Short Stories

Illustrator and writer's Carolyn Marie Castagna's first shared short story. A small icicle hanging from a roof peers inside a window at a small reading room, and learns about magical human qualities, and the importance of the one most special human feeling.

Once upon a time . . . happily ever after turned out differently than expected. In this new, feminist, queer fairy-tale collection, you’ll find the princesses, mermaids, knights, barmaids, children, and wise old women who have been forced to sit on the sidelines in classic stories taking center stage. A gorgeous all-new collection in graphic novel format from a Stonewall Honor-winning author and artist. What if the giant who abducted you was actually thoughtful and kind? What if you didn’t want to marry your handsome, popular, but cold-inside suitor? What if your one true love has all the responsibilities that come with running a kingdom? Award-winning author Melanie Gillman’s phenomenal colored-pencil art creates another "ever after" for the characters who are most worthy of it.

"The Mark on the Wall" is the first published story by Virginia Woolf. It was published in 1917 as part of the first collection of short stories written by Virginia Woolf and her husband, Leonard Woolf, called Two Stories. It was later published in New York in 1921 as part of another collection entitled Monday or Tuesday. The Mark on the Wall is written in the first person, as a "stream of consciousness" monologue. The narrator notices a mark on the wall, and muses on the workings of the mind. Themes of religion, self-reflection, nature, and uncertainty are explored. The narrator reminisces about the development of thought patterns, beginning in childhood.

Araby is a short story by the Irish writer James Joyce, published in the 1914 collection Dubliners. Through first-person narration, the reader is immersed at the start of the story in the drab life that people live on North Richmond Street, which seems to be illuminated only by the verve and imagination of the children who, despite the growing darkness that comes during the winter months, insist on playing "until [their] bodies glowed." Even though the conditions of this neighborhood leave much to be desired, the children’s play is infused with their almost magical way of perceiving the world, which the narrator dutifully conveys to the reader. James Joyce (1882-1941) was an Irish novelist, noted for his experimental use of language in such works as Ulysses (1922) and Finnegans Wake (1939). Joyce's technical innovations in the art of the novel include an extensive use of interior monologue; he used a complex network of symbolic parallels drawn from the mythology, history, and literature, and created a unique language of invented words, puns, and allusions.

Emily is a member of a family in the antebellum Southern aristocracy; after the Civil War, the family has fallen on hard times.

‘The Horse Dealer's Daughter’ was written by D H Lawrence in 1922. It was the forty-third of his sixty-seven short stories, all of which will be published individually in ebook format by the Blackthorn Press. The story, gripping in its content, encompasses the terror of death and disgrace, redeemed by passion and sexuality. The question Lawrence leaves open is whether the doctor's avowal of love is genuine or driven by the awakening of his own sexuality and pity for the woman.

Acclaimed by critics, beloved by readers of all ages, taught everywhere from inner-city grade schools to universities across the country, and translated all over the world, The House on Mango Street is the remarkable story of Esperanza Cordero. Told in a series of vignettes – sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes deeply joyous–it is the story of a young Latina girl growing up in Chicago, inventing for herself who and what she will become. Few other books in our time have touched so many readers.