LitReading - Original Short Stories and Classic Tales

Loneliness can grind a man down like a millstone—yet grief, transformed, can become the miller’s divine salvation. A widowed man turns a forgotten mill into a memorial for his lost little girl, and fate brings a stranger—fragile, secretive—who just might be the miracle he’s been waiting for. He called himself O. Henry, but the man behind the pen was William Sydney Porter—a sneaky little Texan with...

Record summer temperature’s take their toll on both our physical and mental health. Extreme weather has been known to bring about strange and often dangerous behavior among those suffering its effects. How strange, I’ll let you be the judge in our special summer tale, August Heat. We are so honored to have been featured by Apple Podcasts as a great source for summer stories. If you don't want to m...

Grief and heartbreak are the typical reactions to the loss of a loved one, but other emotions may lurk within. We are so honored to have been featured by Apple Podcasts as a great source for summer stories. If you don't want to miss our future stories, please Follow or Subscribe. Also, we have over 100 stories in our back catalog. Enough stories to keep you entertained for weeks. Looking for even...

So far, all of our public domain stories were created prior to 1925. However, there are a few newer tales that are no longer copyright protected. From one of the world’s best science fiction writer’s comes a tale of idioms and aliens. Essentially, this story is a long dad joke. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I, a dad, did. Even if you don’t know his name, you know the work of Philip K. Dick. Sev...

On a cold New Year’s Eve, Nellie peers into a mirror, searching for a glimpse of her happily-ever-after. Instead, the glass betrays her—offering not romance, but a haunting vision of what marriage might truly hold: struggle, sickness, disappointment. Chekhov doesn’t give us a fairy tale—he gives us the nightmare behind the dream. Anton Chekhov was Russia’s great observer of the quiet tragedies hid...

A young man's longing for love is briefly fulfilled on one moonlight evening on the sea off the coast of Cannes. We are so honored to have been featured by Apple Podcasts as a great source for summer stories. If you don't want to miss our future stories, please Follow or Subscribe. Also, we have over 100 stories in our back catalog. Enough stories to keep you entertained for weeks. Looking for eve...

Thankfully, I can now read Hemingway to you. This story is a powerful way to start. It’s a tale of duty, pain, suffering, racism and so much more. It has myriad twists and turns and all manner of fascinating subplots for such a short story. You may need to listen more than once. Hemingway penned this early work at the age of 24, shortly after the birth of his first child (which may explain the sub...

Here is a biting satire of Victorian Era British upper class from the perspective of the family cat who gains a startling new skill. Saki was the pen name of British author, H.H. Munro who was one of true masters of the short story. We are so honored to have been featured by Apple Podcasts as a great source for summer stories. If you don't want to miss our future stories, please Follow or Subscrib...

Being a dog person, some of my favorite stories feature dogs. It only seems fair to feature a feline character. And you couldn’t ask for a story than one from a two time Pulitzer Prize winner. This story was part of Booth Tarkington’s extremely popular Penrod stories, that, during their day rivaled the popularity of Mark Twain’s Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. Tarkington is only one of three auth...

Welcome aboard an early 20th Century trans-pacific ocean liner where one is likely to be stuck for weeks with any number of unusual characters. Of course, we are likely to put a great deal of stock in first impressions when it often pays to wait to get to know someone. Never a darling of the critics, W. Someset Maugham (the W is for William) was a prolific author and playwright. He was best known...

A rural mountain couple struggle with their differences, anger, and overpowering love for each other. We are so honored to have been featured by Apple Podcasts as a great source for summer stories. If you don't want to miss our future stories, please Follow or Subscribe. Also, we have over 100 stories in our back catalog. Enough stories to keep you entertained for weeks. Looking for even more stor...

A new love springs from the conversations of two sisters and a couple of moles. We are so honored to have been featured by Apple Podcasts as a great source for summer stories. If you don't want to miss our future stories, please Follow or Subscribe. Also, we have over 100 stories in our back catalog. Enough stories to keep you entertained for weeks. Looking for even more stories? Check out all out...

When a preacher failed to stir the emotions of his congregants he resorts to the time tested tradition of embellishment. We are so honored to have been featured by Apple Podcasts as a great source for summer stories. If you don't want to miss our future stories, please Follow or Subscribe. Also, we have over 100 stories in our back catalog. Enough stories to keep you entertained for weeks. Looking...

Twenty years after heading west to find his fortunes a man returns to meet a long lost friend. We are so honored to have been featured by Apple Podcasts as a great source for summer stories. If you don't want to miss our future stories, please Follow or Subscribe. Also, we have over 100 stories in our back catalog. Enough stories to keep you entertained for weeks. Looking for even more stories? Ch...

I have always loved the work of Lewis Carroll. In fact, Litreading began with my rendition of Carroll’s nonsense poem Jabberwocky. His only foray into shorter works came in the form of poetry, much of which found its way into his Alice books. This piece was written a bit differently earlier and changed when added to the book, “Alice’s Adventures Through the Looking Glass.” This nonsense verse is s...

Grief part of the human condition and we cope with it varies from person to person. When two old men discuss the loss of family members several years after World War I, it is a fly that help illustrate both life’s constant struggles and fragility. The Fly is considered one of Catherine Mansfield’s greatest works because it is personal. Mansfield lost her brother in a training demonstration during...

Loneliness is painful enough under normal circumstances, but social rejection in the face of a personal crisis can be devastating. We are so honored to have been featured by Apple Podcasts as a great source for summer stories. If you don't want to miss our future stories, please Follow or Subscribe. Also, we have over 100 stories in our back catalog. Enough stories to keep you entertained for week...

This is more a satirical essay than an actual short story, but it makes me smile. The first telephone was demonstrated at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition in 1876. By 1880, many wealthier families were using the new communication device regularly and one of the 19th century’s best known authors and satirists observed some anecdotal differences in the way men and women communicate. Samuel Cle...

We are complex creatures and grow more so with time. Every relationship adds or subtracts from who we are. No relationship is more life changing than marriage and for a woman thrice married in pre-suffrage America the stigma of mutual divorce seems insurmountable until her third husband’s comes to a startling revelation. Best known for her novels, Edith Wharton was a prolific writer of short stori...

In the 19th Century particularly, good boys are supposed to enjoy the fruits of the righteousness, and bad boys were destined for eternal damnation, at least according to Sunday School books, but according to Mark Twain, life often contradicted expectation. We are so honored to have been featured by Apple Podcasts as a great source for summer stories. If you don't want to miss our future stories,...

Pride does seem to go before a fall… In this very short story a young man’s life unravels thanks to a small vanity-induced dissimulation. We are so honored to have been featured by Apple Podcasts as a great source for summer stories. If you don't want to miss our future stories, please Follow or Subscribe. Also, we have over 100 stories in our back catalog. Enough stories to keep you entertained f...

This special short, short story centers on a different kind of haunting, not from without, but from within. The darkness that comes from a profound loneliness that quietly haunts the souls of many. We are so honored to have been featured by Apple Podcasts as a great source for summer stories. If you don't want to miss our future stories, please Follow or Subscribe. Also, we have over 100 stories i...

Happiness has always been elusive, usually found in unexpected places and, often, in the wake of the worst life events In this heart-warming story, an affluent couple discovers what is truly important in life in the wake of both a fiscal and physical tragedy. Kathleen Norris was, for a time, the highest paid female writer in early 20th-century America. We are so honored to have been featured by Ap...

Virginia Wolff had a talent for taking mundane observations and weaving them into enchanting tales. Something a normal as watching two men on an ordinary a day at the beach became an impassioned and poignant story in her hands. Born to an upstanding and literary Victorian family, Virginia Wolff suffered from serious psychological issues which may have been part of the genius behind her introspecti...

What should we do, when should we do it, and whose direction should we take? Those three questions have plagued humanity throughout time. Where can the answers be found or are they unanswerable? We are so honored to have been featured by Apple Podcasts as a great source for summer stories. If you don't want to miss our future stories, please Follow or Subscribe. Also, we have over 100 stories in o...