Short Stories

Reading Time: 7 minutesMina struggles with her gift of the Valiance dance. Her life gets a moment of quiet when her heart is touched by a lonely child. It is not what gifts we are given, but how we choose to use them.

Reading Time: 6 minutesAfter the earth has been radiated by nuclear war, survivors move below the surface and build a new society underground, only going to the surface once a year to visit the one last tree that still remains.

Reading Time: 4 minutesWhen your species is prey, you can never let your guard down. Even when you’re walking home.

Reading Time: 12 minutesA sleepy town in rural Alabama holds many secrets, not all of them worth digging up.

Reading Time: 7 minutesThe lines separating life, death, and laundry are thinner than you think.

Reading Time: 15 minutesWhen the unsuspecting pharmacologist bumps into her former flame in a South London pub, she learns that the very future of the planet may depend on the outcome of her conversation with the drunken professor.

Reading Time: 4 minutesIn a time when death is no longer final, how many ghosts walk among us?

Reading Time: 4 minutesMarilia has a beast to conquer. It may not have scales or sharp teeth, but it’s just as terrifying all the same. Will this strange metal machine consume her, or will she find a glimmer of hope to hold onto?

Reading Time: 9 minutesThe ghost of Edgar Allan Poe gets more than he bargained for.

Reading Time: 30 minutesA young woman purchases a set of beads from an old crone and the adventure of her life begins.

Reading Time: 10 minutesA lonely alien seeks friendship and fulfillment at an Alaska farmers market.

Reading Time: 10 minutesWhen Dominic saved his sister from a monster, he didn’t anticipate he would become one too. Now, he might be the most dangerous creature in the woods and if he doesn’t get help, he could hurt the people he loves.

Reading Time: 16 minutesWhen Olivia gets bored in class and doodles a stickman on her arm, she has no idea what she’s in for. When it is brought to life by a rival girl, everything changes.

Reading Time: 6 minutesThe New Gods were cast out two hundred and sixty-two years ago when humanity enacted the Great Blackout. We had already lost almost everything. Rumors have persisted ever since that they would find a way to return and finish what they started.

Reading Time: 7 minutesSometimes it’s the little things that come back to bite us.

Reading Time: 5 minutesIf you had the power to take down your opponents on the soccer field simply by touching them, would you?

Reading Time: 14 minutesAlone on a foggy day, among the ruins of an old New England town, a runner has an encounter with the ghost of a small child asking for help.

Reading Time: 12 minutesAn epistolary account of alien discovery on Earth over time.

Reading Time: 12 minutesFlea markets have gizmos, thingamajigs and other useful things.

Reading Time: 24 minutesCrossing into a parallel universe is traumatic, but being a good father and learning to let go requires treatment. Originally appeared in Interzone, 2014.

Reading Time: 17 minutesLate one night, an orphan sees a strange monster, a man, patiently waiting just outside the minister’s home.

Reading Time: 4 minutesOnce there was a giant robot. Inside the giant robot was a boy.

Reading Time: 9 minutesIn the land of the blind, the one-eyed man can help.

Reading Time: 5 minutesAfter literally sucking the life out of her abusive husband, a ghost wife tells her story of ruin and retribution.

Reading Time: 10 minutesWhat happens when your superhero powers aren’t so super anymore?

Reading Time: 16 minutesSoledad and her brother arrive at Marytown, a post-apocalyptic stronghold where normal people can live in relative safety–as long as they have a skill to offer the community. The anachronistically well-groomed Queen Mary sees potential in Soledad, introducing both comfort and danger to the siblings’ lives.

Reading Time: 11 minutesDebts are called in high in the hills in this bronze-age fantasy.

Reading Time: 24 minutesKarin heads up a group of disparate and interesting characters exploring tunnels lined with luminous rock that Earth needs. Good suspense with a satisfactorily scientific denouement and love thrown in. What more could you ask?

Reading Time: 23 minutesFirst came the time-storm, which erased half the population. Then came the Dinosaur Apocalypse …

Reading Time: 17 minutesThe lands were barren, the animals were dead and their bellies were rumbling. In one last attempt, they prayed for salvation, but something else answered them…

Reading Time: 27 minutesA psychic makes the mistake of falling in love with the person she is supposed to protect from assassination.

Reading Time: 10 minutes“Don’t go in the forest.” “Don’t open your eyes after sunset.” “Don’t look behind that door in the cellar.” Being forbidden from doing something is a common theme in fairy tales, but why? What kind of power does the person doing the forbidding have over the one being forbidden?

Reading Time: 8 minutesAt a cliff’s edge, an unnamed protagonist has a conversation with their dead mother.

Reading Time: 8 minutesPerhaps we control our own destiny. Perhaps, a kind and gentle deity looks over us from on high, and provides just the right amount of guidance, love and support. Then again, probably not. Perhaps, just perhaps, our destinies and our beliefs are intertwined in some strange manner.

Reading Time: 7 minutesAfter being arrested for stealing a bike, Hasan faces a trial led by a thorough, emotionless machine.

Reading Time: 6 minutesWhen Carter’s whole life has been defined through science and facts, what will he do when those facts suddenly turn his heart—and mind—against all logic?

Reading Time: 7 minutesStarbonder Elidoh never imagined anything would threaten her connection with the Unison. She was wrong.

Reading Time: 17 minutesA dark, speculative story in the vein of Orwell and Vonnegut.

Reading Time: 14 minutesAnna retires to Northwick, with dreams of living out her remaining years in the comfort of a charming New England town. Things aren’t as peaceful as she had hoped, though, as she discovers the islanders’ bizarre secret.

Reading Time: 14 minutesIn an alternate Cold War, America is armed with a fleet of manned nuclear ICBMs. But all is not well, and every night, the rocket man dreams of Moscow . . .