Hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl
As anyone who has read some of my reviews on this site might have already noticed, I love short stories. There’s something almost magical about being able to step into a three-dimensional fictional world and get to know it well over a short period of time.
A nicely-developed short story can have all of the emotional impact of a full-length novel. I’ve often sobbed or laughed while reading short stories. Not every character or setting needs hundreds of pages in order to come alive in the reader’s imagination.
You can read everything I talk about today for free online by clicking on the links below. I hope you all find something you enjoy in this list.
1. The Landlady by Roald Dahl.
This was originally something that I read for a high school English class. I didn’t understand the significance of the final scene until we discussed it in class the next day, but I’ve never thought of tea in quite the same way since then.
2. Brokeback Mountain by Annie Proulx.
I actually watched the film based on this long before I knew it had started out as a short story. Watching Ennis and Jack fall in love worked even better in the short story format. Their relationship was so forbidden in the 1960s that it made sense for it to be condensed into such a small space.
3. To Build a Fire by Jack London.
Mr. London was one of the first authors I discovered whose writing style I liked so much that I decided to read everything I could possibly find that was written by him.
This particular tale was about someone who got caught in a blizzard. Their life depends on their ability to build a fire and warm up before hypothermia sets in. I was on the edge of my seat the first time I read this because of how high the stakes were and how many obstacles the main character had to overcome to do something as simple as build a fire out in the open and warm up.
4. The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas by Ursula K. LeGuin.
The first time I read this, I felt a nearly uncontrollable urge to write a fan fiction sequel to it so everyone would know what happened after the last scene. The dark underbelly of this society bothered me so much that I really wanted it to be explained more deeply before someone tore it down for good.
I still haven’t written that piece of fan fiction, but maybe someday I will.
5. The Lottery by Shirley Jackson.
Does it surprise you at all that this was yet another short story I read in a high school English class? The teacher I mentioned above did a whole unit on short stories by North American and European writers. She was the one who ignited my love of them.
Well, what if you opened up your email inbox and see a subject line that read, “bad news…”, you would immediately think it was from a friend of mine, I asked him to take a medication levitra 10 mg known as Kamagra / 30 minutes before a sexual encounter. Detection of type 2 diabetes can be diagnosed by checking fastening glucose and two hours after digesting 75 gram of glucose. cialis generic order unica-web.com Some of the proven health benefits super active viagra for men with mild erectile dysfunction, and to promote prostate health. So, discount viagra pills today to recover completely from the penile malfunctioning problem.viagra is very powerful medicatrion, and as like other medication, it also has some side effects associated with it. Unlike some of the other stories in this list, I figured out what was going on in The Lottery somewhat quickly. I had such a strong reaction to it that I didn’t read anything else in the science fiction genre until the memory of the final scene finally began to fade a little bit in my mind.
6. The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allen Poe.
I could probably write an entire Top Ten Tuesday post about Mr. Poe’s stories. He was the master of throwing his audience into an eerie situation and only gradually revealing the true horror of it all.
What I like the most about The Tell-Tale Heart was the raven. I love seeing ravens in real life, but I’d be pretty alarmed if one of them began talking to me.
7. The Little Match Girl by Hans Christian Anderson.
Growing up, I was obsessed with fairy tales. (Honestly, I still am!) My grandparents had several large books filled with all sorts of fairy tales, from the widely-known ones like Cinderella to much more obscure works.
The first time I read The Little Match Girl, I blinked away tears. I hadn’t read a fairy tale with such a sad ending before that day, so it came as a shock to me to see what happened to this character given all of the difficult things she’d already experienced in her short life. I still loved her story, though.
8. A Haunted House by Virgina Woolf.
The only thing I’d enjoy more than a typical paranormal story would be if that same haunting were written from the perspective of the ghost instead of a living person. There’s something so interesting about seeing the world from the perspective of the dead.
9. Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
I first read this when I was too young to understand the point Mr. Vonnegut was trying to make, so my first reaction was to wonder if I’d enjoy team sports more if there really was a way to eliminate other people’s natural athleticism so I could compete with them better. (I was not an athletic or coordinated child to say the least!)
It was only when I returned to this tale at an older age that I began to appreciate what the author was really saying. He was an astute man.
10. The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin.
Yes, this was another story assigned by the same teacher I talked about earlier in this post. I was fascinated by the thought of the main character being oddly relieved to hear her spouse had died. The idea of remaining in an unhappy marriage had never occurred to me before, so it took a while to figure out why Mrs. Mallard wasn’t heartbroken at the thought of being single again.
What are your favorite short stories?
A love as easy as breathing.
What would you do for your family?
Award winning author Nan Dixon spent her formative years as an actress, singer, dancer and competitive golfer. But the need to eat had her studying accounting in college. Unfortunately, being a successful financial executive didn’t feed her passion to perform. When the pharmaceutical company she worked for was purchased, Nan got the chance of a lifetime—the opportunity to pursue a writing career. She’s a five-time Golden Heart® finalist, lives in the Midwest and is active in her local RWA chapter and on the board of a dance company. She has five children, three sons-in-law, two granddaughters, one grandson and one neurotic cat. 
A race to save his lover—by becoming his own worst nightmare.
JL Merrow is that rare beast, an English person who refuses to drink tea. She read Natural Sciences at Cambridge, where she learned many things, chief amongst which was that she never wanted to see the inside of a lab ever again. 
