Short Story / Editors’ Picks Filter
  1. The City Born Great

    “The City Born Great” is a short story from Hugo Award winner N.K. Jemisin: “I live the city. It thrives and it is mine. I am its worthy avatar, and together? We will never be afraid again.”
    Fiction
    Tor.com
    by N.K. Jemisin
  2. Perseids

    “Those who are unable to believe in the old ways go south, where life loses this rawness.” In the Tin House archives, writer Emma Cline publishes flash fiction, “Perseids,” set in Tasiilaq, Greenland.
    Fiction
    Perseids
    by Emma Cline
  3. Penguin Roald Dahl

    On this Penguin site for the bestselling author, browse and sample new collections of Dahl’s short stories for adults: tales of intrigue, desire, greed, and fear. Discover Roald Dahl as you’ve never read him before.
    Authors
  4. Place for the Stolen

    “Like that one guy said: Good writers borrow, great writers steal. Welcome to the place where all things have been lifted, looted, and otherwise pilfered.” Daily short fiction, set with creative type and color, from Jenny Maloney.
    Fiction
  5. Hawai`i Pacific Review

    Hawai`i Pacific Review is a literary journal based in Honolulu’s Hawai`i Pacific University, and has been publishing quality poetry, fiction, and essays since 1987.
    Essay
  6. The Perfect Stranger

    “That was that, a beautiful boy passing in and out of my consciousness. A rare solar event, spectacular to witness but never to be glimpsed again in this lifetime.” When you never actually meet, a perfect stranger always remains perfect.
    Fiction
    Brownian Emotion
    by Derecho
  7. Wild Ink

    On his blog, West Yorkshire-based novelist Richard Smyth publishes short stories and excerpts. His novels include Wild Ink, published in 2014, and his newest novel, Quays, which seeks backers through Unbound, the London-based crowdfunding publisher.
    Authors
  8. Word Shamble

    Lynn’s short and flash fiction spans a variety of genres and topics but is always warm, richly detailed, and deeply human.
    Fiction
  9. The Wonder by Emma Donoghue

    The Wonder is a short story by Emma Donoghue — author of Room — which was shortlisted for the 2010 Man Booker Prize.

    Fiction
    The Wonder is a short story by Emma Donoghue -- author of Room -- which was shortlisted for the 2010 Man Booker Prize.
    Granta Magazine
    by Emma Donoghue
  10. Role Play

    “Your eyelids dissolve. There’s a tingling as they go.” Naomi Frisby’s short story, “Role Play,” is shortlisted for the The White Review Short Story Prize 2016.
    Fiction
    "Your eyelids dissolve. There’s a tingling as they go." Naomi Frisby's short story, "Role Play," is shortlisted for the The White Review Short Story Prize 2016.
    The White Review
    by Naomi Frisby
  11. Visual Verse: A Journal of Art, Poetry, Fiction, and Nonfiction

    Each month, Visual Verse supplies a single image and invites authors to submit pieces of 50 to 500 words inspired by it. The catch? The piece must be written in one hour or less.
    Fiction
    Each month, Visual Verse supplies a single image and invites authors to submit pieces of 50 to 500 words inspired by it. The catch? The piece must be written in one hour or less.
  12. What I Am Without: A Sonnet

    A lonely computer muses on love and existence: “You might think that, when Linus leaves the room to answer a knock at the door or to pour another cup of coffee, we, the machines, talk amongst ourselves. You might imagine that we spring into life and caper, laughing, about the room, as inanimate objects do in a cartoon.”
    Fiction
    A lonely computer muses on love and existence: "You might think that, when Linus leaves the room to answer a knock at the door or to pour another cup of coffee, we, the machines, talk amongst ourselves. You might imagine that we spring into life and caper, laughing, about the room, as inanimate objects do in a cartoon."
    Wild Ink
    by Richard Smyth
  13. What We Do for the Dead

    “These things we do for the dead — all this witnessing of objects and memory, all the listening we do for clues as to who our loved ones really were — we would have done for them when they were living, if allowed.” A piece of flash fiction about a woman in an attic, among the belongings of her dead mother.
    Fiction
    "These things we do for the dead -- all this witnessing of objects and memory, all the listening we do for clues as to who our loved ones really were -- we would have done for them when they were living, if allowed." A piece of flash fiction about a woman in an attic, among the belongings of her dead mother.
    Pigspittle Ohio
    by Meg
  14. Crying Just Like Anybody

    “But here the Martian was crying just like anybody. He turned away from the wall; he turned to face me.” A short story from UK-based novelist and journalist Richard Smyth.
    Fiction
    "But here the Martian was crying just like anybody. He turned away from the wall; he turned to face me." A short story from UK-based novelist and journalist Richard Smyth.
    Wild Ink
    by Richard Smyth
  15. Women in Salt

    “What would’ve happened if the girl who was a story who was a myth who was a fiction who was a woman who emerged from the salt, pristine and broken because all of you had become a terrible, trembling blue ruin?” A piece of fiction from a story collection by Felicia Sullivan at love.life.eat.
    Fiction
    "What would’ve happened if the girl who was a story who was a myth who was a fiction who was a woman who emerged from the salt, pristine and broken because all of you had become a terrible, trembling blue ruin?" A piece of fiction from a story collection by Felicia Sullivan at love.life.eat.
    love.life.eat
    by Felicia Sullivan