What are you reading in 2026?

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

As someone who enjoys, and has at times preferred, shorter fiction, I am always saddened when I think how the market for it has contracted (collapsed? imploded?) even just in my lifetime.

I enjoy short stories or novellas on the Kindle, but I'm not sure how much of a market there is for those. I typically see only big name authors doing that.

I do know that the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction is around, and they're the 800 pound gorilla of shorter fantasy and sci-fi. Last I looked, they were basically publishing a small trade paperback, with nice cheap paper, every month, with some of the best stories ever, pretty consistently.

 

[cbwjm]

I enjoy short stories or novellas on the Kindle, but I'm not sure how much of a market there is for those. I typically see only big name authors doing that.

I do know that the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction is around, and they're the 800 pound gorilla of shorter fantasy and sci-fi. Last I looked, they were basically publishing a small trade paperback, with nice cheap paper, every month, with some of the best stories ever, pretty consistently.

Sometimes I wish we still had the large selection of tales magazines of the 1930s to showcase smaller stories.

 

[overgeeked]

I enjoy short stories or novellas on the Kindle, but I'm not sure how much of a market there is for those. I typically see only big name authors doing that.

I do know that the Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction is around, and they're the 800 pound gorilla of shorter fantasy and sci-fi. Last I looked, they were basically publishing a small trade paperback, with nice cheap paper, every month, with some of the best stories ever, pretty consistently.

Sometimes I wish we still had the large selection of tales magazines of the 1930s to showcase smaller stories.

I'm continuously amazed that short fiction hasn't had a boom with the rise of ebooks and ereaders.

 

[Autumnal]

It has, particularly novellas. Amazon’s program of sets of 5-7 short stories as anthologies exists and flourishes, for example. Tor.com releases make good money as well as winning a lot of awards; similarly for other genres I know less about.

 

[Voadam]

I know that I find anthologies of short stories more attractive than full novels for me to pick up and read right now. Tonight I got back into my kindle copy of Space Legends of the Space Marines (a 40K short story anthology).

 

[prabe]

I know that I find anthologies of short stories more attractive than full novels for me to pick up and read right now. Tonight I got back into my kindle copy of Space Legends of the Space Marines (a 40K short story anthology).

Anthologies and collections have their advantages. They're easier to put down in the middle, and if you don't like a given story at least it'll end soon.

 

[cbwjm]

I know that I find anthologies of short stories more attractive than full novels for me to pick up and read right now. Tonight I got back into my kindle copy of Space Legends of the Space Marines (a 40K short story anthology).

I'm kind of the same, I'm no longer in the mood to read some 800 page novel like I used to be. Something small and easy to read is just perfect for me, I think that's why I've gone back to reading RE Howard.

 

[prabe]

I'm kind of the same, I'm no longer in the mood to read some 800 page novel like I used to be. Something small and easy to read is just perfect for me, I think that's why I've gone back to reading RE Howard.

I don't mind reading a big novel, if it's any good. I just spent my weekend nights reading a big novel that isn't, and I'm not super-happy about it (it has a reputation, so I didn't tap out--though I did skim a lot of it once I realized it was garbage).

 

[zakael19]

I just finished "The Secret Life of Groceries" by Benjamin Lorr. Really interesting bit of investigative journalism and history about the supermarket system and some of the logistics and intricacies that surround it.