Short Stories

'Few, it seems to me, have driven their words with such passion' Guardian

How our earliest experiences can shape our destiny is the theme that runs like a thread of revelation through these extraordinary stories. They explore the…

Where sex is a currency, or a weapon.

Where power ends in corruption, or violence.

Where the worst thing to happen is for the best, sometimes.
Where love is power, or something like that.

In these nine blistering stories cavort…

This excellent collection of Donald Barthelme's literary output during the 1960s and 1970s covers the period when the writer came to prominence--producing the stories, satires, parodies, and other formal experiments that altered…

Italo Calvino's enchanting stories about the evolution of the universe, with characters that are fashioned from mathematical formulae and cellular structures, The Complete Cosmicomics is translated by Martin McLaughlin, Tim Parks…

This powerful collection of stories, set in the mid-West among the lonely men and women who drink, fish and play cards to ease the passing of time, was the first by Raymond Carver to be published in the UK. With its spare,…

John Cheever’s Collected Stories explores the delicate psychological frameworks of 20th century suburbia.

WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY HANIF KUREISHI

This outstanding collection by Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist John Cheever shows…

The Awakening and Selected Stories is Kate Chopin's groundbreaking depiction of a woman who dares to defy the expectations of society in the pursuit of her desire, edited with an introduction by Sandra M. Gilbert in Penguin…

In Kiss Kiss you will find eleven devious, shocking stories from the master of the unpredictable, Roald Dahl.

What could go wrong when a wife pawns the mink coat that her lover gave her as a parting gift? What happens when a…

Collecting five stories of suspense, mystery and slow, creeping horror, Daphne Du Maurier's Don't Look Now and Other Stories includes an introduction by Susan Hill, author of The Woman in Black, in Penguin Modern Classics.

John…

"Forget all your fears now. Have a fling this night"'

Untrustworthy, charming Fussy Joe spins stories and breaks hearts in this rollicking story set in the 'sensational city' of 1960s Lagos.

Penguin Modern: fifty new books…

This generous collection of fifty-two stories selected from across her prolific career by the author, is preceded by a preface in which she discusses the sources of her art.

With irony and an unfailing eye for the telling detail,…

'Strangely enough, I mistook it for a gentleman at first. Fortunately I had my spectacles with me so I could see it was really a nose.'

With this pair of absurd, comic stories Gogol indulges his imagination and delights…

From Ernest Hemingway's Preface: 'There are many kinds of stories in this book. I hope you will find some that you like- In going where you have to go, and doing what you have to do, and seeing what you have to see, you dull and…

This is the definitive collection of Shirley Jackson's short stories, including 'The Lottery' - one of the most terrifying and iconic stories of the twentieth century, and an influence on writers such as Neil Gaiman and Stephen…

Revisit the haunting debut short story collection from the Booker-shortlisted author of Everything Under.

'Full of unabashedly, refreshingly angry women... In a year that made me furious, Daisy Johnson’s Fen was a howl I…