is a lighthearted yet profound journey told through 28 short stories, following a restless Monkey and his encounters with a wise Master. As the Monkey stumbles through his questions, doubts, and frustrations, he begins to uncover a quieter truth beneath the noise of his thoughts.

Since its publication in 1996, George Saunders’s debut collection has grown in esteem from a cherished cult classic to a masterpiece of the form, inspiring an entire generation of writers along the way. In six stories and a novella, Saunders hatches an unforgettable cast of characters, each...

A Twist of the Knife is Peter James’s gripping collection of thirty short stories, combining tales from Short Shockers: Collection One and Two. With each twist of the knife, a chilling new journey begins . . . From a woman intent on bizarre revenge to a restaurant critic with a morbid fear of...

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Innocence by Roald Dahl, read by Dan Stevens, Richard E. Grant, Richard Griffiths, Tasmin Greig and Andrew Scott. What makes us innocent and how do we come to lose it? Featuring the autobiographical stories telling of Roald Dahl's boyhood and youth as...

“I was sick, sick unto death with that long agony,” begins one of the most famous tales from the master of the macabre, Edgar Allan Poe. Through the tortures of the Spanish Inquisition, we follow the straying mind of the unnamed prisoner in his quest for hope in a world of darkness and despair. This episode skyrocketed The Classic Tales Podcast to number 3 on iTunes’ Top 100 Podcasts chart.

In three beautifully crafted, dramatic acts, James's little-known novel unravels the painfully complicated emotional bonds which exist within a group of friends and lovers connected by two neighboring homes as they fight publicly for preferment, reciprocation, and successful marriage....

Brought to you by Penguin. The definitive selection of short stories from one of our greatest living writers, curated by Penelope Lively herself Wry, compassionate, and glittering with wit, Penelope Lively's stories gets beneath the everyday to the beating heart of human experience. In intimate...

The original stories featuring A. J. Cronin's much-loved Scottish country doctor. Dr Finlay's Casebook brings together Adventures of a Black Bag and Dr Finlay of Tannochbrae, A. J. Cronin's two hugely popular collections. Set in and around the fictional Scottish town of Levenford and village of Tannochbrae during the interwar years, the stories found here are heartwarming, funny and touching, full of fascinating characters and unforgettable encounters.

In the bizarre world of Franz Kafka, salesmen turn into giant bugs, apes give lectures at college academies, and nightmares probe the mysteries of modern humanity’s unhappiness. More than any other modern writer in world literature, Kafka captures the loneliness and misery that fill the lives of 20th-century humanity.

Much of Richard Matheson's work has found its way into pop culture: The title story became a memorable episode of television's The Twilight Zone, and more recently, Will Smith starred in the blockbuster movie I Am Legend. Stephen King has declared Matheson to be one of his favorite writers. Find out why as you listen to the classic horror story of a man who peers out of his airplane window to see a gremlin destroying the wing.

One town. One nightmare per night. Welcome to Haunted Hollow, where each night a new nightmare unfolds. Abandoned mines filled with mysterious whispers, hotels that don’t want you to check out, bloody Valentine’s Day gifts that you’ll wish you never opened.

In this striking and bleak, yet luminous debut collection, Nathan Ballingrud, winner of the inaugural Shirley Jackson Award, uses the trappings of the Gothic and the uncanny to investigate a distinctly American landscape: The loneliest and darkest corners of contemporary life. Ballingrud’s stories are love stories. They’re also monster stories. Sometimes the monsters collected here are vampires or werewolves.

Two bloody brilliant short stories from No. 1 bestselling crime writer Stuart MacBride, featuring DS Logan McRae and his boss DI Steel STRAMASH: Something fishy is happening on the isle of Jura. DS Logan McRae gets a phone call from DI Steel ordering him to come to the island at once. One...