I tried to start my day this year by reading one short story every morning. I fell short on the goal, although thanks to reading more than one some days, I read over 365 stories, so let’s call it a success. The daily consumption of short stories is a practice I believe helps me as a reader and writer; maybe even as a person. Short stories offer entire narratives, entire worlds, to the reader in a single sitting—the art of compression. Each story is its own little puzzle, its own box to open.
And yet short story collections don’t get enough attention. They’re notorious for being hard to sell and they’re often left off “best books of the year” lists. But as someone who derives meaning and value from reading short stories, I like compiling an annual best-of list for story collections. And 2025 was an incredible year for short story collections.
Bear County, Michigan
John Counts
Northwestern University Press
This collection was on my personal most anticipated books list, and it didn’t disappoint. These stories are set in the backcountry of Michigan, exploring a fictional Great Lakes coastal town with a cast of beautifully complicated characters. As RS Deeren wrote in the introduction to his interview with Counts, “In eleven stories and one novella, John Counts announces himself as a meditative and generous author in the vein of Jim Harrison and Bonnie Jo Campbell.”
Guatemalan Rhapsody
Jared Lemus
Ecco
Set in both Guatemala and the United States, these twelve stories feature characters trying to get by. Lemus exhibits tremendous dexterity as a writer, showcasing varying degrees of machismo in his characters’ lives, often through withholding the male characters’ inner struggles—it’s largely through the female characters that the reader is able to see the men’s vulnerabilities and what they are unwilling to admit. I read the collection shortly after it came out in March, yet continue to think about the story “Dark Road with Diesel Stains.”
The Words of Dr. L. & Other Stories
Karen E. Bender
Counterpoint Press
National Book Award finalist Karen E. Bender is a master of the short story. Her latest collection is grounded in realism and contemporary life, others veer into the speculative; but regardless of the lens, most explore parent-child relationships, particularly in spaces of separation, and provide insight into the current political moment. (Note: I had the opportunity to interview her when the collection was published.)
Bitter Over Sweet
Melissa Llanes Brownlee
Santa Fe Writer’s Project
This might be the slimmest collection on the list, but don’t let its size fool you: these flash stories pack a punch. Following Tita, an Indigenous Hawaiian woman, and other women working to escape poverty and abuse in their homeland that’s overtaken by tourism, these stories of resilience offer a master class in the art of compression. They’re imaginative and unflinching, full of voice and brimming with life.
Waiting for the Long Night Moon
Amanda Peters
Catapult
I loved Amanda Peters’ debut novel, The Berry Pickers, and was eager to check out this gorgeous collection. As Katie Preziosi wrote in her review, “Waiting for the Long Night Moon comprises vignettes and short stories told mostly from the first-person perspectives of Indigenous people from the Northern Atlantic coast of Canada and the United States. The stories span the arrival of the first European settlers in the 1600s to the forced removal of Indigenous children from their homes in the late 1800s and present-day climate protests. It’s an ambitious scope for a slim collection that often packs weighty themes of generational grief and resistance to cultural erasure into stories the length of just a few pages.”
More Hell
Adam al-Sirgany
Whiskey Tit
SFWP editor Adam Al-Sirgany’s sharp editorial eye is reflected in these fifteen stories. Some characters reappear in multiple stories so that the reader meets them from different vantage points, offering a more nuanced portrait of these characters. United by the central theme of loss and longing—the latter often for sex and intoxication—these well-crafted stories explore life in the rural Midwest, places regularly dismissed as corn country. (Note: I had the opportunity to interview Adam when the collection was published.)
Guardians & Saints
Diane Josefowicz
Cornerstone Press
As the title suggests, Guardians & Saints deals with characters in guardian-like roles: mentors, teachers, and therapists. While most of the stories are grounded in reality, a few have hints of speculative-like qualities. Some deal with facilities, others are more familial, but all are fascinating examinations of caretaking—the juxtaposition of sterile environments with the home creates a thought-provoking look at those who are dependent, for a variety of reasons, to get their physical, emotional, social, and psychological needs met. (Note: I had the opportunity to interview Diane when the collection was published.)
Beyond All Reasonable Doubt, Jesus Is Alive!
Melissa Lozada-Oliva
Astra House
When I learned Melissa Lozada-Oliva had a story collection coming out, I squealed. If you’re not familiar with Lozada-Oliva’s dynamic prose style, Beyond All Reasonable Doubt, Jesus Is Alive! is a great introduction to her work. Diving into girlhood, inherited trauma, body horror, grief, fear, control, the stories are united by a theme of transformation and are quirky and weird in the very best way.
Where Are You Really From
Elaine Hsieh Chou
Penguin Press
Here is another collection I was eager to read because I’d loved the author’s debut novel, and it lived up to the hype. As Anson Tong wrote in her review: “The title evokes the commonly cited microaggression about nationality, but the book is interested in where one originates in a more existential sense than that. . . . Where Are You Really From sparkles in the way it infuses dark concepts with whimsy and detail. Chou seems less invested in establishing a firm stance on anything and more about unsettling assumptions and questioning the first version of the story that you hear—her answer to the titular question is infinitely more questions.”
Book of Exemplary Women
Diana Xin
YesYes Books
The well-crafted stories in this collection are wide ranging, with many grounded in contemporary realism while others deal with fantastical creatures such as ghosts. On the surface, the range of such stories sounds too vast, as if they wouldn’t complement each other, but in Xin’s deft hands they are stronger side by side. Book of Exemplary Women is an exemplary collection that exhibits a depth of curation that belies the fact it’s a debut, examining regret, desire, sex, death, and belief. (Note: I had the opportunity to interview Diana Xin when the collection was published.)
Atavists
Lydia Millet
W. W. Norton & Company
This linked collection reads a bit like a novel, not because of the cast of characters, but the way plot points in one story are carried throughout the book. Each story is named after a label that ends with -ist (futurist, therapist, optimist, etc.) and offers a humorous take on left-wing post-pandemic culture. It dives into political, ecological, and interpersonal disasters, and loneliness at a time of hyperconnectivity, and Millet writes with striking insight into her characters.
Make Your Way Home
Carrie R. Moore
Tin House Books
Set across the American South, these eleven stories follow Black men, women, and children who struggle against the past as they seek love and belonging. There is a quiet grace and stunning confidence to these stories, which are all deeply rooted in place. The collection offers a gorgeous look at the making and meaning of home. While I found most of the stories notable, “Naturale,” which was originally published in One Story, was especially memorable. (I’ve noticed a pattern that any stories originally published in One Story tend to be my favorite in collections.)
Crawl
Max Delsohn
Graywolf Press
I picked up this collection thanks to Ruby Rosenthal’s review; queer story collections are my jam. Crawl is a fun, engaging read. As Ruby wrote: “In 10 stories, five in section one, or ‘Side A,’ and five in ‘Side B,’ Delsohn constructs a collection of trans experiences, some bildungsroman-y, some more introspective, effectively showing the tension of being a transgender person in 2010s Seattle. . . . In addition to Crawl’s well-placed humor and charm, and its shrewd attentiveness to human psychology, Delsohn has written a book about hope.”
Extinction Capital of the World
Mariah Rigg
Ecco
I almost missed this collection this year, which would’ve been a tragedy, but thankfully snuck in a read after seeing it praised in a social media post. As Hannah Korbel writes in her review: “In ten all-absorbing, gentle, and melancholy short stories, Mariah Rigg’s debut Extinction Capital of the World is an ode to modern life on the Hawaiian Islands. These stories discuss complex family relationships, types of love, community, and the human condition in a small corner of our warming, dying, beautiful world. . . . Rigg writes eloquently and carefully, her prose containing a beat and rhythm that sound just as heartfelt as it does strong, demanding attention. Her many characters contain the real and raw of personhood, and she finds ways to place elevated, sometimes gut-wrenching, lines of poetry within paragraphs where they are not expected but still felt.”
Where to Carry the Sound
Nina Sudhakar
University of North Texas Press
Speaking of sneaking in, I’m cheating a bit here because this collection was published in 2024. But considering it was published in December, i.e. too late to be considered for last year’s end-of-the-year lists, I think it’s fair game, and the book deserves attention. Winner of the Katherine Anne Porter Prize in Short Fiction, Where to Carry the Sound features characters excavating their lives, whether that’s for family secrets or things lost to them. Most of the stories are set in India, and all are delightfully enchanting and inventive.
