This week's stories are about time travel, technology, talking foxes, and I guarantee one of the oddest quest protagonists you'll have met in a long time.

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Four stories a week seems to be about my level at the moment, so no Friday story yet again. It's possible four stories will be the norm now? We'll see.

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I hope everyone is enjoying my focus on softer stories with happy endings because it is not about to stop. I would love to see more of these types of stories make it into the SFF awards lists this year but even if that doesn't happen I hope writing these posts is helping to make some of my favourite stories more visible.

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Happy New Year everyone. Hope you are all well, and ready to face 2021. I'm going into this year with a lot of gratitude for a variety of different things that I don't want to write about because I am terrified of tempting fate. However, my brain feels it can safely talk about my gratitude for all the creative people, and their work, that kept me going in 2020; starting with a list of favourite short fiction that I read last year.

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A bit of a departure for me this week as I read two horror stories, and a very sad story. If you don't want to read about ghosts, or death, right now (I think we can all understand why), don't worry - I also stayed true to my emerging "soft stories" brand by starting this roundup with a story about a talking cat.

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This week, I have a Christmas craft project I need to wrap up so I might just read flash fiction to fit Short Business in. If there are any great pieces of flash fiction you think I should read drop links in the comments :)

When I first started this post I expected it to be my last Short Business post of the year:

"Possibly my last Short Business post of 2020 as I've just had my last week of holiday until after Christmas? Idk, we'll see how the end of the retail year works out in our new landscape."

How the end of the retail year is working out is… I am back on furlough as all non-essential retail in England closed back down at the end of 04/11/20, in accordance with government guidance, as our country tries to get the 'R number' for coronavirus infections back down. The current government forecast is that we'll re-open on Dec 2nd, but of course we have to see how infection rates and NHS capacity goes before we really know whether that's going to be possible.

I think eventually we all realised there would have to be a second national lock down, but I can't say anyone at our shop expected it to be for a month. And while I absolutely think we need to be shutting places down again to lower infections, deaths, and risk, it's hard to be a human and not to have emotions about a second lock down in terms of how it impacts your own general life and work. With regards to work, our bookshop had just had a really great week. Like, really great. I was feeling positive, and as ready as you can ever be to go into peak retail hard. So, it's a tough turn around to go from that, as well as the level of activity that working retail puts into your life at this time of year, to furlough. My main message is, if you can support your local bookshops at this time (chain and indies) please do. Even a really nice customer comment sent through to managers right now would be appreciated.

Personally, I'm going to try to treat this month as a longish holiday and just chill out reading, watching movies, and TV, while also doing a few things to keep myself feeling like I have a sense of purpose. I'm going to finish the colour in Christmas cards I'm going to send this year. I'm going to try (again) to learn how to knit a scarf. I'm going to take regular walks. And I'm going to return to reading five short stories a week, and doing Short Business posts about them. Hurray, artificially created, self-imposed purpose?

Anyway, on to this week's stories. I don't have five this week because I finished work on Wednesday, and I am adjusting, and I make the rules for this whole thing. But I do have some thoughts on three really interesting stories (some spoilers under the cut).

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This month, I unwittingly read three stories published by Luna Station Quarterly; a magazine I don't think I've ever read before. I'll definitely be investigating what they put out in the future because I really enjoyed all three stories.

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What short fiction have you been reading recently?

Having returned to work, and spent some time adjusting to the new retail, it's pretty clear that even while working at a smaller shop, with an earlier finishing time, and no events to run for the foreseeable future I'm not going to manage to keep creating weekly posts about five short stories. Happily, I've now got a week of holiday, even if that feels bizarre to say having only gone back under two months ago. And as I'm still not planning to go anywhere that isn't absolutely necessary, I have a bit of time to write about four of the short stories I've managed to squeeze into my lunch breaks.

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This week's stories are about magicians, haunted houses, the weirdest summer job, the politics of robots, and magical girls who grew into magical women. Dive in!

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( Ideas for supporting these short fiction authors at this time )

Feel free to use the comments to recommend short stories you'd like to see written about here.

Libraries, cursed swords, magical restaurants, inter-galactic jazz bands, and the end of the world. Surely, there is something for everyone in this week's Short Business?

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( Ideas for supporting these short fiction authors at this time )

Feel free to use the comments to recommend short stories you'd like to see written about here.