100 Quotes About Short Story

We weren’t happy together but we lived in a state of easy, mild contentment. We shared everything except the stupid fucking secret hanging round your neck. I imagined tiny photographs: portraits in sepia of your parents, their faces partially obscured by goitres. Meanwhile, maybe not tomorrow, maybe not next year, maybe not even in a decade from now but one day: the planet would fall apart. Jon Gresham

Gabrielle chuckled, her dark eyes twinkling. “So he’s been after you, has he? Poor Etta, pursued by a sun priest offering to pleasure–” “Every nook and cranny, ” Marietta interrupted dryly and Gabrielle tipped her head back with a throaty laugh. Michelle OLeary

I’ve been asking you to marry me since we met! What more do you want? Chayada Welljaipet

Later, you told me what your mother had said. How your father, the farmer, rose up slowly. You told me how your mother wailed on the other end of the phone, grieving her loss and complaining about the basketball of a goitre perched on her shoulder. She told you, your father walked onto the veranda and saw a chook floating ten feet above the ground. The chook didn’t flap a feather and just sat there brooding, swaying in the breeze. Jon Gresham

We all dream dreams of unity, of purity; we all dream that there's an authoritative voice out there that will explain things, including ourselves. If it wasn't for our longing for these things, I doubt the novel or the short story would exist in its current form. I'm not going to say much more on the topic. Just remember: In dictatorships, only one person is really allowed to speak. And when I write a book or a story, I too am the only one speaking, no matter how I hide behind my characters. Unknown

For the source of the short story is usually lyrical. And all writers speak from, and speak to, emotions eternally the same in all of us: love, pity, terror do not show favorites or leave any of us out. Eudora Welty

Do you mind?” she asked.“ Mind what?”“ While you were looking in the mirror I couldn’t help myself and I began fantasizing about you. And I figured if I was going to continue to fantasize about you, the only polite thing to do was to ask your permission. So now I’m doing the polite thing again and asking, ‘do you mind?’”“ No, Nina. I don’t mind at all.” Then she leaned down and kissed him. . Richard Finney

There are always messages, even enigmas to be searched, mysteries to be solved in all of my books. I like to puzzle readers, but I do not make so to the point of being so complex that they will lose interest in the plot. And that for me is the essence of every great literature around the world, and that’s been so for ages.(..) Some were inpired by real life characters, some other books I wrote are hybrid fiction/non-fiction, so I pretty much get inspired by people who have lived, and even who are still breathing among us… so don’t get discouraged if I didn’t mention your personality traits yet. I might even have your name over my books, I must some day…. Ana Claudia Antunes

Thank you father, thank you. I know you watched me from above and protected me. I promise I shall serve the Magnarian Confederation with all my body and soul. I shall dedicate myself fully to our confederation, the family that you so loved. And I love it too. I shall protect, love and respect it always. This is my promise and commitment. Thank you Chayada Welljaipet

The rain still drummed on the roof, like fine needles striking the shingles. The family sat silently around the table, each one wrapped in their own thoughts. It was Matthew’s voice that broke the silence, asking, “And what happened after that?”“ After that, ” said Paul, “came Gettysburg. Elisabeth Grace Foley

We do not know if she collapsed because of overwhelming joy, extreme surprise, grave disappointment, or heavy anxiety that for the next months and years she would live with a human male, because in fact she had been honest when she told her girlfriends that she had given up on men, OR NONE OF THE ABOVE. Kyoko Yoshida

WORSHIP IS ACTION.Worship is not lazy, boring and sad. Worship is zealous, famous and joyful. Psalm 66:1-2Shout joyfully to God, all the earth; Sing the glory of His name; Make His praise glorious.1 Corinthians 6:20For you have been bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body. Psalm 107:32Let them extol Him also in the congregation of the people, And praise Him at the seat of the elders. . Mac Canoza

History is finite-there's only so much you can learn about a six square block historic district in New York City. (Dark City Lights) Kat Georges

That was 1993 grunge in suburbia. This was 2003 hell in Harlem. (Dark City Lights) Eve Kagan

The father and daughter made their way north, through unknown sylvan paradises where only the owls and skunks know their way around. The hard work of paddling non-stop for many hours had long since stopped being difficult for Saweyimew. In spite of her beauty and grace, her back had grown strong and sinewy from years of canoe trips. She reveled in the exhilaration it always brought her, after the first few hours left her body insensible to pain or discomfort. Warm and tingly, lulled into peaceful contemplation by hours of the rhythmic paddling, the smell of the water, exotic blooms, animal musk. It all combined as one to make her feel so alive. Especially when it rained, and her body steamed against the cool drops, feeling invincible against the elements. The mountain of her father's back was like a rock against anything nature could throw against them. The stream of fragrant pipe-smoke still flowing from his lips, regardless of any obstacle. She felt at that moment, nothing would ever stop her father's pipe from smoking. Nothing, not death, not any force of the living or spirit world, would ever still her father's heart. Rain cleansing her to the core, she was a spring of raw power and self-reliance, paddling against all adversity--their master completely. Her father's daughter. At times like that, when it rained, she entirely understood and shared her father's outlook on life. Alexei Maxim Russell

Later, as she drove the children to school, she thought how worn the grooves were along which they moved their quarrels. She could feel herself saying all the clichéd phrases of a thousand injured women before her, but she could never stop herself. - ‘The Negotiated Settlement Petina Gappah

He cupped her face and held her still, as he looked into her brown eyes; she was all flash and no bang. She talked big, but when it came down to it, she was a simple girl. Elaine White

This was a great idea; he needed to go into tonight knowing that this was the last time he would ever be with Barry. He needed to savour it and enjoy it, to lock it tight in his memories, so that he would never forget how it felt to be with him. This would be his final goodbye.~ A Case of the Ex Elaine White

Get your sticky fingers away from my cookies, ” Ben ordered, without turning his head, to see Jaxton trying to steal one from the cooking tray.“ You weren't saying that last night, ” Jaxton retaliated, coming up to Ben's side, to give him a nudge. They were both smiling, while looking down at the counter, where Ben was making his delicious rosemary cookies. “In fact, I seem to remember you grabbing my sticky fingers and putting them in your mouth, ” he teased, speaking quietly, so that Lyon wouldn't hear them at the other side of the room. Ben turned to Jaxton and abandoned his baking, to catch his face in flour covered hands and plant a deep kiss on his lips. Jaxton opened his mouth, in acceptance of his kiss.~ From the Heart . Elaine White

Jaxton smiled and caught his hand, holding it tight in both of his. “Are you burnt out? Is it all too much?” he asked, getting straight to the root of the matter, in one go.“ Yes, ” he sighed, hating that it was true.“ Then you'll stay home.”“ You know I can't. It's impossible, ” Roman complained about the unfairness of it all. He was due to return to the studio in two days times, to finalise the tracks he'd recorded yesterday. Then he had to sit down with Jalen next week, to pick out a new piece of his artwork for the next album cover. And two weeks after that, he had three interviews with three different music channels, to film.“ Try telling that to Ben.” Jaxton winked at him, then ducked down to kiss him.~ From the Heart . Elaine White

Chocolate makes everything better, in the end, ” he announced, and Thayer fully agreed. Thayer gave him a smile of gratitude and watched Castel lift his spoon from the saucer. He dipped it, gracefully, into his coffee and gave it a light stir.“ Too many people rush to stir such delicate flavours. Take too long and they will clog together to become a lump of bitterness in your coffee. But take your time and be gentle with them, ” Castel explained, quietly, “and they will create a symphony of flavours, to melt in your mouth, ” he said, leaning down, just until his nose was over his cup, to take a long inhale. He smiled and straightened, extracting the spoon to place it back on his saucer. “Now try it.” Thayer took a sip and almost felt his toes curl at the luxurious taste.~ Cinnamon Kiss. Elaine White

He was getting undressed and it snapped something inside of him that had been drawing taut, ready to break for months.“ I'm hungry, Bruno, ” he said, in a soft voice, as he removed the shirt from his broad shoulders, revealing a perfect sight of smooth dark skin. “I can't wait for dinner, ” he continued, with a smile. When he put his hands to the fastening of his trousers, Bruno let out a sigh and put the take out menus on the counter. He couldn't look at him, because he knew Lyon was trying to seduce him on purpose. He didn't want to talk or hear him out or spend time with him that didn't end with an orgasm.“ I can't do this anymore, ” Bruno confessed, quietly. Elaine White

I stared down at my hands and saw the blood coat them, how warm and real something felt when it wasn’t just ink and stains. This was life and I was holding it in my hands. I drew my eyes back up and beneath the flickering streetlight and the throng of drunken cattle, I saw nothing else but the dead girl. Somebody out there had taken her life, her heart, and there I was with her warm, sticky blood. Feeling the most alive I’d felt in years. I had to find him. I just had to. . Charlotte Munro

In high school, she’d been the loner fat girl and I’d been the asshole jock. There had always been something between us; we had gotten on so easily. I remember being both confused and upset that when I’d finally experienced that thing everyone called chemistry, it had been with her of all people. Rose Fall

Our passing interrupted the road crossing, and the crowd bunched on both sides waited for us to go by as we all waited for the war to go by, thinking we can suspend or postpone living and not knowing that in war the heart grows older than it does in dreams Dan Davin

We should follow every supply that runs into the particular lake below, going upstream in terms of we can. When we do not find Drakes’ path, or even an additional, we should come back straight along, look yourself upward an additional way to obtain foods, and then do a similar for the next water for the south. Chayada Welljaipet

Each day Marda gets closer. The sub circles coral reefs off the coasts, where mermaids are said to like the colors of the schools of fishes, and train them to swim around their necks like jewelry or live behind their ears, beneath their long hair. Sometimes mermaids like shallow places, but mostly they like the dark and the beautiful, uncharted, abandoned, soulless parts of the undiscovered world. Holly Walrath

Then why are you still here?” I ask. I stand up and her gun follows me. I welcome its bullets just to see if I could survive.“ Masochism.”“ I don’t know what that means.”“ It means I like my own pain.”“ That doesn’t make sense.”“ I’m human. You think we ever make sense? Tessa Maurer

He had to die someday too. He might do it on sheets with a six-hundred-plus thread count, but he'd die just the same. Death wouldn't forget about him. Unknown

The first thing you lose when you die is your motor skills. Unknown

One evening, after a particularly terrible row, the prince smashed his princess over the head with an old wooden clock and she tumbled to the floor, dead. Brooke Warra

Sometimes I help him out and sometimes he helps me out, and sometimes he tries to push me through the wall. (Dark City Lights) Parnell Hall

I'd started calling my parents but only when I knew they wouldn't be home. Angus McLinn

With more time spent in their mother's presence, Maggie kept topics of conversation to small stuff, seldom ever wanted to dig below the surface, learned from her mother: just be polite, which makes Callie's own facile mental questioning and creative drive, paired with her physical rigidity, all the more oppositional, and, how they dance around serious subjects, laughable. Justin Bog

Fiction has been maligned for centuries as being "false, " "untrue, " yet good fiction provides more truth about the world, about life, and even about the reader, than can be found in non-fiction. Clark Zlotchew

When they reached their ship, Ed gazed out at the bay. It was black. The sky was black, but the bay was even blacker. It was a slick, oily blackness that glowed and reflected the moonlight like a black jewel. Ed saw the tiny specks of light around the edges of the bay where he knew ships must be docked, and at different points within the bay where vessels would be anchored. The lights were pale and sickly yellow when compared with the bright blue-white sparkle of the stars overhead, but the stars glinted hard as diamonds, cold as ice. Pg. 26. Clark Zlotchew

Lipstick never lasted long when they were together; he would always kiss her after she had applied it, as if he liked the smearing viscous sensation. Sometimes she felt sure it was discomposing her that he enjoyed. Sarah Hall

You're never too old to laugh at stories about love and sex. Albert Zimbler

This daemon loves men whose marriage beds have grown cold, so she can set them ablaze. Solange Nicole

Oh no, princess. I would never carry out anything which could harm your being. This was just something I was told to say. I'm not sure what is planned, if, you go against their wishes. But, I'm sure you're smart and won't test them. Chayada Welljaipet

Only the foolish, blinded by language's conventions, think of fire as red or gold. Fire is blue at it's melancholy rim, green in it's envious heart. It may burn white, or even, in it's greatest rages, black. Salman Rushdie

For me a page of good prose is where one hears the rain. A page of good prose is when one hears the noise of battle.... A page of good prose seems to me the most serious dialogue that well-informed and intelligent men and women carry on today in their endeavor to make sure that the fires of this planet burn peaceably. John Cheever

I’d always hated cocktail parties. And this one was worse than most. Overdressed pseudo—people smiled plastic smiles, told one—upmanship stories with phony self—deprecation, then half—listened with painted—on sincerity to the one—upmanship rebuttals. Mannequins. Robots. Androids. Pseudo—people laboring in the vineyards of pseudo—intellectualism to gather the bitter grapes of self—aggrandizement. . Walt Shiel

There’s an immense dramatic possibility in describing that universe. The books, for me, were an enormous relief in that sense of how they were written to allow primary emotion, elemental emotion, to matter enormously but to give the thing an extraordinary flow so you don’t notice at what point that you’re actually overwhelmed by this. There’s no showiness, at all. It’s the opposite of showiness. I think, if it was a painting, it could be very grey abstract, almost, with some lines and very, very beautiful. But you wouldn’t have a notion of where the beauty was.( Talking about the short stories of Alistair MacLeod, who he discovered while working on The Modern Library.) . Unknown

The sultan had enormous eyebrows, fibrous like angora wool. In moments of strife, his eyebrows twitched violently. Like now! His Excellency’s royal blood boiled. Once again another mesmerized American news anchor gushed about Dubai’s vision, hailing the imagination of the al- Maktoum family.“ Where is this vision coming from?” probed Katie Couric.“Ignorant Yankee! ” Sultan Mo-Mo’s British twang bore traces of Basil Fawlty.The sultan wanted to retch. Dubai’s showboating gave him indigestion, but he continued helping himself to more chips and fiery salsa, downing cold Guinness, smoking excellent hash, humming the theme song of The Wonder Years. Deepak Unnikrishnan

This is new territory; a bridge between the conservative and conventional lit mag tradition and those colourful speculation-driven pamphlets that you find in stacks by the coffee-shop door, full of zombies and vampires and crashing space ships. This is a serious journal with a wide aesthetic. The Review Review

One day, I decided to be an island. I took off my clothes and walked into the sea, then floated there, bobbing along with the tide, suspended by my inflatable tube and water wings. Ng YiSheng

I remember clearly the afternoon that she stood at the corner beside the door of the tourist centre in Gdansk. You Jin

The four of us got back into the car. In an instant, I distinctly heard a “soundless music”. It was the melody of friendship, the sound of a perfectly tuned quartet who got together by chance, four hearts playing in harmony. You Jin

As the wind continued to howl and groan through her decaying body, she began to sing her story. Ken Liu

Rebecca woke up with her knees hurting and her fingers ice-cold, and the specifics of her life returned to her as the dream disappeared: weekend, hotel room, Baguio, memory, memory, memory. Eliza Victoria

But we will not bury our mother. We have no interest in putting her bones in soft ground, no desire for memorials and platitudes, no feelings attached to the organic detritus of her terminated existence. J.Y. Yang

Any moment now, I thought, he was going to wake up. Any moment. O Thiam Chin

She looked at me like I was stupid, the same look the girls in JC used to give me when I hadn’t heard of the latest boy band, or turned up at Zouk wearing unfashionable clothes. Jeremy Tiang

The child came to a stop beside her mother and stared up at her face as if she had never seen it before. It was the face of the new misery she felt, but on her mother it looked old and it looked as if it might have belonged to anybody, a Negro or a European or to Powell himself. The child turned her head quickly, and past the Negroe's ambling figures she could see the column of smoke rising and widening unchecked inside the granite line of trees. She stood taut, listening, and could just catch in the distance a few wild high shrieks of joy as if the prophets were dancing in the fiery furnace, in the circle the angel had cleared for them. . Flannery OConnor

While he sweated out a story she bled put a poem. (Dark City Lights) S. J. Rozan

Forgiving himself came easy to him. His, he'd come to realize, was a forgiving nature. Lawrence Block

Perhaps she moves too slowly now, or the world moves too fast for her. She enters the lift, a giant wheel turns and steel cables lower the mechanized box. The lift drops down a black shaft, which exists at the heart of each HDB block. The country may be described, not as a place covered with blocks of public housing, but a topography where black vertical shafts, some forty storeys tall, rise out of the ground like trees. . Justin Ker

There are myriad kisses in a relationship: desperate ones as involuntary as breathing, stolen ones on crowded trains, ceremonial ones at the front door, routine ones as dispassionate as licking an envelope. It takes two to kiss, but does it take two to hold the memory? Stephanie Ye

Soon I find myself squatting on the floor. I am still striking my face; not with my fists this time, but with wide-open hands. I am slapping myself. The sounds I make when my palms meet my cheeks are like an unrelenting round of applause. I am clapping myself. Or clapping for myself. I start to giggle. All the voices are receding now. I am no longer filled with rage or disappointment. I clap and clap and simply cannot stop. . Cyril Wong

She remembered the way the damp, coarse sand had clumped to her legs and hands, and burrowed beneath her nails and into the folds of her clothes, and she had wondered why the British children in her storybooks were always excited about going to the beach–just as now she wondered why the light from the lighthouse seemed to be coming from the landward side of the expressway. “I thought a lighthouse is out at sea. YuMei Balasingamchow

His wife had also studied art in her hometown, and she could paint, but depending on such work for her livelihood was just not possible. As far as appearances went, she was definitely a real beauty. When she was young, she looked a little like Gong Li, but now that she was middle-aged, she had put on weight and gradually taken on more of a bell-shaped look, resembling Li Siqin. But no matter what, a wife always looks better than her balding, broadbellied husband. . Chew Kok Chang

Dear family, I am drafting a new laundry protocol for better and more considerate usage of the washing machine Koh Choon Hwee

The day the earth-moving machines arrived, it was as if aliens had invaded Earth. Overnight they appeared, diggers with huge scoops, plodding their slow and ancient ways across the landscape. By the next week they had multiplied and evolved into diverse forms–cranes with long arms, bulldozers and levellers, an assortment of lorries. All day they worked towards some unseen design, creating and removing debris, their latticework of tracks remaking and writing over the space. Untenanted and vulnerable, the attap huts offered no resistance. Karen Kwek

The exhausted earth groaned and quivered under the monotonous glare of the sun. Spirals of heat rose from the ground as if from molten lava. A panting lizard crawled painfully over the fevered rock in search of a shady crevice. Cattle and dogs cringed under the scanty shade of the trees and waited for the rain to deliver them from the heat and thirst. Instead the heat grew more intense and oppressive each day, singeing and stifling all living things with an invisible sheet of fire, which only the rain could put out. The drought had persisted for over a month. S. Rajaratnam

If freedom is free and none need worry, then what blood drops for thee? Ryan Goodrich

How is it possible you have caught me off guard, he seemed to ask. Exactly where have I miscalculated the velocities, how have I misjudged the vectors? Stephanie Vaughn

We awoke to a fabulation of ice, the sun shining like a weapon, light rocketing off every surface except the surfaces of the Army's clean streets and walks. Stephanie Vaughn

The times have changed and now the story is old, but yet it all remains the same, a victim in the cold. Stephen Harker

Homo Americanus is going to go on speaking and writing the way he always has, no matter what dictionary he owns. Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

Somebody will beat both [contents and price] sooner or later because that is good old Free Enterprise, where the consumer benefits from battles between jolly green giants. Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

Finally I do like best of all stories whose necessity is in the implied recognition that someplace out there there exists an urgency–a chaos–, an insanity, a misrule of some dire sort which can end life as we know it but for the fact that this very story is written, this order found, this style determined, the worst averted, and we are beneficiaries of that order by being readers. Richard Ford

Quote from “FUTURE GONE”: "…I wonder what actually this hospital is, why I am in it and who I am. I have no time to find out. I die, with my arms stretched towards the spotlights. Then whiteness. My body is still there somewhere… Buried in the extremely bright lights of empty hope". Alexandar Tomov

Quote from “Unexpected Tales from the Ends of the Earth”: “The only one everlasting love is the unrealized one. The love to this thing that you’d never had. Behind it is hidden the love to your own ego and feelings". Alexandar Tomov

Inside the room there sat a rocker, which she sat on, and which had rocked her while she sipped the beer, because in spite of herself she had become so giddy to have so quickly relieved her heart that she allowed herself to lean backwards while in the rocker, which had made it possible for the rocker to rock her, although it was not her intention to be so rocked. Also there stood an ironing board with a still hot iron on it that was burning a yellow shift, and there was, among several items that were not as noticeable to the woman, and yet were noticeable enough to at least bear mention, a fake man." I hope you don't mind me asking, " said the woman who lived in the room, but then while in her chair she nodded off. Justin Dobbs

Never forget, ' says Sugar Daddy, 'we are a nation built on sugar. It is our history and it is the source of our prosperity, now and in the future.' This is true. Our entire nation sits on reclaimed land made from sugar. Ours is an island that rose out of the sea, built on a hard core of toffee. Julie Koh

She pulls me further down. More trapped souls reach out to us, dressed in clothes from decades past. The girl ignores them as we descend along the timeline — decade by decade — towards the birth of the island. Julie Koh

Quote from “FUTURE GONE”:“…I set the house on fire. It’s dark outside. The fire tears down the darkness. I turn my back to the place and leave, not knowing where. And suddenly I understand… All dreams are dead now”. Alexandar Tomov

If the world explore all my dark fantasy, will change for the better”. Alexandar Tomov

I'm looking for something new to believe in that isn't the way people yearn at night in the city. Constance Renfrow

Poems are surmountable. They have rhymes and rhythms to help you make meaning. They're short enough. to read and reread until you've made some sense of them. Short stories are a different ballgame. You read them and understand the words completely. You know what happens in each sentence. You follow the dialogue and action. at the end, you know exactly what's happened. And also you have no idea. Laurie Frankel

I held Angie Luna in that room for hours, and I remember the different times we made love like epochs in a civilization, each movement and every touch, apex upon abyss. In the luxury of our bed, we tried every position and every angle. I explored the curves on her body and delighted in seeing the freedom of her ecstasy. Her desperate whispers and pleas. I told her I loved her, and she said she loved me too. We lay in bed with our limbs entangled, in a pacific silence that reminded me of existing on a beach just for the sake of such an existence. I couldn't imagine the world ever becoming better, and for some strange reason the thought slipped into my head that I had suddenly grown to be an old man because I could only hope to repeat, but never improve on, a night like this. I finally took her home sometime when the interstate was empty, and the bridges seemed to lead to nowhere, for they were desolate too. Sergio Troncoso

This town of churches and dreams; this town I thought I would lose myself in, with its backward ways and winding roads leading to nowhere; but, I found myself instead. -Magic in the Backyard (excerpt from American Honey) Kellie Elmore

No. No… No! ’ the fear ebbed my voice, cut through me like a knife. I ran, bare feet slipping and sliding over the floorboards. I turned the corner and headed for the backdoor. Run. Run. I must run. As soon as I reached the backdoor in the kitchen, pulling the barn door from the hinges, I felt his gaze upon me. Cinders and kindling crunched at my feet; what had once been my lovely mahogany kitchen furniture was now little more than firewood. My crockery and china splintered in shards and as I turned to face him, I felt them dig into my skin, cut me with every shiver that bolted through my frame.‘ You wanted Hemlock House. You have, Hemlock House.’ His voice was dark, cruel and yet hauntingly light. As if cooing, whispering to a newborn. He was lounging against the countertop as if waiting for breakfast, as if waiting for something so meaningless. . Charlotte Munro

If I'd learned nothing else in my twenty-seven years on this planet, I'd learned that when someone gives you something totally unexpected and undeserved, you don't ask questions. Jill D. Block

If I'd learned nothing else in my twenty-seven years on this planet, 'd learned that when someone gives you something totally unexpected and undeserved, you don't ask questions. (Dark City Lights) Jill D. Block

She resents the chipped paint of the table and the dingy closet they call a dressing room. (Dark City Lights) Annette Meyers

Why is it so hard? It's hard because it matters, I think. Mina Holmes

I have this uncanny knack of falling for the most irrelevant men, my love story would be comprising of short stories. Pushpa Rana