American Short Fiction

Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author’s brain, their soul and heart. They can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that is difficult to achieve elsewhere. A new century dawns, one in which America would become pre-eminent as its industrial might and military power rose above all others. In literature too its authors tackled new forms and new ideas, they shied away from little, immersing themselves and their readers in the promise of a new Century.

John LeBrock is the greatest MMA fighter on Earth. He takes on all opponents and destroys them with ease. He is rich, good-looking, and oozes charisma. He wants for nothing, and life is good. John will soon find out that a seemingly perfect life can change in the blink of an eye. The MMA world champion will be given the opportunity to travel through a cosmic doorway that leads to the other side of the universe to a strange but beautiful world called Azura.

Spanning several decades, Ghassan Zeineddine’s debut collection examines the diverse range and complexities of the Arab-American community in Dearborn, Michigan. In ten tragicomic stories, Zeineddine explores themes of identity, generational conflicts, war trauma, migration, sexuality, queerness, home and belonging, and more.

I am THAT wife. I am Suzy Homemaker. I don't go anywhere; don't do much of anything. I stay home, I cook, I clean, I take care of my man. I am faithful to my man. I am a fraud. I'm not happy, least not completely. I am unfulfilled. I'm missing something. My husband is a great man but he doesn't get my motor running or my heart racing. And when was the last time he made my panties wet? Has he ever made my panties wet? Our sex life, when it happens, is vanilla at best. But I make it work, you know? Because that's what wives do. But then one day, I am accosted by a sexy, demanding, enticing ...

Louis L'Amour's world is built on those dramatic moments when men and women cast their fears, doubts, and pasts behind them and plunge into the unknown. Nowhere is that more evident than in this latest collection of stories set on the American frontier. These selections include "The Nester and the Piute"; "Big Man"; "Waltz Him Around Again"; "Shadow"; "Barney Takes a Hand"; "When a Texan Takes Over"; and "No Trouble for the Cactus Kid".

Windows to My Soul is a project that I have been working on for the past year and a half. Its my personal novel of poems and small quotes that I have written that has helped me through some tough times in my life. These are poems and quotes of love, anger, loneliness, happiness, sexuality, lust, power, and self-love.I hope that Windows to My Soul could and will reach out to you and help to ease some of your weariness and doubt about who you are, what you stand for, and your place in this world. Be you, be bold, be daring, be adventurous, but most importantly live as if you are in your last ...

Temptation can make even the strongest man bend to his knees and forsake everyone else for just one taste. When you combine brown sugar and honey with bourbon whiskey, you get something sweet, sticky, and unforgettable. You experience a flavor that will burst on your tongue and make you fall in love with the taste. She was forbidden. Untouchable. But that didn’t stop Parker's desire for her. He tried to fight the attraction, but something about Kandace kept pulling him closer. Until one day, he knew he could no longer walk away. Parker and Kandace are two people on a collision course. No ...

Headlined by New York Times best-seller Carl Weber, three authors bring listeners tales of power, greed, and ambition set in some of the country's roughest neighborhoods.

All the delightful and bizarre inhabitants of Wonderland are here: the White Rabbit and the Cheshire Cat, the hooka-smoking Caterpillar and the Mad Hatter, the March Hare and the Ugly Duchess... and, of course, Alice herself - growing alternately taller and smaller, attending demented tea parties and eccentric croquet games, and observing everything with clarity and rational amazement.

For Unique, life is good until her dope-dealing boyfriend, Took, is arrested and winds up in jail. Now she's broke as a joke, trying to put every petty hustle into play to chase hard times away from the door. With an empty refrigerator, a stack of bills piling up, a tenth-grade education, a big butt and a smile, it doesn't take long for her to learn to pull the wool over the eyes of any fool who's blinded by her good looks.

Queen Amira has suffered her husband's neglect and disdain since she came to be his wife. His attitude only softening the slightest bit with the birth of the two princes and heirs. With that, she has retained some of her power and love at court. But, she is still lonely and dreams of a true love of her own. Though she dare not dream it will ever come. King Deron loves women. His wife that was sent for him was barren for years. He thought he made a mistake in marrying her. He even took her lady as his mistress and had a child with her. A child that he flaunted under the queen's nose as he ...

Millie Two Bears lives alone in a trailer in the heart of the Blackfeet Nation in Montana. Since her husband went to jail, she’s been on the outs with the reservation. And it’s not just people she has to contend with. Now the prairie dogs are moving in on her patch of land. When a strange woman comes into Millie’s life, and Millie’s rodent war escalates, a fateful confrontation with vengeance, secrets, and survival is just underfoot.

Hot Ghetto Mess is and exciting read, about a set of friends from the hood and their relationships, money, love, lust, lies, drugs, and friendship. Come on this bumpy ride and find out what it means to have a friend who has your back no matter what, a true ride or die. Shanique and Amy are best friends who have seen more than their share of heartache. Shanique became a mother in high school with her first baby a son by Ricky, the school star football player. Ricky took to a life in the streets he dropped out of school and sold drugs on the corner with his best friend, J-Rock. Ten years ...

To see her is to want her. To touch her is to crave her. To love her is to give her everything you are. Jasmine has always been the strong one, the person everyone else depends on. She never thought to take care of herself first. But now it's time for her to give over control to someone else. For just one night, she needs to be taken care of in all the ways she deserves and she's going to love every moment. Ian knew this was his opportunity and there was no stopping him. He'd given Jasmine time to understand just how good they would be together, but she’s resisted their attraction. If he ...

Available as a value box amazon.com/dp/B07Y2B5HJG (copy and paste the link into your browser) Join Emily from Marshall Manor as she prepares for a wedding she doesn’t want to go through with and find out what happens when her entire life changes in a span of a week. It’s a crisp autumn evening and the weather in Chicago is not the only reason for the chill in the air. Promised to an older man when she was just a young girl, Emily has now come of age and is forced to face a long-delayed reality. Living in Marshall Manor has been an exceptional blessing for Emily and her fellow orphan ...

A grieving mother makes a spreadsheet of everyone she’s lost. Elsewhere, a professor develops a troubled intimacy with her hairdresser. And every year, a restless woman receives an email from a strange man twice her age and several states away. In Yiyun Li’s stories, people strive for an ordinary existence until doing so becomes unsustainable, until the surface cracks and the grand mysterious forces—death, violence, estrangement—come to light. And even everyday life is laden with meaning, studded with indelible details.

For more than fifty years, Wendell Berry has been telling us stories about Port William, a mythical town on the banks of the Kentucky River, populated over the years by a cast of unforgettable characters living in a single place over a long time. In A Place in Time, the stories dates range from 1864, when Rebecca Dawe finds herself in her own reflection at the end of the Civil War, to one from 1991 when Grover Gibbs's widow, Beulah, attends the auction as her home place is offered for sale.

The son of Maya Angelou, Guy Johnson is a critically acclaimed author and poet in his own right. Echoes of a Distant Summer is the story of Jackson St. Clair Tremain, a San Francisco civil servant who thought he had left his old life far behind. In 1982, Jackson is summoned to Mexico to confer with his dying grandfather, the brutal hustler King Tremain. When King dies, Jackson inherits $50 million - and the unwanted attentions of a malevolent bayou crime lord named Pug DuMont.

Roxie Stillwater’s father gets her a job with his oldest friend, the CEO of a software company, Griffin Graham. Roxie and Griff form an instant attraction and connection – but Griff is old enough to be her father. How can she have a love relationship with her boss? What will her father say? Roxie knows her dad will kill them both if he finds out. And yet more trouble arrives when Griff’s ex-wife decides she wants Griff for her own. Sneaking behind her father’s back makes Roxie very uncomfortable, but she’s helplessly falling in love with Griff. Nor does she dare tell her dad. How ...

A remarkable talent far ahead of her time, Diane Oliver died in 1966 at the age of 22, leaving behind these crisply told and often chilling tales that explore race and racism in 1950s and 60s America. In this first and only collection by a masterful storyteller finally taking her rightful place in the canon, Oliver’s insightful stories reverberate into the present day.