Open Stories — Short Fiction by Hank Redding

Complete works shared freely, as written.
Four picked at random. No email required. No catch.

Reading strictly Westerns? See the literary Western short stories guide.

See all 40 open stories →

Choose by pressure

Three clean starting points

Quiet grief Where the River Narrows A restrained piece about grief, endurance, and choosing a direction after the familiar path ends. System pressure Held to Account A novel-length Western about responsibility without mercy and a town whose order works too well. Short and cold Car No. 47 A winter survival novella about waiting, abandonment, and what people measure when rescue does not come.

Collected works · 1982–Present

HR–009 The Day the Cottonwoods Bled 31 min read · Literary fiction

In 1871, a small western town is destroyed in a sudden act of violence. What follows is not justice or revenge, but the slow work of survival—burying the dead, choosing whether to stay, and learning what it means to live inside a place that remembers. The Day the Cottonwoods Bled is a five-part Western about loss, endurance, and what remains after the noise.

HR–004 The Bend in the Current 12 min read · Literary fiction

In a remote Wyoming basin, a solitary rancher spends his mornings fishing a slow bend in the river while the season presses quietly forward. When a boy arrives looking for work and instruction, their days unfold through labor, water, and restraint. The Bend in the Current is a quiet Western story about endurance, transmission, and what continues without resolution.

HR–002 After Mackinac City 33 min read · Literary fiction

A man sets out on a westbound ride that becomes an examination of what remains after a life quietly breaks apart. As distance accumulates, the story traces how freedom, connection, and disappearance can occupy the same road without offering answers.

HR–036 West of Holding 56 min read · Literary fiction

In 1878 West Texas, a ranch survives conditions that should have broken it. When a quiet stranger takes work and the land begins to adjust, the people who keep the place standing are forced to reckon with how endurance is maintained—and what it costs. West of Holding is a novel-length story about land, labor, and the unseen weight required to keep things from falling apart.

This collection grows as work concludes.
Stories are presented without revision or annotation.