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Questions tagged [short-stories]

For about a fictional work too small to be called a [novel] or [novella] - usually less than 10-20 thousand words and no chapters. Use to either identify the media on a [story-identification] question or disambiguate works where the tag covers the short story and its form in other media.. If you are looking for a particular anthology of short stories, use the [anthology-book] tag instead.

6 votes
1 answer
47 views

Short story where a captive spirit entity was used to defeat other spirit-realm entities

There was a story in a collection by a Japanese writer 90% sure. A “spirit” entity was being held captive and used to defeat other spirit-realm entities. Maybe captor was descendant of Nazis or some ...
Pamela Richmond's user avatar
16 votes
1 answer
2k views

Short story: typical 'time machine and kill Hitler' tactic backfires when the world is made peaceful and thus totally unprepared for alien invasion

I've googled this a few times and can't find it. Short story, 3k-5k words I suppose, likely published in the 70s-90s. I read it in the 80s or 90s. Someone sees another human with a time machine ...
Vara La Fey's user avatar
9 votes
1 answer
582 views

Improved memory leads to writing success

I'm looking for a short story probably from the 1950s or 60s (I probably read it on Project Gutenberg). I think the person telling the story is a TV producer. He gets a script from a newcomer, which ...
Andrew's user avatar
  • 52.1k
-1 votes
0 answers
48 views

A male furry prevented a male student from jump down onto a train track, and ending up the boy also help the furry from depression [closed]

This is a short manga (one-shot) about a male furry (drawn in his 30s I think) helped a boy (a human). The furry took antidepressant pills until he ran out and decided to end his own life similar to ...
JustATree's user avatar
18 votes
1 answer
2k views

A short story where all humans deliberately evacuate Earth to allow its ecology to recover

I don't even remember when I read this short story, except it was very long ago, nor whether I read it in French or English. After my question on the last zoo on Earth was answered, Jason Patterson ...
Alfred's user avatar
  • 19.5k
9 votes
0 answers
109 views

What was the short story about a woman stealing aluminum items and putting in a seemingly bottomless shopping bag?

This story came from an anthology, I'm pretty sure. I read it about 30 years ago. A lady ... in somewhat of a trance ... gets caught shoplifting and all she is stealing is aluminum items. The stuff ...
Altdude's user avatar
  • 705
10 votes
1 answer
626 views

Very old horror short story about a dead man waking up

A dead man wakes up because his cemetery is being plowed up so they can build something there (apartments, houses, a parking lot?). I think the man kills the person running the bulldozer or backhoe? ...
Oliver W.'s user avatar
  • 109
15 votes
1 answer
2k views

The human population on Earth reached its maximum with the end of the last zoo

I read this short story at least 30 years ago. I suppose it was in a collection, since I rarely read magazines. I don't remember if I read it in English or in French, but it might have been a ...
Alfred's user avatar
  • 19.5k
9 votes
0 answers
110 views

A short fiction about a contraption not called a "time machine", driven by the "forty-year-old itch", but that did something in the past

I read this SF short fiction about 30 years ago. I'm pretty sure I read it in English, in a collection. I write "short fiction" because it was definitely not a novel. But much too long to ...
Alfred's user avatar
  • 19.5k
10 votes
1 answer
193 views

Looking For story - Artist Forced to be a Miner [duplicate]

I am looking for a story that I remember from ages ago. I want to point to a similar query here: Story about person assigned by test to be a miner when he wants to be an artist Mark, the original ...
Dave Hudson's user avatar
19 votes
3 answers
3k views

Identify the story about an author whose work-in-progress is completed by a computer [duplicate]

The protagonist's collected works having been fed in as a database, the machine projects the ending of his current work (I remember that it does a scene break with asterisks), at which point the ...
user avatar
1 vote
0 answers
41 views

Monster themed universe book series with a woman on the cover in blue with three mini-stories inside all connected to each other

It was a bit of a larger book, it had three separate stories with a connecting universe, this would have been volume 2 of that series. The cover had a woman on the front in black and white with blue ...
auggie's user avatar
  • 11
8 votes
1 answer
2k views

Short story about a traveler who receives shelter, but after some dialogue, the traveler turns out to be a ghost or maybe Odin

It was told from the point of the view of the ghost traveler at first. It felt like folklore, and I think there was some sort of test that was failed during the dialogue where the true nature of the ...
prak's user avatar
  • 81
18 votes
1 answer
2k views

Looking for the title of a short story for my students to read about a woman searching for the last man alive

Read this short story as a sophomore in 1983-1984. I am now a freshmen English teacher and want to include it into my class. The plot involves a woman searching for the last man alive. She thinks it ...
Philip's user avatar
  • 189
13 votes
0 answers
103 views

Short story with a house in a suburban neighborhood that was dangerous only at certain times of day

I remember the feeling of impending terror I got reading this story more than the storyline. I know it was in an anthology, whether sci-fi, fantasy or horror. There's nothing that I can remember in ...
Anna C's user avatar
  • 131

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