Tiptoe, by Laird Barron Read it here in 15 minutes. Thinking about why I love it… This story mixes the everyday with the creepy. From the first paragraph, we have a mixture of comics (normal), playing catch (normal), and shadow puppets (moving towards creepy). The shadow puppets are made up of standard animals (normal) andContinue reading “A short story I recently read”
Author Archives: Mina Ma
A short story I recently read
Where Memory Meets the Sea, by Laia Asieo Odo Read it here in 10 minutes. Thinking about why I love it… This story intrigued me from the beginning, as it opens with a description of a group of characters who routinely go to the sea shore and stand in the waves in order to rememberContinue reading “A short story I recently read”
A short story I recently read
The Funeral, by Mahreen Sohail Read it here in 10 minutes. Thinking about why I love it… This story is set in Pakistan (the author’s home country) – a country I’ve never been to, and a culture I’ve don’t know much about – this means there are elements that I don’t recognise, such as theContinue reading “A short story I recently read”
My top 3 of 2025
After a long hiatus, I restarted blogging about my favourite short stories half-way through 2025. Here are some of my favourite novels from my 2025 reading, to join those short stories: On the Calculation of Volume I, by Solvej Balle (trans. Barbara J. Haveland) This novel is the first of a series, which will eventuallyContinue reading “My top 3 of 2025”
A short story I recently read
In Winter the Sky, by Jon McGregor Read it here in about 50 minutes. Thinking about why I love it… This version of the story (see the introduction from Granta) is written in the 3rd person, limited to the POV of the female character (Joanna), but it also includes extracts from Joanna’s writing (starting ‘InContinue reading “A short story I recently read”
A short story I recently read
On a Winter’s Night, by Kate DiCamillo Read it here in less than 10 minutes. Thinking about why I love it… I love metafiction, so the opening sentence – ‘My father told me this story.’ – immediately entices me; it makes me think, ‘Yes! Tell me the story! I want to hear it!’. This first sentenceContinue reading “A short story I recently read”
A short story I recently read
The Great Silence, by Ted Chiang Read it here in less than 10 minutes. Thinking about why I love it… There aren’t nearly enough stories featuring sentient animals, let alone narrated by them; this story is narrated by an unnamed parrot, who speaks eloquently on behalf of the entire parrot collective (‘We’re a nonhuman speciesContinue reading “A short story I recently read”
A short story I recently read
The Monster, by Ali Simpson Read it here in 10 minutes. Thinking about why I love it… The first sentence hooked me – ‘LAURA WAS BECOMING UNSURE ABOUT WHAT TO DO with the monster in her closet’ – firstly, I’m intrigued by the idea of an actual monster being in a closet, rather than theContinue reading “A short story I recently read”
A short story I recently read
‘Heat’, by Joyce Carol Oates Read it here in about 20 minutes. Thinking about why I love it… The story builds up in layers, right from the very first paragraph, adding detail as it moves forward. So, you’re given information about the time of year, the place, the twins, the fact they’re dead… Then, moreContinue reading “A short story I recently read”
A short story I recently read
Kaleidoscope by Ray Bradbury Read it here in about 10 minutes. Thinking about why I love it… The opening paragraph is a mixture of metaphors (‘can opener’ / ‘silverfish’ / ‘sea’ / ‘meteor swarm’), which shouldn’t work, and writers are told not to mix metaphors because of this, but it does work, because it perfectlyContinue reading “A short story I recently read”
Mina Ma 