Great Literary Short Stories

READ BY PALLAS ERDRICH “Pulitzer winner Erdrich dives deep into the American psyche in this spectacular collection. . . . A staggering sense of empathy infuses the stories. With its range of voices and styles, this puts Erdrich’s powers on full display.” — Publishers Weekly (Starred...

Celeste Price is an eighth-grade English teacher in suburban Tampa. She's undeniably attractive. She drives a red Corvette with tinted windows. Her husband, Ford, is rich, square-jawed, and devoted to her. But Celeste's devotion lies elsewhere. She has a singular sexual...

A collection of the year’s best short stories, selected by celebrated bestselling author Lauren Groff, author of Matrix and The Vaster Wilds, and series editor Heidi Pitlor. “There have never been as many exquisitely built stories in existence than there are now,” proclaims guest editor...

“A diverse and glorious selection . . . a gift of imagination, wit, and wonder. The collection is filled with miniature masterpieces. . . . This must-have anthology is a treasure trove not to be missed.” —Library Journal (starred review) The prestigious annual story anthology, featuring...

County Sheriff Brody Hayes is in the midst of a missing person's call - for a five-month-old baby. Deep in the mountains of his hometown, Bowie, Wyoming, Brody's desperate search for the helpless child through a worsening snowstorm leads him on an even greater journey - one through his memories of his childhood, his brother, his son, and a life for himself that he thought was lost.

Eloise hasn't quite figured out how to move on after the death of her son, Eddie. She makes good money, buys a new apartment, learns the piano, engages in an office flirtation, but nothing seems to brighten her days quite like the occasional letter from one of her accounting clients, Ed B. When, after months of correspondence, Ed invites Eloise to his country home for a visit, she finds herself overwhelmed by the "Eddies" of her life - the one she lost, the one she writes to, and the one she's eternally searching for.

Viewed by many as the greatest science fiction writer on any planet, Philip K. Dick has written some of the most intriguing, original and thought-provoking fiction of our time. This collection includes stories that will make you lough, cringe...and stop and think. The Minority Report: a special...

A family is shaken to its core after the mysterious disappearance of a teenage boy in this eerie tale, a blend of literary fiction, psychological suspense, and supernatural horror from the author of A Head Full of Ghosts. A Head Full of Ghosts scared the living hell out of me, and I m pretty...

Before there was Raylan, there was Sisco... U.S. Marshal Karen Sisco is on the hunt for world-class gentleman felon Jack Foley in Out of Sight, New York Times bestselling author Elmore Leonard’s sexy thriller that moves from Miami to the Motor City. Based on Miami, Florida's Gold Coast, U.S...

Big Fish meets The Notebook in this emotionally evocative story about a man, a woman, and an alligator that is a moving tribute to love, from the New York Times bestselling author of the award-winning memoir Rocket Boys—the basis of the movie October Sky. Elsie Lavender and Homer Hickam (the...

From New York Times bestselling author James Rollins comes a stirring story of a soldier and his military war dog who are drawn into a dark mystery tracing back to World War II and a lost treasure tied to the bones of the dead. Off the blustery streets in the medieval heart of Budapest, Captain...

An astonishing collection of fifty of the greatest short stories ever written by some of literature's most highly acclaimed writers. 1. "Odour of Chrysanthemums" by D. H. Lawrence; 2. "Miss Harriet" by Guy de Maupassant; 3. "Twenty-six Men and a Girl" by Maxim Gorky; 4. "Hot Potatoes" by Arnold Bennett; 5. "Rats" by M. R. James; 6. "Zodomirsky’s Duel" by Alexandre Dumas; 7. "The Story of an Hour" by Kate Chopin; 8. "The Cask of Amontillado" by Edgar Allan Poe; 9. "The Encased Man" by Anton Chekhov.

Lovable serial killer Serge Storms is back and coming to the rescue of a Midwestern couple who aren't finding Florida quite as charming as he does in Riptide Ultra-Guide, the sixteenth installment in Tim Dorsey's bestselling series. When newly unemployed Patrick and Barbara McDougal decide a...

A variety of work from one of the most quotable of all twentieth-century authors—the inimitable Dorothy Parker Author, poet, screenwriter and outstanding member of the legendary Algonquin Round Table, Dorothy Parker was known for her quick wit, keen observations, and remarkable insight into...

From the bestselling author of Oracle Night and The Book of Illusions, an exhilarating, whirlwind tale of one man’s accidental redemption Nathan Glass has come to Brooklyn to die. Divorced, retired, estranged from his only daughter, the former life insurance salesman seeks only solitude and...

From New York Times bestselling author James Rollins comes a thrilling short story that delves deep beneath the city of Paris to a dark necropolis, where the only means for escape is…The Skeleton Key. Seichan is ripped out of the Sigma series for an adventure all her own—but can she survive?...

A man walks into a trendy Los Angeles restaurant -- a disgruntled ex-employee with an automatic weapon -- and seconds later, thirteen people are dead and thirty-two more have been wounded. It is a heinous act of mass slaughter that haunts Homicide Detective Peter Decker. But, though eyewitnesses...

Road Rage unites Richard Matheson's classic Duel and the contemporary work it inspired—two power-packed short stories by three of the genre's most acclaimed authors. Duel, an unforgettable tale about a driver menaced by a semi truck, was the source for Stephen Spielberg's acclaimed first film...

Trapped in the clutches of a Zombie apocalypse, the City of Chicago, the murder capital of the U.S., unleashes the ultimate weapon, capitalism, by paying $1,000 for every Re-Killed Zombie brought to city hall, ushering in "The Great Zombie Gold Rush". Zombies never have a chance in a world where people realize 75 Zombies pays off their student loans, 40 Zombies buys them a Tesla, 5 Zombies wipes out their Visa debt...

The Greatest Female Writers Classics Collection is a stunning compilation of twenty books by some of the most legendary women writers throughout history. From Mary Wollstonecraft’s groundbreaking call for women’s rights to Austen’s unparalleled witty romance; from Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s clever reckoning with female oppression to the stunning verse of Emily Dickinson: these writers put women’s literary genius on the map, and continue to resonate with audiences today.