Every September I make a special effort to get to more of the short fiction on my shelves, e-readers, and library catalogue. Last year, Lisa of ANZ LitLovers launched Short Story September as a proper blogger challenge and I had great fun taking part. This year her health does not allow her to host*, so I’m stepping in; apologies for the last-minute announcement.
Lisa encouraged people to choose particular short stories that they would recommend. You may want to review individual stories – from anthologies or literary magazines, for instance – instead of or in addition to entire collections.
I’m going to keep it all quite simple so there’s more time for reading and less taken up by blog admin. My plan is as follows; feel free to join in with the prompts in bold, which always serve as handy ways to top and tail a challenge month:
- 24 August: Planning post for Short Story September – Photographs of my potential reads
- 1 September: Opening post with InLinkz link-up (pinned to my site throughout the month)
- 4 September: My Year in Short Stories – Looking back at the collections I’ve already read in 2026, with mini-reviews of some stand-outs.
~Reviews of various collections and individual stories through the month~
- 28 September: New to My TBR – Short stories and authors I’ve discovered through this year’s challenge
- 30 September: Round-up of your links, with statistics on the number of authors and books featured and any stories that were discussed multiple times
- 7 October: The link-up will stay open for another week to mop up any late entries, which I will also add in to the round-up post.
I hope you’ll join me in celebrating the art of the short story next month. The hashtag is #ShortStorySeptember and the badge is above. I’m on Bluesky (@bookishbeck.bsky.social) and Instagram (@bookishbeck) but likely to miss social media posts, so do also add your post to the InLinkz party and/or paste a link in a comment on the opening post.
*Please send Lisa all your warm get-well wishes!
Many thanks to Kim of Reading Matters for the use of her logo design.
Bookish Beck = Rebecca Foster. American transplant to England. Freelance proofreader and book reviewer.
Bookish Beck 
Sounds good – thanks for hosting, Rebecca! I’m sure I can dig up something to read for it.
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Yay! — and thanks.
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Excellent idea and well done you for picking it up! Sending big get-well-soons to Lisa.
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I’m hoping the challenge will mostly look after itself. In the last 5 years I’ve read 11-15 collections per September, so I thought why not get others to join me?
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So sorry to hear that Lisa’s not well. I usually have a collection on the go which I can add.
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Wonderful! Thanks, Susan.
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This sounds fun, I hope to fit a few in! I have a couple that I have put on a list for a 50 classic short stories, so might start there 😀 Thank you for stepping in to host!
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It would be great to have you join in. Thanks!
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A great chance to read some of my short story collections! Thanks for picking up the hosting reins Bec.
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Enjoy exploring your collection. I turned up many more from my shelves than I thought I had!
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I already know I have more than I can ever hope to read in this lifetime 😀
But a month devoted to short stories will help a little, so thank you.
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This sounds fun! My reading has been a rollercoaster lately and I was thinking that short stories may be just the ticket right now. So seeing your post feels like perfect timing. 😊 I think I will join in!
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Great! I hope short stories work out well for you. I find they can be a good palate cleanser.
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So glad this is running and thank you for hosting – I have a good number of options on the TBR!!
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My pleasure! If you’re like me, you’ll find many more options than you realized…
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Yay! I’ve been wondering if this was coming back – thank you for hosting!
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No worries! I only encourage the reading of short forms 😉
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I guess I should write a note on my calendar, in, say, June for this. I am already scheduling reviews for October and ramping up for Non Nov and Nov in Nov in November. I might read a short story or two, but I’d have to sneak the reviews in somewhere.
The only way I ever got going with the two November challenges was to get myself to think about them way ahead of time. Fortunately, since I usually do Readers Inhaling Peril, or whatever it is, in September and October, I read enough books in those genres that I just mark them as they go up. Oh, it’s Imbibing Peril. I haven’t heard anything about that this year yet.
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Wow, you work really far ahead! I am always doing things last minute, or playing catch-up. (I’ve been a procrastinator since high school, unfortunately; I have improved somewhat in terms of work, but not much in every other aspect of life.)
I think one can assume that R.I.P. is always happening. And if not officially, why not post for it anyway?
I hope you’ll be able to squeeze in some stories.
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Yeah, that’s true. It depends on how many reviews I’m posting a week. Right now, I am pulled back to three a week, and since I’m usually 20 reviews ahead, that usually sticks me at least a month and a week ahead, but for some reason, I am farther ahead this time. In November, I’m going to switch back to four books a week, and that will pull me back to a month. I like to stay there, but if I start falling behind on my reading and catching myself up, I switch back to posting fewer reviews a week. That’s where I was earlier this year.
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You always do single-book reviews, I think, whereas I’m often catching up by featuring 3-4 at once.
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I’m in. I’m so bad at getting to short stories normally. This will encourage me.
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Hurrah! I’ll look forward to seeing what you choose.
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Oh… I love a good short story, but… I’m reading a collection now! Oops!
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You could always hold your review for September 1st? 😉
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Um… I could. Or I could just… you know… find another short story and read it at random. I have two books of short stories that I bought for that weekend I spent in Ireland for a seminar with Claire Keegan. We only read one story from each for that seminar, so… I do have dozens more.
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Wow, you had a seminar with Claire Keegan?! I am deeply impressed!
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Not a one on one seminar with Keegan, and I did pay for it and have to travel to Ireland to participate. There were about 50 people in the room, but it was fascinating to hear how she reads fiction, and who influenced her writing. I’d do it again. She holds them at least once a year.
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Sorry to hear about Lisa’s health.
Planning to participate: I have a collection of scifi short stories by Erle Stanley Gardner, yes HIM!, that’s been intriguing me.
And a recent scifi collection to review.
Thanks for hosting
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Great to have you join in!
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I am new to joining this challenge, and thanks for hosting this year! I’m gonna start making my list of short stories I want to read next month 🙂
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Hey I’m wondering, since I am new the challenge… what are we considering a short story? A certain page number? What I thought was a short story isn’t listed as one so now I am confused.
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Sorry for the belated response. Thanks for joining us! I guess I’m thinking any one story from a collection or an anthology or a literary magazine (print or online). Page count will vary, from flash fiction on up to 50 pp. or so. There’s also that new vogue for printing individual stories as standalone volumes (e.g. by Claire Keegan and Colm Tóibín) which makes them look more like novellas. I’m not going to be prescriptive about things. If you think it’s a short story and you want to read and review it, no problem!
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Thank you for the information! Can’t wait for September 🙂
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You know me and short stories … but I do actually have one short story collection on my TBR so will try to make an effort to read it!
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What is it?
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Hi, this sounds fun! I’m not a blogger just a reader – can I still take part?
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Of course! If you want to post your review on social media somewhere, you can link to that. Or just paste your review in a comment on the opening page. Thanks!
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This is such a good challenge, so thank you for helping Lisa out. I’m reading Graham Swift’s new collection Twelve Post-War Tales (2025), as poignant and compressed as ever, one about a retired consultant returning to hospital work during Covid follows his thoughts as he drives to and from the hospital. Swift has two other short story collections which have punctuated his longer work, Learning to Swim (1982) and England and Other Stories (2014).
My other collection will be Call to Memory, not everyone’s idea of fun as it is Holocaust literature for a course I am taking in Holocaust education. I had hoped to restart my old blog from bookshop days but between selling the family home, finding a new place and this course, it might have to wait again!
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Welcome! I keep meaning to read more by Swift (I’ve only read Mothering Sunday thus far, though I do own Waterland).
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