Amazon Original Stories | Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Warm Bodies
Author: John Marr
Publisher: Amazon Original Stories
Publication date: November 1, 2026*
Length: 107 pages
Genre: Contemporary fiction
Source: Kindle First Reads freebie
Rating:

From the multimillion-copy bestselling author comes a chilling tale about Brenda: they watched her, judged her, and talked. They should have left her alone.

Brenda lives quietly in a picture-perfect English village. She looks after her grandchildren, restores old furniture, and keeps herself to herself. She’s the sort of neighbour people feel comfortable judging.

And judge they do. Because villages notice everything. The shopping. The visitors. The hours kept behind closed doors. And when the local WhatsApp group begins to turn its attention to Brenda, curiosity hardens into suspicion, and gossip becomes a sport.

As scrutiny tightens, Brenda finds herself navigating busybodies, moral crusaders and a community that believes it knows best. What they don’t know is that Brenda has spent a lifetime solving problems discreetly.

Methodically. Permanently.

Well, this was a fun little diversion! Warm Bodies was one of the free options for Kindle First Reads this month. The cover caught my eye, I read the synopsis, and I just had to know more!

In this short(ish) story, Brenda is just trying to take care of her family and mind her own business. In her fifties, she provides a home for her daughter and three grandchildren. They’ve had the good fortune of moving to a sweet little cottage in a lovely village, where the children are safe and attend good schools. Brenda is a doting grandmother, and after years of just barely scraping by, works hard to provide a good life for the people she loves.

What she actually does for work is revealed and, well, it’s not precisely what you’d consider grandmotherly… but it keeps a nice roof over the family’s heads and food on the table, and she does enjoy the challenge of it all.

But the neighbors are not exactly warm and welcoming, and Brenda has declined invitations to join volunteer committees and clubs once too often. The village chat has zoomed in on Brenda, and they’re determined to drive her away. As the gossip mounts, Brenda finds herself at the center of unwanted attention that presents a danger to herself and her family’s well-being… and she really can’t have that.

The writing here is snappy and a bit twisted. The village WhatsApp thread oozes viciousness under a layer of fake concern. Brenda is a marvel, savvy and practical, incredibly loving yet capable of doing whatever needs to be done, and what needs to be done… well, let’s just say, it isn’t pleasant.

Warm Bodies is a small town thriller with a dark sense of humor. Some scenes may be a bit much for squeamish readers. I found it all oodles of fun. Brenda is a terrific character — I wouldn’t want to hang out with her, but it was certainly entertaining (in a totally macabre way) to be inside her head for a while. I’m glad I stumbled across this short read and gave it a try!

*A note on the publication date: November 1, 2026 is listed as the official release date for Warm Bodies, but it’s available now as a First Reads pick for Amazon Prime subscribers.

Title: The Answer is No
Author: Fredrik Backman
Publisher: Amazon Original Stories
Publication date: December 1, 2024
Length: 68 pages
Genre: Contemporary fiction
Source: Purchased
Rating:

In a hilarious short story from New York Times bestselling author Fredrik Backman, the absurdities of modern life cause one man’s solitary world to spin suddenly, and comically, out of control.

Lucas knows the perfect night entails just three things: video games, wine, and pad thai. Peanuts are a must! Other people? Not so much. Why complicate things when he’s happy alone?

Then one day the apartment board, a vexing trio of authority, rings his doorbell. And Lucas’s solitude takes a startling hike. They demand to see his frying pan. Someone left one next to the recycling room overnight, and instead of removing the errant object, as Lucas suggests, they insist on finding the guilty party. But their plan backfires. Colossally.

Told in Fredrik Backman’s singular witty style with sharply drawn characters and relatable antics, The Answer Is No is a laugh-out-loud portrait of a man struggling to keep to himself in a world that won’t leave him alone.

A new story from Fredrik Backman is practically guaranteed to be a joy to read… so does The Answer is No succeed? The answer is yes!

This funny, quirky tale is about a man who wants the world to leave him alone, but the world doesn’t seem to get the message. He’s perfectly happy, until the frying pan incident spirals out of control, bringing visitor after visitor to his door.

It’s a cute, clever story with a simple plot. What makes it a gem is Backman’s writing, of course. Here are a few choice snippets:

Lucas is happy. This is a very provoking thing to the world. Because people aren’t supposed to be happy, they’re only supposed to want to be happy, because how otherwise are you supposed to be able to sell things to them?

Just to be clear: It’s not that Lucas hates other people. He just really enjoys being where other people aren’t. He works well in groups as long as it’s groups of fewer than two people.

“During the night someone left an old frying pan on the ground outside the recycling room!” the first head explains, as if this were the beginning of a detective novel where a dead body’s been found in a lake, and a divorced police officer from the big city who has just returned to her childhood home is drawn into an investigation that forces her to confront her past, but which may or may not also give her the chance to fall in love with a man in a flannel shirt who has a golden retriever and a charming down-to-earth view of life.

Lucas opens the door with the defeated manner of a sausage that dressed itself up as a carrot to avoid being eaten by a bear, only to be found by a rabbit.

The Answer is No is available now as a First Reads pick for Amazon Prime subscribers, and will be released officially as of December 1st. It’s a sweet, cheery treat — and obviously, a must-read for Fredrik Backman fans!