Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author’s brain, their soul and heart. They can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that are difficult to achieve elsewhere.

In this series we try to offer up tried and trusted ‘Top Tens’ across many different themes and authors. But any anthology will immediately throw up the questions – Why that story? Why that author?

The theme itself will form the boundaries for our stories which range from well-known classics, newly told, to stories that modern times have overlooked but perfectly exemplify the theme. Throughout the volume our authors whether of instant recognition or new to you are all leviathans of literature.

Some you may disagree with but they will get you thinking; about our choices and about those you would have made. If this volume takes you on a path to discover more of these miniature masterpieces then we have all gained something.

The City of Lights may be one of the glories of the world but for those whose three score and ten have passed it is the final resting place for some of the very finest of literary talents.

1 - The Top 10 Short Stories - Buried in Paris - An Introduction

2 - Claude Gueux by Victor Hugo

3 - The Maison Tellier by Guy de Maupassant

4 - Plato's Dream by Voltaire

5 - The Atheist's Mass by Honore de Balzac

6 - The Spectral Hand by Jean Lorrain

7 - The Secret of the Scaffold by Auguste Villiers de I'Ísle-Adam

8 - The Siege of Berlin by Alphonse Daudet

9 - Rooms by Gertrude Stein

10 - The Opium Gates by Marcel Schwob

11 - Lord Arthur Savile's Crime - Part 1 by Oscar Wilde

12 - Lord Arthur Savile's Crime - Part 2 by Oscar Wilde