By length
Best Short Novels & Novellas
The novella is the novel with nothing to waste. Too long for a short story's single effect, too short to sprawl, it forces a writer to concentrate — and in the right hands the result hits harder than a book three times its length.
These are the finest examples, ranked by intensity and annotated with what each one accomplishes in so few pages: a whole life, a single unbearable descent, a moral fable that will not let go. Every title opens a study guide, and every one can be read in an afternoon.
- 15 books
- 15 authors
- 1843–2002 span
- 1
The Woman in Black
OCR set textSusan Hill · 1983 · Novella · novel
- 2
Animal Farm
OCR set textGeorge Orwell · 1945 · Novella · novel
- 3
The Call of the Wild
Common CoreJack London · 1903 · Novella · novel
- 4
A Christmas Carol
Eduqas set textCharles Dickens · 1843 · Novella · novella
- 5
Chronicle of a Death Foretold
IB set textGabriel García Márquez · 1981 · Novella · novella
- 6
How Many Miles to Babylon?
Leaving CertJennifer Johnston · 1974 · Novella · novel
- 7
Heart of Darkness
AP Lit set textJoseph Conrad · 1899 · Novella · novella
- 8
Of Mice and Men
Edexcel set textJohn Steinbeck · 1937 · Novella · novella
- 9
The House on Mango Street
AP Lit set textSandra Cisneros · 1984 · Novella · novella
- 10
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Edexcel set textRobert Louis Stevenson · 1886 · Novella · novella
- 11
The Metamorphosis
IB set textFranz Kafka · 1915 · Novella · novella
- 12
Billy Budd, Sailor
AP Lit set textHerman Melville · 1924 · Novella · novella
- 13
Kitchen
IB set textBanana Yoshimoto · 1988 · Novella · novel
- 14
The Old Man and the Sea
AP Lit set textErnest Hemingway · 1952 · Novella · novella
- 15
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