Short Books for Tired Readers

Short novels and novellas for tired readers with short attention spans 😩

Updated October 25, 2023
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Breakfast at Tiffany's and three stories
Capote, Truman
Paper Book
Holly Golightly knows that nothing bad can ever happen to you at Tiffany's. In this seductive, wistful masterpiece, Capote created a woman whose name has entered the American idiom and whose style is a part of the literary landscape--her poignancy, wit, and naïveté continue to charm....
Our souls at night
Haruf, Kent
Paper Book
A spare yet eloquent, bittersweet yet inspiring story of a man and a woman who, in advanced age, come together to wrestle with the events of their lives and their hopes for the imminent future. In the familiar setting of Holt, Colorado, home to all of Kent Haruf's inimitable...
The ballad of Black Tom
LaValle, Victor D.
Paper Book
One of NPR's Best Books of 2016, winner of the Shirley Jackson Award, the British Fantasy Award, the This is Horror Award for Novella of the Year, and a finalist for the Hugo, Nebula, Locus, World Fantasy, and Bram Stoker Awards People move to New York looking for magic...
Every heart a doorway
McGuire, Seanan
Paper Book
Winner of the Hugo Award, Hugo Award for Best Series, Alex Award, Locus Award, and Nebula Award Nominated for the World Fantasy Award, British Fantasy Award, and Tiptree Honor List "A mini-masterpiece of portal fantasy -- a jewel of...
Lost in the moment and found
McGuire, Seanan
Paper Book
Winner: 2022 Hugo Award for Best Series A 2023 Indie Next Pick! A LibraryReads Hall of Fame Inductee! A young girl discovers an infinite variety of worlds in this standalone tale in the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning Wayward Children...
Where the drowned girls go
McGuire, Seanan
Paper Book
Winner: 2023 Hugo Award for Best Novella Winner: 2022 Hugo Award for Best Series In Where the Drowned Girls Go, the next addition to Seanan McGuire's beloved Wayward Children series, students at an anti-magical school...
Binti
Okorafor, Nnedi
Paper Book
Nnedi Okorafor's Binti is the winner of the Hugo Award and the Nebula Award for Best Novella! Her name is Binti, and she is the first of the Himba people ever to be offered a place at Oomza University, the finest institution of higher learning in the galaxy. But to...
My name is Lucy Barton : a novel
Strout, Elizabeth
Paper Book
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * A simple hospital visit becomes a portal to the tender relationship between mother and daughter in this extraordinary novel by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Olive Kitteridge and The Burgess Boys. Soon to be a...
All systems red
Wells, Martha
Paper Book
A New York Times and USA Today Bestseller Winner: 2018 Hugo Award for Best Novella Winner: 2018 Nebula Award for Best Novella Winner: 2018 Alex Award Winner: 2018 Locus Award One of the Verge's Best Books of 2017 A...
Another Brooklyn : a novel
Woodson, Jacqueline
Paper Book
A Finalist for the 2016 National Book Award New York Times Bestseller A SeattleTimes pick for Summer Reading Roundup 2017 The acclaimed New York Times bestselling and National Book Award-winning author of Brown Girl Dreaming delivers her first adult novel in twenty years...

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