The Story Prize Longlist for Story Collections Published in 2023

At The Story Prize, we announce our shortlist of three finalists first—as we did a few weeks ago—then release our longlist later. The three finalists, The Story Prize Spotlight Award winner (which we recently announced), and the longlist combine to highlight 20 books. Here are the books published in 2023 that we've chosen:

        •  Temple Folk by Aaliyah Bilal (Simon & Schuster)
        •  Witness by Jamel Brinkley (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
        •  I Meant It Once by Kate Doyle (Algonquin Books)
        •  The Faraway World by Patricia Engle (Avid Reader Press)
        •  Elsewhere by Yan Ge (Scribner)
        •  After the Funeral by Tessa Hadley (Alfred A. Knopf)
        •  Games and Rituals by Katherine Heiny (Alfred A. Knopf)
        •  The Best Possible Experience by Nishanth Injam (Pantheon)
        •  So Late in the Day by Claire Keegan (Grove Press)
        •  Disruptions by Steven Millhauser (Alfred A. Knopf)
        •  I Am My Country by Kenan Orhan (Random House)
        •  The Disappeared by Andrew Porter (Alfred A. Knopf)
        •  This Is Salvaged by Vauhini Vara (W.W. Norton)
        •  The People Who Report More Stress by Alejandro Varela (Astra House)
        •  Dearborn by Ghassan Zeineddine (Tin House)
        •  The Sorrows of Others by Ada Zhang (A Public Space)

Last year, The Story Prize received 113 books published by 84 different publishers or imprints. We read more worthwhile short story collections than is practical to include on our longlist, and it was very difficult to narrow down the choices. (That's why we take extra time to do some rereading before releasing our list.) As always, we believe that every writer who writes and publishes a short story collection has accomplished something significant and deserves a ton of credit. 

We've put together a Bookshop list of all the story collections that we received in 2023, many more worth reading than can fit on our longlist. We'll announce the 20th winner of The Story Prize on March 26 at a private event featuring readings by and interviews with the three finalists—Yiyun Li, Bennett Sims, and Paul Yoon. Before then, we'll provide links to watch the program live or online in the days that follow the announcement of the winner.