What are some short stories with twist endings?
 

I know there is a short story thread, but I'm looking specifically for shorts with twist endings.

The reason is because I'm trying to find examples of 2000ad future shocks and couldn't find any(other then the one), so I thought short story's in traditional literature would work as well.

Let's start with the obvious.

"Occurrence at Owlcreek Bridge", by Ambrose Bierce.

read it

"The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson

read that too

Before we continue this thread, why don't you give us a list of candidates that you've already read?

Where the Wild Things Are

Eh? There's a lesser known forum than Book Talk?

Charlie by the aforementioned Shirley Jackson

Also, anything by O'Henry. Twist endings were his speciality.

I meant to say short story thread, not forum.
And the stories I have read:
The Lottery
The Gifit of the Magi
Occurrence at Owlcreek Bridge
The coming out of Maggie

That's pretty much it, I assumed people would post other examples. Sorry.


And would you mind listing specific o henry stories with twists? The few that I've read didn't really have twists.

"The Last Question" by Isaac Asimov (Currently available in the book "Robot Dreams.")

O'Henry was famous for writing short stories with twist endings.

would you mind listing specific o henry stories with twists? The few that I've read didn't really have twists.

Actually i can't - i'm stretching back to a short story class i took my first year of college and i remember having a compendium of O'Henry short stories and us talking in class about one of his styles being the twist ending. Bear in mind this is a memory from several years back so perhaps i have him wrong.

Philip K Dick's short stories also typically have twist endings. There are too many for me to list, or remember, you'd probably be fine just getting a short story collection from him and read the whole thing. However, there's some specific ones I remember.

First off, there's:
Minority Report
Impostor
Second Variety
We Can Remember it for you Wholesale
Paycheck

All of these were adapted into films, although the short story endings are all different than their filmed counterparts, typically offering a different "twist" than the films.

Some others:

War Veteran
War Game
The Variable Man
The Hood Maker

Aside from twist endings, you can't go wrong with Philip K. Dick. The man was a genius of sci-fi literature and one of my fav authors. I especially like Galactic Pot-Healer and Flow My Tears the Policeman Said.

Another Isaac Asimov short story, "The Billiard Ball" has a twist ending.

From Harlan Ellison, there's the stories "Base," "Brillo," "Chained to the Fast Lane in the Red Queen's Race," "Run For The Stars," and "Mefisto In Onyx"

From Neil Gaiman, there's "Sunbird," "We Can Get Them For You Wholesale," and "Murder Mysteries"

Likewise for Guy de Maupassant...sort of a French O. Henry. GREAT ending to "The Necklace."

Edgar Allan Poe is an obvious one.

Ray Bradbury's "A Sound of Thunder" and "The Veldt" are two of my student's favorites.

Frank Stockton's "The Lady, or the Tiger?" is a classic.

"The Monkey's Paw" has a neat twist at the end.

The short stories of Saki (aka H.H. Munro) also often have twist endings.

Pretty much any of them. His most famous twist story is "The Ransom of Red Chief".

Thought of another story that I liked as a kid (although I doubt it would hold up today): "Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper" by Robert Bloch.

Good call. "The Interlopers" is another of my student's favorites.

If you're into modern crime/thrillers. Jeffrey Deaver has a solid book of short stories out there titled Twisted.

I second this, check out PKD his short stories I have really enjoyed and most of them seem to have twist endings.

The Sniper-Liam O'Flaherty