4 Short Stories You Need to Read Today

With 2014 drawing to a close, as I do every year, I'm feeling the distinct desire to ingest media. Most specifically, literature and television. I know, TV's going to rot my brain. Doesn't mean I don't partake of it occasionally, particularly when I'm too tired to properly absorb literature. After all, it would just be a waste to let the written word slide over me, rather than penetrate deep.

But I'm getting way off topic.

Lots of lists float around this time of year: 10 Things to Make 2015 the Best Year Ever, 46 Shows to Watch Before Netflix Rends Them From Their List Next Year, 268 Things You Wish You'd Found out About Early Enough to do Them Before the New Year.

I'm hoping to provide something a little more doable. So I give you my end of the year list: 4 Short Stories You Need to Read Today.

Or, you know, whenever you have the time.

No pressure.

This list spans genre, length, subject, time periods, complexity. The only thing I really tried to do was make sure that, if I included it, it was free to read online. Click the story title in the list and it'll take you right to it. These aren't in any order, other than which story weighed on my mind the most at that exact moment.

So, let us begin.

1: Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius by Jorge Luis Borges

Borges is arguably the very first writer ever identified with the genre of magical realism. And in a lot of ways, Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius is most certainly magic realism. But in a lot of ways, it's more. Or less. Or just something else. The 'story' is sort of it's own thing. The closest examples I can give you aren't all that close. It reminds me of Flatland, in the way that the main body of the 'story' is a description of the culture of Tlön. It reminds of me of the early 90's PC game Myst, in the way that the described and heavily detailed world of Tlön becomes it's own sort of reality. And it reminds me of the Codex Seraphinianus… which makes perfect sense, since the Codex was inspired by the short story. But as fair warning, you'll want to make sure you have ample time to read it. It's only about 5,000 words, but you'll likely need to stop at several points to look up certain philosophical theorems, or translate the sprinklings of German and Latin throughout. And then you'll need time to mull through the story after you read it. It's very dense and a very mentally tiring read. But well worth the effort.

2: The Lady, or The Tiger? By Frank R. Stockton

Loved by critics, hated by high school students. Which is so often how it goes. But if they could just look past the necessity of their teenage rebellion, they could see how wonderfully tragic The Lady, or The Tiger? is. A princess loves a man too low for her status. When the king finds out, he puts the man to the usual trial for crimes he's put his royal interest in: he must choose between two doors. One hides a woman of appropriate social standing, the other a nearly starved tiger. He doesn't know which door hides which, of course. If he chooses the door with the tiger, it eats him, of course. If he chooses the woman, she doesn't eat him, but he is required to marry her on the spot. The beauty of this story is that the princess knows which door has the tiger, and which door has the woman. But the woman is an attendant the princess despises. As to the fate of the man, it's never revealed.

3: Berenice by Edgar Allan Poe

I often bring up Berenice as one of my favorite short stories, or among the best of Poe, or good short stories you haven't heard of. And for good reason. More than really any story I've ever read, Berenice is just straight-up creepy. And I know that Poe is known for horror, but most of his stories never really got to me. Berenice did. The obsession. The strange catatonic episodes. The memory loss. It all builds to the climax, one of the eeriest scenes ever penned in the English language, in my opinion. Thirty-two little ivory things scattered on the floor.

4: For Sale: Baby Shoes, Never Worn by Ernest Hemingway

Well, possibly by Ernest Hemingway. Technically, the jury is still out on the actual author, but it's widely accepted/purported that it was penned by Hemingway. I don't have a link, because the title is also the full text of the piece. Widely considered the epitome of flash fiction, and for good reason. It is everything flash is supposed to be: tiny, powerful, memorable. And it's among the tiniest, most powerful, and most memorable out there. Just think about it for a moment, think about what it must mean. Or what it might mean. And whether it's really Hemingway or not, the 'Six Word Story' has taken hold of writers everywhere, both as an exciting medium and as a challenge.

Of course, this isn't in any way a comprehensive list. But these are stories you will find jumping to my tongue when someone needs a recommendation.

What are your must read shorts?

Voss

Flash Fiction: Face

She stretched from her sleep, brushing the cold satin canopy of her bed—a gift from a former lover. It took effort to pull herself from the depths of the silken sheets and pillows, but there was no hurry for her to go anywhere—no one would dare rush her. When she finally managed to get on her feet, the woman walked no more than a yard from her bedside and stopped. The mirror. There it stood behind the thick curtain, half a century of dust coating the folds of the fabric. A tear streaked down her face, following the scars and wrinkles, but she brushed it away—tears would do nothing for her.

She stalked to the old cabinet and her spine chattered in fear—the clasp hung loose between the doors. She reached a mangled, shivering hand out, pulled open one of the doors just enough to see inside and fell to her knees—painted porcelain shrapnel littered the lining of the cabinet. She had nothing without them. She reached up, opened the carved doors the rest of the way and burst into tears—the shards showered down around her, slicing her skin. She stared up, saw a single perfect face and reached for it, but to no avail—it was only a photograph.

No one could love you without a mask. Her father’s voice burned in her skull. Through the blurring rain of tears she grabbed pieces of pale china and jammed them against one another. Red trails cascaded from her hands, staining the floor and glass crimson.

She crawled across the sharp, broken doll faces and ripped away the curtain from her mirror. Dust exploded through the air, landing thick on her floor. That was the face no one knew, the face she kept hidden from the world. She smeared the blood across her skin, the red liquid pooling in the deep pockmarks and wrinkles.

Pulling her skin taut, she caught sight of the wine-stain birthmarks and painted them over with red—it was all she could do now. She clutched a larger piece of one of the masks, the smooth surface cool against her skin, and ran it along her forehead. More blood flooded down, dyeing her skin like a rose.

She couldn't afford a new face—all of her wealth came from suitors. All of her suitors came for the angelic beauty. Once, too many years ago to count, she may have gone outside to find work, but not now—no one would love her without a mask. So she let the blood flow.

Red would be her new visage.

What's New, What's Not, Where's Neverland

I answer everything but the last question. Everyone knows you just go to the second star on the right and then straight on 'til morning.

I hope you had a glorious weekend, everyone. I had company and so couldn’t get on too often. Sorry about that. But what matters is that I'm here now, and I've got an update on what I've been doing lately. I want to let you, my loyal fans and followers, get the first taste of what's been happening in the Vossverse… or UniVoss… I haven't decided on a name yet.

A lot of my time has been taken up prepping to launch The Jester Prince next month. It's the first time I've never released a direct sequel before, so it's proving interesting. Watch out for that touring the blogosphere in mid-August.

As for active, butt in chair, fingers on keys writing, it's been going between a few things, including blogging. I've been slacking off on my blog for a while, but I'm rising back up to the challenge. So you'll get to see a lot more of my smiling… words?

I've also thrown together a few shorts for various anthologies: Mortimer, the story of a girl and her pet monster, The Bruja's Gate, a tale of Dia de los Muertos gone off kilter, and Saur, a quick bit of flash set after an interplanetary war. So, keep an eye out for those.

Most of my time, as of late, has been spent dealing with The Park, a record of a controversial reality show from. Journals kept by the contestants, eMails from within the production company, reviews; all combined together to create a single cohesive record.

So, you can keep your eye out for that in the near future as well.

That's what's been happening lately. If you want to keep caught up on all my other goings on, just follow me up top. It only costs a couple seconds and a bit of your soul. But souls are highly overrated, anyway.

Voss