‘The Whipping’ by Wally Wood

Since “elevated horror” has become a buzzy phrase, some have opined that horror has only recently taken a turn toward allegorical (and sometimes literal) explorations of social issues. Not so—since its early days, writers have turned to the genre’s terrifying tropes to shed light on real-world demons. In EC Comics story “The Whipping,” a white man tries to kill his daughter’s Mexican-American boyfriend and ends up murdering her. The story certainly threatened the status quo when it was published—in fact, EC EIC William Gaines was called before the Senate Subcommittee to Investigate Juvenile Delinquency in 1954 to defend its value. 

Published in ShockSuspenStories Vol. 1 #14, EC Comics 1954

‘Moon’ by Esther Yi

I began my writing career as a teen music journalist, and my fascination with parasocial relationships (see: Parasocialite) largely stems from the artist-fan interactions I observed (not to mention the occasional flickers of infatuation I had to stomp out in order to do my job well). Thus, Moon immediately seized my attention. As so many of us do, I love the intersection of highbrow and lowbrow, and Moon is as good as it gets in that category: Yi records the vicissitudes of a K-Pop fan’s obsession with striking seriousness (all while maintaining a powerful first-person POV).

Published in The Paris Review, Summer 2022

‘Pearls’ by Michael Cunningham

Not only is Michael Cunningham a master of the short story—he’s one of the mentors who helped me find my own voice in undergrad. I could’ve put “White Angel” or “A Wild Swan” here, but there’s something about surreal gem “Pearls” that stands out as especially striking to me. After losing his lover, a young man notices loose pearls from her favorite necklace turning up in increasingly surprising hiding places around his home. The best jokes don’t need to be explained; neither do the best metaphors.

Published in The Paris Review, Winter 1982

‘Captain Hook at Eton’ by J. M. Barrie

This is my wild-card pick. I love how Barrie treats his characters as living, breathing entities whose movements he’s simply recording rather than directing. Captain Hook at Eton is evidence of this. Written in the form of an address (intended for the titular boys’ school, of course), it delves into the fearsome foe’s life in English high society before he took to the seven seas. It was published in 1927, fourteen years after Peter Pan; considered alongside earlier works such as the Peter Pan play and “Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens,” it’s a testament to the way the same stories can have a hold over us for years, changing as we do. Admittedly, this bit of apocrypha might not be particularly interesting to you if you’re not a certified Pan fan… but I place myself firmly in that camp, so en garde. Although my work tends to lean toward darker topics, I would love to weave a tale that conjures up a Barrie-esque sense of childlike wonder someday.

Published in The Times, July 1927

‘The Problem With Blackberries’ by Kate Feld

“I mark the day when the blackberries are perfectly ripe. And the day after. Then it changes. Then I don’t want to see them anymore.”

This story was the easiest one for me to choose, because I’ve thought about it at least a couple of times a month ever since I first read it (and every single time I notice blackberries at the side of a train or a tram track). Kate Feld is a magician; this tiny story feels as shockingly personal to me reading it now as it did when I first discovered it.

First published by minor literature[s], 2016, and available to read online here

‘The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas’ by Ursula K. Le Guin

“Only pain is intellectual, only evil interesting. This is the treason of the artist: a refusal to admit the banality of evil and the terrible boredom of pain.”

Ursula K. Le Guin’s stories feel like the definition of the form to me, and her writing played a big part in forming my ideas about what short fiction can do and how they can use apparently simple storytelling to tell us deep truths about ourselves and the world. I love this story, which manages to be both escapist and monstrously real and totally heartbreaking. It calls for courage and demands hope.

First published in New Dimensions, 1973, and collected in The Wind’s Twelve Quarters, Harper & Row, 1975. Also available in The Wind’s Twelve Quarters and The Compass Rose, Gollancz SF Masterworks, 2015

‘Pushed Buttons’ by David Hartley

“Liz put her father-in-law in the lift, pushed the button, and watched as he was taken away.”

This is a great story from one of my closest friends; we’ve been in a fiction writing group together for over 10 years. I wouldn’t be writing fiction if it wasn’t for Dave inviting me to join what we call the ‘Gaslamp Writers’ (named for the iconic subterranean Manchester pub we used to meet in every month, often to the background noise a group of sword-dancers practising in the next room). Dave is a lovely person who can write surprisingly nasty stories – this is one with a particularly sharp set of teeth.

I love the way this story uses structure to let its momentum build and build, to reveal truths beneath truths about its characters. I’ll let you discover this terrible father-in-law and even more frightening lift for yourselves…

First published in Electric Literature, 2023, and available to read online here

‘The Correct Hanging of Game Birds’ by Rosie Garland

Rosie Garland (another friend, who was also my magnificent mentor for a while) is rightfully known for her weird and wonderful tales and writes novels and poetry as well as short stories.

This is a beautiful example of an innovative use of form, and also what can be achieved when a short story is written really sparingly, allowing the reader to fill in the gaps to work out what’s really going on. It’s a brilliant little horror story that lingered with me long after I read it, and I think this section is particularly note-perfect:

“Lock the dog in the yard, to stop it lapping up the puddles that collect under the carcasses. Ignore the neighbours complaining they can’t sleep. The smile that shuts them up faster than any bellowed argument. The way they shrink away.”

First published in X-R-A-Y, 2020, and available to read online here

‘The Husband Stitch’ by Carmen Maria Machado

This one might be familiar to lots of you (and will almost certainly have appeared on other people’s lists!). Carmen Maria Machado’s stories felt revelatory when I first read her collection Her Body and Other Parties. I love how it starts with directly addressing the reader, like she’s directing the staging of a play, giving you instructions on what to see in your mind’s eye and hear in your head that you can choose to obey or ignore. Her work has so much confidence and swagger, it’s very charismatic!

It’s this mesmerising quality of showmanship, I think, which is so appealing about her work, and which makes even the retelling of a familiar fairytale feel so startling and fresh. She even tells you, right near the start: “This isn’t how things are done, but this is how I am going to do them.”

First published online in Granta in 2014 and available to read here. Collected in Her Body And Other Parties, Graywolf/Serpent’s Tail, 2019

‘Skin’ by Daniel Carpenter

“He imagined for a moment, what it would be like to be a Skinship, to have spent so long in space, only to return. Space giving way to atmosphere and cloud and then the lights of cities and the cold night black of towns and villages and there, somewhere far below, hundreds of little yellow fires, guiding the way like landing beacons. Would someone be waiting for him?”

Dan is another member of our Gaslamp writers group, and his new collection of horror stories, Hunting by the River, is not to be missed. I love this story because it really showcases what his writing does best: dark, dystopian stories that never fail to twist the knife, paired with an incredibly detailed and immersive sense of place – in this case, a frightening and futuristic Manchester.

‘Skin’ by Daniel Carpenter (First published in Manchester Climate Monthly, 2013, and available to read online here)

‘Alysm’ by Irenosen Okojie

I discovered Irenosen Okojie’s writing when a version of this story appeared alongside mine in an anthology of speculative fiction inspired by true stories about women’s bodies, called Disturbing the Body from Boudicca Press. This story is the most impactful and affecting responses to the early days of the pandemic that I’ve come across.

“There is a lump in my throat. I sense an alien force hijacking my system. I feel it moving inside me. My body is no longer mine alone. It is a host for something malevolent.”

First published in The London Magazine, 2021, and available online here; also published in Disturbing The Body, Boudica Press, 2021

‘Mrs Pinto Drives to Happiness’ by Reshma Ruia

“‘Before you go, make sure to mop the bathroom floor.’ Mrs Ibrahim’s voice is distracted.
‘Yes, madam,’ Mrs Pinto says. They both know she has cleaned the entire house from attic to cellar that very morning.”

Reshma and I have the same publisher for our short story collections, the small but mighty Dahlia Press, run by the brilliant Farhana Shaikh. I’ve heard Reshma read this story a few times at various literary events and I’m always excited to hear it again – I feel like I get more from it every time. The characters feel so real and fully formed that this little story packs as much into it as some whole novels, but leaves you wanting to turn the page and read on.

Collected in Mrs Pinto Drives to Happiness, Dahlia Press, 2021

‘Rebecka’ by Karin Tidbeck

“I don’t know why I remained her friend. It’s not like I got anything out of it. It was the worst kind of friendship, held together by pity.”

Karin Tidbeck’s wonderful collection Jagganath was one of the first contemporary short story collections I owned – long before I ever thought about publishing one myself.

This story is deliciously horrible – about a woman who God isn’t allowing to kill herself, no matter how hard she tries. Like all the best horror stories, it’s got a brilliant sting in its tale, and an ending that makes you go ‘ah’.

First published in Swedish in Vem är Arvid Pekon, Man av Skugga Förlag, 2010, and in English in Jagannath, Cheeky Frawg, 2012; reprinted in Nightmare, 2014, where it is available to read, here