When the waves faded out on the far side of the stream, Kenn felt the great silence that lay upon the world and stood in the midst of it trembling like a hunted hare.

Highland River

Neil M. Gunn

IF YOU HAVE ANY GOOD IDEAS PLEASE PUT THEM IN MY HEAD.

Fully Coherent Plan

David Shrigley

When Apollo was born, Brian and Lillian thought they'd reached the end of their story but they'd been wrong. The wildness had only begun.

The Changeling

Victor LaValle

He could see the furniture, the curtain across the bed, his mother and father, the decorations and through it all, vaguely, the buildings, the night. And hung there, shimmering, in that room he could never enter, the tinsel garland that would never tarnish.

Its Colours They Are Fine

Alan Spence

I've always believed in standing up for what I think is right. I've always believed in speaking up when other voices are silent. I've always believed in refusing to be cowed by those who shout over you, who want you to go away, who think that just by dragging you through the mud, you will break.

Rise

Gina Miller

You are meant to be frightened when you see a ghost but I was not frightened because it felt completely normal which is weird because I had never seen a ghost before. He was just standing there behind the smoke of Big Vics cigar and he was looking at me and not scared of my eyes like everyone else was.

The Dead Fathers Club

Matt Haig

I have to tell you how it was, exactly as I saw it, because this was the end and the start of everything, wasn't it? So come on, Terence, get on with it, you don't have all day.

The Possession of Mr Cave

Matt Haig

The Boy's eyes suddenly focused, like he'd just seen McCoy for the first time. He spun his arm round towards him and lined up a shot, pistol aimed square at his head. McCoy froze as the boy adjusted his aim and squeezed the trigger.

Bloody January

Alan Parks

What could make a stable, gregarious, newly married man who had just made plans for the weekend suddenly jump off a building?

An Unexplained Death

Mikita Brottman

Twelve. That was the year that I learned that being Black and poor defined me more than being bright and hopeful and ready.

When They Call You a Terrorist

Patrisse Khan-Cullors & asha bandele

One autumn morning, as I read a dead poet's letters in my friend Wendy's backyard in San Francisco, I glimpse a fragment of that atomic mutuality.

Figuring

Maria Popova

Dogs like to talk. We are talking all the time, non-stop. To each other, to humans, to ourselves. Talk, talk, talk . . . During every sniff, every bark, every crotch nuzzle, every spray of a lamppost, we are speaking our minds. So if you want the truth, ask the dog

The Last Family in England

Matt Haig