Short Story

"As a story grows shorter and shorter, all the fancy embroidery that length makes possible must go. In the short story, there can be no subplots; there is no time for philosophy; what description and character delineation there is must be accomplished with concision."

— Isaac Asimov in the introduction to 100 Great Science Fiction Short Short Stories

A common type of Prose Fiction and a good way for new authors to start out. Short stories are any stories that run up to 7,500 words in length, though some definitions place them as long as 20,000. Due to the discrepancy, short stories can overlap with the Novella and the Novelette but are usually categorized separately. Some people feel a story is only "short" if it can be read in one sitting, but "one sitting" is a very subjective definition due to differences in attention span - even among heavy readers.

Short stories are usually published in magazines and, more rarely, collections. There is a large Pulp Magazine industry that is much easier to break into than the book industry, which makes it a good place for a new writer to build up a resume. And a good place to stage Old Shame.

A lot of Fan Fic takes the form of Short Story.

Compare: Novel, Novella, and Novelette. An Anthology is a collection of short stories by different authors.

Pseudopod.org makes a job of publishing audio version of short stories.

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Examples:

• The twelfth book in the Alex Rider series, Secret Weapon, was a collection of short stories featuring the character. Several of them had previously been published in newspapers (but were revised to make them a bit more substantial), and a couple of them were totally new.
• Christopher Anvil
  • Behind the Sandrat Hoax
  • The Troublemaker
• "Amina" is a 1906 horror story written by Edward Lucas White.
• "Arcana Magi Zero" is a Web Original Short Story trilogy written by H-M Brown.
• "The Night Wire", a classic horror story by HF Arnold, who only wrote short stories. His other two stories are impossible to find.
• Jeffrey Archer
  • "The Car Park Attendant"
• Isaac Asimov
  • Dr Asimov edited the 1978 collection of 100 Great Science Fiction Short Short Stories. Yes, that's two "shorts" - not a single story is over five pages - most are two and a half. Sadly it's been out of print for a long time, but can still be found in used book distributors and stores.
  • All the Troubles of the World: A Science Fiction story which was also republished as a 32 page children's book.
  • "Author! Author! (1964)"
  • "Does a Bee Care?"
  • "Homo Sol"
  • "I'm in Marsport Without Hilda"
  • I, Robot is a Novel Anthology consisting of short stories and Novelettes set within a Framing Device.
  • "Liar! (1941)"
  • "Light Verse""
  • "The Message"
  • "Reason"
  • "Robbie"
  • "Time Pussy", as by George E. Dale
  • "Trends"
• Clive Barker's "Books Of Blood"
• Alfred Bester's "Adam And No Eve"
• James Blish's "There Shall Be No Darkness" was adapted into a movie, Amucis's The Beast Must Die.
• Jorge Luis Borges
  • "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius"
  • "The House of Asterion"
  • "The Library of Babel"
• Leigh Brackett's "Martian Quest" and "The Treasure Of Ptakuth"
• Ray Bradbury
  • "All Summer in a Day"
  • "Icarus Montgolfier Wright"
  • "A Sound of Thunder"
  • "There Will Come Soft Rains"
  • "The Veldt"
• Joseph Payne Brennan
  • "The Corpse of Charlie Rull"
  • "Slime (1953)"
• Max Brooks's "The Extinction Parade", which was later adapted into a comic book.
• Robert W. Chambers's The King in Yellow is a short story collection.
• Hal Clement's "Proof"
• "The Clone" by Theodore L Thomas, which he later expanded into a full-length novel with co-author Kate Wilhelm.
• The Codeless Code is a series of short stories.
• Wardon Allan Curtis’s The Monster Of Lake LaMetrie.
• "Coulrophobia"
• "Cruel Sisters" by Patricia C. Wrede
• "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" was originally a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald.
• "Daedalus", by Thomas Bulfinch.
• Roald Dahl
  • "Lamb to the Slaughter"
  • "The Landlady"
• "The Dandelion Girl" by Robert F. Young
• L. Sprague de Camp's "Some Curious Effects Of Time Travel"
• Lester del Rey's "The Wings Of Night"
• The Demigod Diaries, possess several stories much like its predecessor.
• The Demigod Files, possess several stories.
• "Despoilers of the Golden Empire" by Randall Garrett
• "The Devil and Daniel Webster" by Stephen Vincent Benét.
• Down in the Dark
• "The Dungeonmaster" by Sam Lipsyte
• "The Egg" by Andy Weir
• Harlan Ellison
  • "Final Trophy"
  • "I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream"
  • "Psycho At Mid Point"
  • ""Repent, Harlequin!" Said the Ticktockman"
  • "The Situation On Sapella Six"
  • "The Untouchable Adolescents", under the name Ellis Hart.
• "The Fable of the Dragon-Tyrant" by Nick Bostrom
• "Far Centaurus" by A.E. van Vogt
• William Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily"
• "Flowers for Algernon" by Daniel Keyes, later expanded into a novel of the same name.
• "The Fly" by George Langelaan
• "Flying With Santa"
• Gillian Flynn
  • The Grownup
• HB Fyfe's "Locked Out"
• "Games", by Katherine Mac Lean.
• GJ-bu is a strange case; it is marketed as a Light Novel but is more accurately a collection of short stories, all exactly 4 pages long.
• "Grandpa Gray" by Cass Hollander.
• DW Hall's "Werewolves Of War"
• Thomas Hardy's "The Son's Veto"
• "The Hare and the Pineapple" by Daniel Pinkwater
• Willard Hawkins's "The Dwindling Sphere"
• Nathaniel Hawthorne
  • "The Birthmark"
  • "Feathertop"
  • "The Great Carbuncle"
  • "The Maypole of Merry Mount"
  • "Rappaccini's Daughter"
  • "The White Old Maid"
• "The Happy Prince" by Oscar Wilde
• "Harrison Bergeron" by Kurt Vonnegut
• "He" by Alan Dean Foster
• Her Body and Other Parties, a collection of short stories by Carmen Maria Machado.
• HB Hickey's "Hilda"
• Robert E. Howard made his career on short fiction, with every Conan the Barbarian story save The Hour of the Dragon being a short story. He also wrote "The Shadow of the Vulture".
• L. Ron Hubbard
  • "The Slaver"
  • "Strain"
• Tanya Huff has penned a huge number of short stories, with "A Woman's Work" having a page here.
• "Instead of Three Wishes", a collection of short stories by Megan Whalen Turner
• Washington Irving
  • "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow"
  • "Rip Van Winkle"
  • "The Spectre Bridegroom"
• "The Lottery"
• Malcolm Jameson
  • "If You're Smart—", as by Colin Keith
  • "Pig Trap"
  • "Slackers Paradise"
• "Joey: A 'Mechanical Boy'"
• Raymond F Jones's "Test Of The Gods"
  • Joseph E Kelleam's "The Eagles Gather"
• Stephen King has several collections of short stories in his bibliography, and many films have been based on these stories. The early stories were usually published in men's magazines, and King has pointed out that the income often took care of necessities the family couldn't afford otherwise. Many fans express a preference for King's shorter work over his novels.
  • "1408"
  • "The Fifth Step"
  • "Jerusalem's Lot"
  • "The Langoliers"
  • "The Mangler"
  • "The Mist"
  • "The Monkey"
  • "Sometimes They Come Back"
  • "Trucks"
• And his short story collections:
  • Different Seasons
  • Everything's Eventual
  • Four Past Midnight
  • Full Dark, No Stars
  • If It Bleeds
  • Just After Sunset
  • Nightmares & Dreamscapes
  • Night Shift
  • Skeleton Crew
• Rudyard Kipling wrote a large number of short stories, including:
  • ".007"
  • The Just So Stories
• Norman L Knight
  • "Bombardment In Reverse"
  • "Short Circuited Probability"
• Myer Krulfeld
  • "Mission"
  • "Mudman"
• League of Legends: The writers for the series publish a lot of short stories that focus on the game's various Champions. You can track some of them in the recap page.
• Life in the Iron Mills by Rebecca Harding Davis
• Most of what H. P. Lovecraft wrote was in the form of a short story. These include:
  • "The Call of Cthulhu"
  • "The Cats of Ulthar"
  • "The Colour Out of Space"
  • "Cool Air"
  • "Dagon"
  • "The Dreams in the Witch House"
  • "The Dunwich Horror"
  • "The Festival"
  • "From Beyond"
  • "The Horror At Red Hook"
  • "In the Vault"
  • "In the Walls of Eryx"
  • "The Lurking Fear"
  • "The Music of Erich Zann"
  • "Old Bugs"
  • "The Outsider (1926)"
  • "Pickman's Model"
  • "The Rats in the Walls"
  • "Sweet Ermengarde"
  • "The Temple"
  • "The Terrible Old Man"
  • "The Thing on the Doorstep"
• "Lust Caution" was originally a short story by Eileen Chang
• Kelly Link's "Magic For Beginners"
• Winston K Marks's "Manic Perverse"
• P Schuyler Miller
  • "Bird Walk"
  • "In The Good Old Summertime"
• "A Model Life" by Kim Antieu.
• "The Monkey's Paw" by W. W. Jacobs.
• "The Moon Asks A Question" by E Jade Lomax
• "The Most Dangerous Game" by Richard Connell
• "Der Münchner im Himmel" by Ludwig Thoma
• Nobel prize winner Alice Munro works exclusively in the short story format.
• Haruki Murakami
  • after the quake (collection)
  • "Barn Burning"
• "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" by Ambrose Bierce.
• "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" by Ursula K. Le Guin.
• Lewis Padgett's "Project"
• Pareidolia and the Gilded Scar is a collection of short stories connected by a common theme of expressing different mental health states though surrealism (8 so far with the goal being to have one for each letter of the alphabet).
• Dorothy Parker's "Big Blonde"
• "Paying The Ferryman" by Joanna Berry
• Personalias's "Twitter Story Earth 5 AR" and "Who Says"
• AM Phillips's "A Chapter From The Beginning"
• Peter Phillips's "c/o Mr. Makepeace"
• Vic Phillips's "Emergency"
• Vic Phillips and Scott Roberts's "Fish Story"
• Edgar Allan Poe
  • "The Black Cat"
  • "The Cask of Amontillado"
  • "A Descent Into The Maelstrom"
  • "The Fall of the House of Usher"
  • "The Masque of the Red Death"
  • "The Pit and the Pendulum"
  • "The Tell-Tale Heart"
  • "William Wilson"
  • The C. Auguste Dupin stories
• Annie Proulx's "Brokeback Mountain" forms the basis of Brokeback Mountain.
• Alexander Pushkin's "The Queen of Spades"
• Ross Rocklynne's "Quietus" and "Unguh Made A Fire"
• "The Red Tower", by Thomas Ligotti
• "Romance with a Double Bass" by Anton Chekhov
• F Anton Reeds's "Forever Is Not So Long"
• Eric Frank Russell
  • "Exposure"
  • "Jay Score"
• Secret Santa 2004 by Steve Hockensmith.
• "Shabti"
• Most of the Sherlock Holmes oeuvre consists of short stories.
• Robert Silverberg
  • "Catch 'em All Alive!"
  • "Galactic Thrill Kids"
  • "The Happy Sleepers", under the name Calvin M. Knox
  • "The Insidious Invaders" under the name Eric Rodman
  • "Misfit"
  • "The Monsters Came By Night" under the name Charles D. Hammer
  • "The Seed Of Earth"
  • "World Of A Thousand Colors"
  • “Our Lady Of The Sauropods”
• "Sleep No More" by James H. Schmitz
• Henry Slesar's works:
  • "Desire Woman"
  • "The Dope", under the name O. H. Leslie
  • "Mr Loneliness"
• Evelyn E Smith
  • "The Weegil"
  • "Woman's Touch"
• Richard R Smith
  • "Get Rich Quick"
  • "The Old Timer"
  • "The Well Fed Birds"
• The Stories of John Cheever is a collection of these by (who else?) John Cheever.
• Kevin Strange's "Holey Matrimony"
• Theodore Sturgeon's "Two Percent Inspiration"
• "Talma Gordon"
• "The Tamarisk Hunter"
• "The Thing About Cassandra" is a short story by Neil Gaiman featured in the collection Trigger Warning.
• The Thirteen Problems, a short story collection by Agatha Christie featuring Miss Marple
• "The Thought-Monster" by Amelia Reynolds Long, which was adapted into the classic sci-fi/horror film Fiend Without a Face.
• Most of the Transformers: Timelines fiction consists of short stories, and issues of The Transformers (Marvel) and The Transformers: Last Stand of the Wreckers had short stories published in them occasionally.
• "A Tropical Horror" by William Hope Hodgson
• Harl Vincent's "High Frequency War"
• A.E. van Vogt's "Not The First"
• Harry Walton
  • "The Scrambler"
  • "Subcruiser"
• Roby Wentz's "A Nose For News"
• Robert Westall wrote a great deal of short fiction; notably "Break of Dark" and the best of anthologies Demons and Shadows and Shades of Darkness.
• "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" by Joyce Carol Oates.
• "The White People" by Athur Machen.
• Oscar Wilde
  • "The Canterville Ghost"
  • "The Happy Prince"
  • "The Selfish Giant"
• "When This World Is All On Fire" by William Sanders.
• "Window" by Bob Leman.
• "Worrywart" by Clifford Simak.
• Donald A Wollheim's "The Embassy", as by Martin Pearson
• You Know You Want This is the debut short story collection by Kristen Roupenian
• Verge: Stories by Lidia Yuknavitch is a collection of short fiction.
• "An Invitation From Thanatos"
• The La Fuerza Series.

• Quite a few short stories vie for "shortest story ever":
  • Margaret Atwood:
    "Longed for him. Got him. Shit".
  • Hemingway's bet-winning short story, though it's undetermined if Hemingway actually wrote this story.
    "For sale: baby shoes, never worn."
  • "Science Fiction for Telepaths" by E. Michael Blake:
    "Aw, you know what I mean."
  • "Sign at the End of the Universe" by Duane Ackerson:
    "˙dn puǝ sıɥʇ"
  • Spanish Literature has Augusto Monterroso with his short story "El dinosaurio:" ^note "The dinosaur"
    "Cuando despertó, el dinosaurio todavía estaba allí".^note "When he awoke, the dinosaur was still there".
  • "Cosmic Report Card: Earth" by Forrest J. Ackerman:
    "F"

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