Episodes

So far, all of our public domain stories were created prior to 1925. However, there are a few newer tales that are no longer copyright protected. From one of the world’s best science fiction writer’s comes a tale of idioms an...

While forward to the future we often forget the darkness that is part of life.

A young man's longing for love is briefly fulfilled on one moonlight evening on the sea off the coast of Cannes. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Thankfully, I can now read Hemingway to you. This story is a powerful way to start. It’s a tale of duty, pain, suffering, racism and so much more. It has myriad twists and turns and all manner of fascinating subplots for such...

Here is a biting satire of Victorian Era British upper class from the perspective of the family cat who gains a startling new skill. Saki was the pen name of British author, H.H. Munro who was one of true masters of the short...

Being a dog person, some of my favorite stories feature dogs. It only seems fair to feature a feline character. And you couldn’t ask for a story than one from a two time Pulitzer Prize winner. This story was part of Booth Tar...

Welcome aboard an early 20th Century trans-pacific ocean liner where one is likely to be stuck for weeks with any number of unusual characters. Of course, we are likely to put a great deal of stock in first impressions when i...

A rural mountain couple struggle with their differences, anger, and overpowering love for each other. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A new love springs from the conversations of two sisters and a couple of moles. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When a preacher failed to stir the emotions of his congregants he resorts to the time tested tradition of embellishment. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Twenty years after heading west to find his fortunes a man returns to meet a long lost friend. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I have always loved the work of Lewis Carroll. In fact, Litreading began with my rendition of Carroll’s nonsense poem Jabberwocky. His only foray into shorter works came in the form of poetry, much of which found its way into...

Grief part of the human condition and we cope with it varies from person to person. When two old men discuss the loss of family members several years after World War I, it is a fly that help illustrate both life’s constant st...

Loneliness is painful enough under normal circumstances, but social rejection in the face of a personal crisis can be devastating. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is more a satirical essay than an actual short story, but it makes me smile. The first telephone was demonstrated at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition in 1876. By 1880, many wealthier families were using the new com...

We are complex creatures and grow more so with time. Every relationship adds or subtracts from who we are. No relationship is more life changing than marriage and for a woman thrice married in pre-suffrage America the stigma...

In the 19th Century particularly, good boys are supposed to enjoy the fruits of the righteousness, and bad boys were destined for eternal damnation, at least according to Sunday School books, but according to Mark Twain, life...

Pride does seem to go before a fall… In this very short story a young man’s life unravels thanks to a small vanity-induced dissimulation. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This special short, short story centers on a different kind of haunting, not from without, but from within. The darkness that comes from a profound loneliness that quietly haunts the souls of many. Hosted on Acast. See acast....

Happiness has always been elusive, usually found in unexpected places and, often, in the wake of the worst life events In this heart-warming story, an affluent couple discovers what is truly important in life in the wake of b...

Virginia Wolff had a talent for taking mundane observations and weaving them into enchanting tales. Something a normal as watching two men on an ordinary a day at the beach became an impassioned and poignant story in her hand...

What should we do, when should we do it, and whose direction should we take? Those three questions have plagued humanity throughout time. Where can the answers be found or are they unanswerable? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com...

What is truth? How does our perception color the facts as we observe them. Those differences how we see the world complicates this Japanese murder investigation in this renowned short story. This profound modernist fable has ...

Would it be better to start life as an old man and end it as an infant? That was the question posed by Mark Twain that inspired F. Scott Fitzgerald to write his short story, "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button." Hosted on Ac...