Our Collection | The Short Story Project

An Account of the Decline of the Great Auk, According to One Who Saw It

UK

This rock was perhaps an island once, but now all that is left is a dowager’s hump breaching the ocean sheer on all but one side and on that side it slopes so that you can...

An Account of the Decline of the Great Auk, According to One Who Saw It

Jessie Greengrass

5 min

Mexico

My father’s job, like many in this city, is parasitic. A professional photographer, he would have starved to death—along with his entire family—if it hadn’t been for Doctor Ruellan’s generous proposal which, in addition to providing...

Ptosis

Guadalupe Nettel

9 min

USA

Ten candles in a fish stick tell you it’s Gully’s birthday. The birthday girl is the center of attention; she squints into the popping flash cubes. The black cat seems to know every smooth cat pose...

At the Gates of the Animal Kingdom

Amy Hempel

7 min

USA

It is very seldom that mere ordinary people like John and myself secure ancestral halls for the summer. A colonial mansion, a hereditary estate, I would say a haunted house, and reach the height of romantic...

The Yellow Wallpaper

Charlotte Perkins Gilman

24 min

Canada

I have a mermaid in a jar that Quilty bought me at a garage sale for twenty-five cents. The mermaid’s all, “I hate you I hate you I hate you,” but she’s in a jar, and...

Mermaid in the Jar

Sheila Heti

1 min

India

Tara was fat. Her husband made it clear that it didn’t do his image any good to have her waddling around, jiggling rolls of flesh. “I don’t waddle,” she said, hurt. “You do,” said Abhay and...

Chocolate

Manju Kapur

9 min

USA

She sat on a chair her hair cut short revealing her narrow neck. I wanted to cry and I wasn’t quite sure why exactly, that’s not true, I knew why. She gave me that intrusive thought that...

The Parts Where Your Pee Comes From

Emily Brout

6 min

USA

Traveling with a movie star Twice I have sat next to a famous man on an airplane. The first man was Jason Kidd, of the New Jersey Nets. I asked him why he didn’t fly...

Roy Spivey

Miranda July

11 min

Israel

The light has turned green and my son shows no sign that he wants to cross the street. He won’t budge from the traffic island, his eyes squinting against the lashing sun, his hands on his...

What You Looking at?

Tamar Merin

8 min

Argentina

My grandma didn’t like the rain, and when the sky darkened before the first few drops started to fall, she would take bottles to the backyard and half bury them in the earth, the bottlenecks facing...

The Little Angel’s Exhumation

Mariana Enríquez

10 min

USA

We have all these favorite shows coming on every evening. They say it will be exciting and it always is. They give us hints of what is to come and then it comes and it is...

Television

Lydia Davis

4 min

Argentina

Sitting on each side of the double bed, Jana Rietter and I watch over the wounded man. The yellow light from the kerosene lamp gives the room a ghostly atmosphere. Despite the large open windows, the...

The Foreman’s Wife

Selva Almada

12 min

UK

Going to the shore on the first morning of the vacation, the young English boy stopped at a turning of the path and looked down at a wild and rocky bay, and then over the crowded...

Through the Tunnel

Doris Lessing

15 min

Argentina

“Where are your parents’ clothes?” Marga asks. She crosses her arms and waits for me to answer. She knows that I don’t know and that I need her to ask another question. On the other side...

My Parents and My Children

Samanta Schweblin

6 min

Argentina

His hand brushes against mine in the darkness. His skin is hot and rough. Short hair, curls combed flat with some amateur pomade that shines even in the penumbra of the movie theatre. His smell insinuates...

Cohiba

Lucía Puenzo

16 min

Israel

She picked her nose with pleasant tranquility and gazed out the car window, watching the Sharon plains pass by. The radio stations toppled over each other as he searched for a decent one they could listen...

A Story of a Sad Vacation

Tamar Levit

9 min

Israel

The Scouts Camp When I was in 6th grade I went on a Scouts camp. Near Kibbutz Ginegar. In the Jezreel Valley. Three day camp. With a smoky smell in my hair and potatoes and canned...

The Last Time

Tamar Gelbetz

19 min

Spain

To Narciso, protector of shipwrecks The kids insisted on buying an inflatable float on our way to the beach. They chose the biggest one, a yellow circle with some rocks and a crab in relief....

The Islands

Marina Perezagua

9 min