Short Stories audiobooks

The Singing Lesson

By: Katherine Mansfield

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 15 minutes

Abridged: No

Katherine Mansfield (1888 - 1923) was a prominent modernist writer of short fiction and a close associate of D. H. Lawrence and Virginia Woolf.

The Singing Lesson describes the turmoil of a young schoolmistress holding a singing lesson for years 4, 5 and 6 immediately after she has received a very disturbing letter from her fiancé. Her dismal... Read more

Diamond Cut Diamond

By: F. Britten Austin

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 1 hour 5 minutes

Abridged: No

Frederick Britten Austin (1885 - 1941) was a popular British fiction writer, whose crime and mystery stories were very much influenced by his experiences as a soldier. He had enlisted in the London Rifle Brigade on 4 August, 1914, the day war was declared on Germany. By war's end he had reached the rank of captain.

In Diamond Cut Diamond, Britten... Read more

Charles

By: A. J. Alan

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 19 minutes

Abridged: No

The story opens with the narrator on his way home from the theatre one evening, when his attention is drawn to a crowd gathered around a road accident in the West End of London. A taxi has hit a pedestrian. Out of the crowd emerges Charles, an old friend, supporting a fainting women. They had been the passengers in the taxi, and Charles now... Read more

The Shadow of the Shark

By: G. K. Chesterton

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 51 minutes

Abridged: No

When the body of the eccentric painter Sir Owen Cram is found on a deserted beach next to his easel, a murder enquiry is launched. It is clear that the injury which has killed him could not have been self-inflicted. Nor is the murder weapon anywhere to be found. But most mysterious of all, there is only one set of footprints in the sand leading... Read more

The Perfect Murder

By: Stacy Aumonier

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 43 minutes

Abridged: No

Stacy Aumonier was a British writer, best known for his outstanding short stories. Nobel Prize-winner John Galsworthy described Aumonier as "one of the best short story writers of all time" and predicted that he would "outlive all the writers of his day".

Aumonier wrote over 85 short stories in his lifetime. He has been described as the "British... Read more

The Magic Casket

By: R. Austin Freeman

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 57 minutes

Abridged: No

Richard Austin Freeman (1862-1943) was a British writer of detective stories, often starring the forensic investigator Dr. Thorndyke. He is often credited with having invented the inverted detective story (a crime fiction in which the commission of the crime is described at the beginning, with the story then describing the detective's attempt to... Read more

An August Bride

By: Debra Clopton

Narrated by: Amber Quick

Length: 3 hours 5 minutes

Abridged: No

A year’s worth of novellas from twelve inspirational romance authors. Happily ever after guaranteed.As far as Kelsey Wilcox is concerned, her last cowboy was the last cowboy. Kelsey Wilcox has had enough of cowboys. After the last one broke her heart, Kelsey traded in her boots for flip-flops, and the open range for a bistro on the beach.  Her... Read more

New Frontiers

By: Ben Bova

Narrated by: Stefan Rudnicki, Paul Boehmer, Gabrielle de Cui...

Length: 9 hours 45 minutes

Abridged: No

New Frontiers offers fourteen startling visions of yesterday, today, and tomorrow from Ben Bova, six-time winner of the Hugo Award.Frontiers can be found in all directions—frontiers of time and space, as well as frontiers of courage, devotion, love, hate, and the outer limits of the human spirit. This outstanding collection of stories by one of... Read more

The Child with the Bread Shoes

By: Teofilo Gautier

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 17 minutes

Abridged: No

When little Hans dies of the croup, his mother uses all her scant wealth to ensure him a proper burial. She spins the thread for his shroud and has a beautiful little coffin made. But while she is out, the rats gnaw at little Hans's leather slippers and the dead child has nothing for his feet.

Hans' mother makes him a pair of shoes from her last... Read more

Who Was She?

By: Bayard Taylor

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 45 minutes

Abridged: No

Bayard Taylor (1825 - 1878) was an American writer and poet, best known for his translations of German literature, including his acclaimed Faust.

Who Was She? is a romantic mystery. The narrator is on vacation and discovers what he takes to be a secluded glen unknown to anyone else. But one day, he finds a wilted bunch of flowers and a book on... Read more

An Episode of the Reign of Terror

By: Honoré de Balzac

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 44 minutes

Abridged: No

Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) is arguably the greatest European novelist in terms of the range and power of his writing. Most of his short stories predate his long novels and are written in a different style.

One of the earliest is An Episode of the Reign of Terror in which two nuns and a priest in hiding from the mob are visited by a stranger... Read more

The Man Who Stole a Meeting House

By: John Townsend Trowbridge

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 39 minutes

Abridged: No

A group of travellers are telling increasingly tall tales about horse thieves and robbers...but one traveller's story trumps the lot. It is the story of a miserly farmer who steals a meeting house and carries it off. But his plans do not go at all as he expects... Read more

The Reverend Father Gaucher's Elixir

By: Alphonse Daudet

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 21 minutes

Abridged: No

Alphonse Daudet (1840-1897) was one of France's finest storytellers.

The Reverend Father Gaucher's Elixir is set in a dilapidated monastery in Provence. The order has fallen on hard times and the future of the entire monastery is in jeopardy. But the order's simpleton cow-herd, Brother Gaucher, has an unexpected idea. His old Auntie Bégon had in... Read more

Jeannot and Colin

By: Voltaire

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 22 minutes

Abridged: No

Voltaire was the nom de plume of François-Marie Arouet (1694-1778), a well known writer, poet, satirist and wit whose ascerbic criticism of many institutions of the day once earned him a period of imprisonment in the Bastille.

In this tale of Jeannot and Colin, Voltaire not only tells an instructive tale, warning of the dangers of sudden wealth... Read more

Benedict Cumberbatch Reads Thrilling Stories of the Railway - Abridged

By: Victor Whitechurch

Narrated by: Benedict Cumberbatch

Length: 1 hour 9 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Benedict Cumberbatch reads five stories featuring the famous vegetarian railway detective, Thorpe Hazell, as heard on BBC Radio 4.

In The Affair of the German Dispatch-Box, Hazell hatches a daring plan to retrieve a highly sensitive government document before it reaches the German Ambassador.

In Sir Gilbert Murrell's Picture, When an entire wagon... Read more

Showdown Trail

By: Louis L’Amour

Narrated by: Jim Gough

Length: 6 hours 56 minutes

Abridged: No

A collection of two stories by beloved Western writer Louis L'AmourIn "The Trail to Peach Meadow Canyon," Mike Bastian has been raised by outlaw chief Ben Curry and trained in frontier skills by Curry's most trusted associates. Curry now wants to retire from leadership of the gang he has headed for years. But he is frustrated in this ambition by... Read more

Stories of the Golden West, Book 5

By: Jon Tuska, Zane Grey, Max Brand & Louis L’Amour

Narrated by: Grover Gardner

Length: 8 hours 55 minutes

Abridged: No

A collection of classic Western tales"Ca+¦on Walls" by Zane GreySmoke Bellew enters a remote Mormon settlement only a jump ahead of a posse. Finding employment as a ranch hand working for a dowager Mormon, Smoke finds that his life undergoes a transformation and he is able to make her ranch a financial success, at the same time falling in love... Read more

The Mystery of Choice

By: Robert W. Chambers

Narrated by: Stefan Rudnicki

Length: 6 hours 3 minutes

Abridged: No

An eerie and macabre collection of stories from Robert W. Chambers, author of The King in YellowConsidered by many to be the father of supernatural fiction, Robert W. Chambers' work continues to influence writers today. Originally published in 1897, The Mystery of Choice brings together seven chilling tales, most of them set in Brittany.... Read more

The Marquise

By: George Sand

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 1 hour 2 minutes

Abridged: No

George Sand was the pseudonym of Amantine-Lucile-Aurore Dupin (1804-1876), and was a much admired French novelist and memoirist. She is equally well known for her much-publicized romantic affairs with a number of celebrities including Frédéric Chopin and Alfred de Musset. It was the way Sand turned her own love affairs into novels and stories... Read more

A Desperate Adventure

By: Max Adeler

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 17 minutes

Abridged: No

Max Adeler was the nom de plume of the American writer and humorist Charles Heber Clark (1841 - 1915). His tale A Desperate Adventure begins thus: "WANTED, four persons who are bent upon committing suicide, to engage in a hazardous adventure. Apply etc. to Captain Cowgill, No. 1, Blank Street after nine o'clock in the morning." From the... Read more

Zodomirsky's Duel

By: Alexandre Dumas

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 32 minutes

Abridged: No

Alexandre Dumas (1802-1870) was one of France's best-known and most-prolific authors. He excelled at many genres, but is probably best known for his stories of high adventure and dashing derring do.

In Zodomirsky's Duel, he tells the tale of an unusual duel between officers in a regiment stationed on the Austrian border. A new officer has... Read more

Titbottom's Spectacles

By: George William Curtis

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 57 minutes

Abridged: No

George William Curtis (1824 - 1892) was a traveller, essayist and fiction writer who was particularly renowned for his short stories. He combined a highly polished style with a great sense of humour and his works we enthusiastically received in the heydays of American Periodical Literature.

In the marvellous story Titbottom's Spectacles, Curtis... Read more

The Diamond Lens

By: Fitz-James O'Brien

Narrated by: Cathy Dobson

Length: 1 hour 4 minutes

Abridged: No

Fitz James O'Brien (1828 - 1862) was an Irish-born American writer, some of whose work is considered the forerunner of today's science fiction. "The Diamond Lens" is his most famous short story and tells the strange story of a scientist who invents a powerful microscope and discovers a beautiful woman in an enchanting microscopic world inside a... Read more

Tail of Vengeance

By: Spencer Quinn

Narrated by: Jim Frangione

Length: 1 hour 4 minutes

Abridged: No

Chet and Bernie-everybody's favorite human-canine detective team-are asked by a beautiful woman to find evidence that would put her cheating boyfriend in the doghouse in this e-original short story from New York Times bestselling author Spencer Quinn. Read more