11 Short Stories High School Students Will Actually Enjoy
Open up any high school English textbook, and you’ll find short stories. Lots of short stories.
But short stories high school students will actually enjoy? Short stories high school students will actually care about? Short stories high school students will relate to? That’s a much tougher find.
Short stories are a staple in the high school ELA classroom, now more than ever. Their length not only makes them perfect for covering a wide variety of literary devices, time periods, authors, themes, and perspectives, but it also makes them more attractive and accessible to students who read reluctantly and disengaged teenagers with short attention spans. They’re packed with meaning, which makes them worthy of analysis at all levels.
But the short stories high school textbooks feature tend to be, well, kind of old. It’s rare to find one from this millennium, much less this decade, and while there’s a reason we’re still talking about “The Masque of the Red Death” and “Young Goodman Brown” and “The Yellow Wallpaper,” we have to do quite a bit of work to convince our students that the stories are interesting and relevant to their lives.
Due to time constraints and our many other responsibilities, most of us feel stuck with the short stories in our textbooks. We’d love to branch out, but we don’t know where to start, and we don’t have the time to read multiple collections in the hopes that we’ll find one story that will work. This was us (and we’ve compiled our favorite textbook finds for teaching plot, characterization, point of view, symbolism, irony, and setting).
But as we’ve engaged with high school teachers around the country, we’ve started to compile a list of the more modern and diverse short stories high school teachers are finding success with in their classrooms, and there are some good short stories out there.
You may not have the time to go on a short story hunt, but we have the time to do it for you, so if you’re looking to freshen up your curriculum with short stories high school students will actually enjoy, we’re sharing 11 we feel really excited about.
11 Short Stories High School Students Will Actually Enjoy Reading
“Appropriation of Cultures” (1996) by Percival Everett
We’re thrilled to have discovered this gem of a story, which is perfect if you’re looking for short stories with irony. In fact, it’s far better (and has far more substance) than the options we used in our AP Lit class; irony was the device we never quite found the perfect short story for, even though we tried quite a few.
Daniel Barkley, a Black man living in South Carolina, has money, a degree in American Studies from Brown University, and plenty of free time, which he uses to read and play jazz with some older men. One night, some frat boys request that the band play “Dixie,” the unofficial national anthem of the Confederacy, and when Daniel does, he claims the song as his own. After all, he, too, is from “the land of cotton,” and it is true that “old times there are not forgotten.”
Not long after, Daniel develops a desire to purchase a pick-up truck, particularly one with a Confederate flag decal in the back window, much to the confusion of the couple selling the car and the men and women, Black and white, young and old, who see Daniel driving it around South Carolina. Daniel’s response and the ripple effect of his actions raise fascinating and important issues for discussion, issues that are relevant today and get right to the root of American culture.
“Cherry Coke & Mint Pulao” (2020) by Anurag Andra
In this beautiful and heartbreaking short story, a young man discovers that his father is cheating on his mother. The story itself is short and simple, but it is a rich coming-of-age and loss-of-innocence story, capturing not only disillusionment about love (in a story Kate would have vastly preferred to James Joyce’s “Araby”) but also the realization that parents are not, in fact, perfect people.
This story would work well to teach point of view, as it is written in the rare second-person, effectively making the loss-of-innocence moment universal (and making a far more accessible example than the excerpt from Dickens’s “Somebody’s Luggage” we used to use), and it would also make a great opportunity to discuss symbolism: the father is associated with the artificial sweetness of Cherry Coke while the mother is associated with “the warm, brittle earth of mint pulao.”
“Death by Scrabble” (2012) by Charlie Fish
This is a popular short story in classrooms across the country, and it’s easy to see why. The darkly humorous narrative presents a husband, bored and suffocating in his middle age, playing an afternoon game of Scrabble with his wife, whom he apparently hates. As the temperature rises, exacerbating the narrator’s anger and resentment, he ruminates on the idea of killing his wife, looking to the letters for a sign of whether or not he should do it.
When the narrator notices that the words he and his wife are playing seem to be controlling what happens around them, he’s even more drawn to his plan, but the story’s ending is a perfect example of irony. Capturing the mundanity and restlessness of feeling trapped in a life you’re starting to resent, which may not necessarily be something high school students relate to, it also highlights the self-destructive effect of hatred and resentment (which is plenty familiar to them). Ultimately, we harm ourselves more than the person we resent.
The use of the stifling heat functions on a plot and symbolic level, and it is a great way to discuss foreshadowing: the story is short enough to read multiple times, going back to look for clues that hint at the ending long before it happens.
“Exotics” (2020) by Dantiel W. Moniz
Oh, there is so much to discuss with this one. It’s short, but there is so much packed in that it makes not only for an exercise in close reading but for a rich discussion of complex themes.
On the surface, the story is simple: told from the “we” perspective (the first-person plural is a fun approach to the point of view) of the waiters at a fancy dinner club where wealthy patrons eat increasingly exotic animals, we see the waiters’ horror and passivity, particularly when the wealthy patrons go too far at their last feast.
Because the meal at the last feast isn’t directly stated, the story rewards close reading and raises fascinating topics of discussion: the slippery slope of indulging whatever money will buy, the power dynamic between the wealthy and the poor, the extent to which people will go in service of “we only did our jobs.” There are some nice symbolic touches—the animal masks the wealthy patrons wear, the setting within an unremarkable building in a busy city—and we think students will definitely have something to say about it.
Do be aware that the ending is horrific, though not described graphically; it’s no worse than many of the other stories popular in upper-level high school English classes (think “A Modest Proposal”), but you’ll want to keep in mind your students and your community before using it in your classroom.
“A Family Supper” (1983) by Kazuo Ishiguro
Ishiguro’s short story would work nicely as a focus on conflict, characterization, mood, or point of view. The narrator has returned to his childhood home in Japan shortly after his mother has died from eating fugu, a poisonous fish that must be prepared carefully: if the two fragile bags containing the poison are not removed gently, the poison can leak into the fish’s veins, causing anyone who eats the fish to die a gruesome death.
There is a lot of unresolved conflict in the family: the story is full of tension, and the narrator never fully explains the cause of that tension. It’s clear that his parents disapproved of his choices earlier in life, perhaps his decision to move to the United States.
It’s the lack of clarity, however, that makes this story perfect for discussion: when the father serves his family fish at the end of the meal, we’re left wondering if it is the same poisoned fish that killed his mother. There’s room (and evidence) to interpret the story in multiple ways, but however you read the ending, the story points toward the dangers of suppressed emotion and unresolved or unspoken conflict as well as generational and cultural differences (the story happens after World War II in Japan, but the son now lives in America and the daughter is interested in going there as well).
It’s easy to read the father as a villain; however, this article on the narrator’s lack of openness suggests an alternative interpretation we found thought-provoking. We’re always looking for short stories that use typical conventions in unusual ways or have ambiguous endings. Many of the reviews we read compare Ishiguro, especially in this story, to Hemingway, and the story’s sparsity and lack of clarity remind us of “Hills Like White Elephants.”
Do be aware that there are references to suicide.
“The Paper Menagerie” (2011) by Ken Liu
Oof. This story is beautiful, but it’s painful. The narrator grows up enamored with his mother’s origami animals, which come to life for him. Yet when he turns 10 and moves to a new neighborhood, he starts to realize that his family is different: the neighboring women talk about him and his mother; his neighbor, Mark, mocks his tattered animals made from recycled paper (especially in comparison to Mark’s lightsabers); he’s called racial slurs at school. And, as the narrator longs to be accepted as American, he pushes away his paper animals, refuses to speak to his mother in Chinese, and becomes increasingly contemptuous and resentful toward her.
But after she dies, he discovers a letter she wrote to him, refolded as one of his paper animals, and he learns the story of her life before she met his father, her experience of the conflict between them.
The story, which would be perfect for a focus on characterization or conflict, captures the challenges and complexities of the mother-child relationship, but it adds the perspective of growing up caught between two cultures, and the particular challenges that immigrant and biracial children face.
“Popular Mechanics” (1981) by Raymond Carver
Another one that we’ve seen recommended frequently online, this story left us thinking and Googling quite a bit, which is, of course, the sign of a great short story.
Only two pages long, the story describes an encounter between a married couple: the husband is packing to leave his wife, and they fight over who will take their baby, to devastating effect.
But what makes the story rich and fascinating for discussion is its ambiguous ending: what, exactly, happened, and what, exactly, is Carver’s point?
This is a great piece for teaching allusion. The story of King Solomon ordering a baby to be cut in half jumps immediately to mind, and the title merits investigation. Carver originally titled the story, “Mine,” which makes obvious and immediate sense, and as we tried to work out why on earth he would change it, we discovered that the founder of Popular Mechanics wanted the magazine to “explain ‘the way the world works’ in plain language, with photos and illustrations to aid comprehension” (Wikipedia).
When we consider the title with that in mind, the universality of the characters’ behavior becomes readily apparent, and we have a memorable piece reminding us that, at heart, humans are selfish creatures. The story certainly comments upon the devastating impact divorce can have on children, but the title suggests that, perhaps, humans have a tendency toward selfishness that goes beyond this one situation to apply to all of us in some way.
“The Rock Eaters” (2015) by Brenda Peynado
We would love to know how our former students, many of whom are the children of immigrants, would respond to Peynado’s story.
The narrators, the first generation to leave their Caribbean island country, mysteriously gained the ability to fly when they came of age. When the story begins, they are returning with their own children and presents they couldn’t really afford but purchased to show their resentful family and friends that leaving was the right choice.
While home, the narrators (love the plural first-person point of view again!) remember what they loved about the island, and their children, too, fall in love with it. When the children start to come of age and develop their own flying abilities, they see the ability not as a source of joy and freedom but of terror: they do everything they can to weigh themselves down, to keep themselves from flying away and leaving, resulting in a climactic scene that tears the families apart.
The story effectively uses magical realism to capture the tension of being caught between two cultures: do I leave my home for new opportunities, or do I stay? What impact does my leaving have on the people I leave behind? What impact do my choices have on the next generation? But it also taps into the universal inevitability of growing up: immigrants or not, we can all relate to the tension that arises between parents and children as the children come of age and want to go their own way while the parents cling desperately to keep them by their side.
An excerpt from the story appeared in the prose analysis question (Q2) of the AP Literature exam in 2023, and we’d be inclined to check out more stories from Peynado’s collection.
“Standard Loneliness Package” (2010) by Charles Yu
“Don’t feel like having a bad day? Let someone else have it for you.”
We love this story and think it would lead to rich discussions. Our narrator lives in a world where technology has advanced to the point that we can pay others to experience our pain for us. Funerals, colonoscopies, broken arms, confrontations with a boss or lover . . . if you can afford the price, someone at a far-off call center will experience the pain and discomfort for you.
Our narrator works in one of the call centers, and through his reflections on his own experiences, his family’s experiences (his father has mortgaged his entire life away to earn money for the family), his coworkers’ experiences (his closest friend Deepak broke down and had to be carried out of the call center by paramedics), and his relationship with Kirthi (a young woman he meets at the call center), we are forced to reflect on what, in fact, life is without pain or suffering and what makes a life worth living.
And of course, there are the implications of class dynamics: it’s uncomfortable to look at a world where the rich can pay exorbitant prices for luxury while the poor provide that luxury just to make enough money to survive.
In our technological, global world, this story feels incredibly modern and relevant, and there are rich themes for you and your students to discuss.
“Sweetness” by Toni Morrison
When we stopped teaching The Bluest Eye, we still wanted to expose our students to Toni Morrison: she is, after all, a talented and important author, one they are likely to encounter in college literature classes.
We discovered “Sweetness,” an excerpt from God Help the Child published as a short story in The New Yorker in 2015. In it, a mother reflects back on her relationship with her daughter: the mother was born “light-skinned, with good hair” (as she refers to herself), but when her daughter is born “Midnight black, Sudanese black,” the mother is horrified, embarrassed, and briefly considers suffocating her newborn daughter.
The story provides us with opportunities to consider racism, segregation and its lingering effects, and colorism. But it also allows us to explore the complex relationship between parents and children. The story reads like a defense, as the mother tries to justify to us her treatment of her daughter growing up, trying to protect her from the prejudice she will face as a Black woman. And we understand it. But we also ache for the daughter, who was clearly hurt by her mother’s behavior, which the mother knows from their strained relationship. And the daughter is now pregnant, about to have her own child, and the mother knows her daughter and granddaughter will experience the same tensions.
side note
When we were researching popular short stories, we discovered quite a few teachers who also teach Morrison’s only short story, “Recitatif” (1983). On a first read, the story is a little bit confusing: what is it that Morrison is trying to get at? But when we read her own words on her purpose, that the story is “an experiment in the removal of all racial codes from a narrative about two characters of different races for whom racial identity is crucial,” along with Zadie Smith’s introduction to the release of “Recitatif” as its own volume, it’s fascinating, and Morrison’s artistry is clearly evident.
However, we’d be nervous to use this in class and open it up for discussion as we typically would: the point of Morrison’s experiment is to put the reader in the uncomfortable position of realizing they are making assumptions about the characters’ races and desperately wanting to know who is Black and who is white, but we’d be reluctant to open up a classroom discussion in which students are encouraged to give evidence for one side or the other, as it opens the floor for students to share potentially harmful stereotypes.
This might be a story we would have students read, followed by Smith’s critical analysis, before doing something with it. (Also, do be aware that there is a gay slur in it.)
“Two Words” (1989) by Isabel Allende
We’ve noticed a trend here with these stories that are so popular in AP classrooms across the country: they have ambiguous endings that leave the reader desperate for answers. And we’re here for it.
Belisa Crepusculario is a seller of words. Born into a poor family, Belisa sets out into the world on her own during a drought, after burying four of her younger siblings. When she discovers a mysterious piece of paper covered with “fly tracks” that someone explains to her are words, it changes her life. Now she travels from town to town, selling stories and carefully selected “secret words,” unique to each customer, that have the power to “drive away melancholy.”
She becomes famous enough that the infamous Colonel, feared for his association with “devastation and calamity” in the country’s civil war, sends his right-hand man, El Mulato, looking for her. The Colonel longs to be the country’s next President, respected and loved instead of feared, and so he needs Belisa to write a campaign speech for him. She does (admirably well), and she also leaves him with two words crafted specially for him, words that bewitch and entrance him, words that he obsesses over every second that he is not delivering his speech. In the end, Allende never reveals those words (though we can certainly guess), but it brings Belisa and the Colonel together again in an unexpected way.
Ultimately, as English teachers, stories like this are our bread and butter: it gives us the opportunity to discuss the power of words, small things that can have a massive impact on the world around us. And, perhaps, there is something that has just a little bit more power to “drive away melancholy,” in the end.
Our mission to investigate short stories high school students would actually enjoy reading and discussing was a delight. There are some great stories out there, and we’d be tempted to throw out our whole curriculum to put this collection in front of our students. Every story on this list rewards close reading and offers ample opportunity for lively discussion (and the kinds of arguments about ambiguous endings that we love to see as English teachers).
Do you teach any of these stories? Please tell us what your experience with them has been. Do you have must-read short stories high school students have liked? Tell us about them. You can reach us at [email protected] or on Instagram @threeheads.works.
And no matter what short story you select, we’ve got a character analysis activity that reinforces our 5C paragraph structure, helping your students improve their ability to write about literature, not just argue about it in lively oral discussion. The activity can be used with any short story and includes student directions, an easy-to-use scoring rubric, a student bookmark reminding them of the 5Cs, and a list of adjectives that describe character.
