Short Stories
 

As I get older I find myself reading shorter novels and collections of short stories instead of trying to motor through a 600 page book. I just finished Stephen King's Bag of Bones and really loved it and will definitely be going to find more of his stuff. I've also read a few of Vonnegut's collections and they were fantastic too. Any reccomended books or authors I can keep an eye out for? Anything semi Vonnegut/King would be great but I'm open to just about anything that won't put me to sleep.

Check out the Bachman Books.

As a lazy intellectual, short stories make up some of my favourite works. Anything by Joyce Carol Oates or Flannery O'Connor is worth your time. A few other favourites

The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
The Bees by Dan Chaon
The Hunger Artist by Franz Kafka
Turn of the Screw by Henry James (more of a novella but whatever)
1408 by Stephen "Absolute Hack" King


And for fun I'd like to redisclose that Ray Bradbury is an on-the-nose technophobe with a boring writing style.

^^ thanks I'll definitely be getting some of those if they have copies. It's a second hand bookstore so it can be hit or miss but they have alot.

PDFs of all of them except for the Turn of the Screw (I only assume it's not up because of the length) can be found pretty easily online if you're okay with that mode of reading.

I prefer physical copies but I can dig it.

Ask Ori for some of his stuff. 100% serious. Guy's gonna be huge some day.

Etgar Keret's collections seem just what you're looking for. I dig his flash fiction style, the Vonnegut-esque breaking of the fourth wall, and the melancholic whimsy in each story. Highly recommend The Bus Driver Who Thought He Was God, The Nimrod Flipout, and The Girl On the Fridge

Edit: he's best known for his story Kneller's Happy Campers which was adapted into the film Wristcutters: A Love Story

I guess Dostoevsky's out. :laughing:


You probably have read them but Kafka and Edgar Allan Poe are great short storytellers. I also picked up Vonnegut's God Bless You Dr. Kevorkian. That book made me smile. Also, if you like sardonic humor, check out the Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce.