Elwin Cotman 89 pages Nomadic Press (2023)

Read this if you like: mythic fantasy, punk poetry, Haruki Murakami tl;dr summary: Combination poetry collection and story about a galaxy-traveling wizard

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Multiple authors (anthology) 302 pages Air and Nothingness Press (2022)

Read this if you like: Dr. Who, non-humanoid aliens, speculative short fiction

tl;dr summary: Interdimensional librarian has adventures, loans books, preserves knowledge across the multiverse.

See the book on the Air and Nothingness Press website

Juan Villoro (trans. Kimi Traubb) 136 pages George Braziller, Inc. (2015)

Read this if you like: Denis Johnson, Roberto Bolaño, Mexican culture

tl;dr summary: Magical realism without the magic in modern Mexico

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Jennifer Wortman 167 pages Split/Lip Press (2019) 

Read this if you like: Susan Minot, Kristen Roupenian, writing flash fiction

Tl;dr summary: Stories of people trying to find and show love and mostly failing, but in a funny, beautifully-written way.

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Chapbook-length manuscripts are admittedly more common for poetry than for fiction, but that certainly doesn’t mean they’re off-limits for prose writers. This length of around 20-40 pages is ideal for collections of micro-fiction and micro-essays, as well as stand alone short stories and essays that aren’t quite big enough to be novellas (if you write things that straddle that length divide, you can check out my list of long short story and novella publishers to find more places to send them).

Since this length and style of book has been considered the domain of poets for so long, though, searching for fiction chapbook publishers can be frustrating. They’re definitely out there—it can just take creative search terms and time spent scouring press guidelines to find them.

Chris Tarry 128 pages Red Hen Press (2015)

Read this if you like: Kelly Link, Raymond Carver, Haruki Murakami tl;dr summary: Quirky merger of cryptids and fantasy with real-world settings and emotions.

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Christine Rice 361 pages University of Hell Press (2016)

Read this if you like: Jennifer Egan’s A Visit from the Goon Squad, Alan Heathcock’s Volt

tl;dr summary: Life in New Canaan, MI is shitty, and lots of different characters tell you why.

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Sherrie Flick 207 pages Autumn House Press (2016)

Read this if you like: Writing and reading flash fiction

tl;dr summary: Collection of short (and short-short) literary stories showing the everyday lives of a variety of characters.

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