Short mystery fiction

  • “The Float House,” Forthcoming in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine

  • “Cold Storage,” Forthcoming in Home Sweet Homicide (a Sisters in Crime anthology)

  • “The Toll,” Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, January/February 2025

  • “Good Reason,” WritersDigest.com, October 2024

  • “You Get What You Get”, Mystery Magazine, February 2024

  • “Exodus,” Mystery Magazine, April 2023

A student is found hanging in the bell tower. An old man indulges his passion for tripping people. A young woman finds more than brisket in her uncle’s chest freezer.

Jillian Grant Shoichet’s short fiction pulls the reader into the lives of others, revealing intimate details, half-acknowledged fears, and hidden desires. There may be a body, there may be a secret. There is always a sense of discovery.

Short literary prose

A dead ostrich. A nuclear mishap. A devastating wildfire. A missing woman. A locked room.

Jillian Grant Shoichet’s short prose explores relationships, loss, resilience, and the sometimes otherworldly beauty of grieving.

  • “From Ashes”, Bristol Short Story Prize Anthology, July 2025

  • “Mothers and Daughters”, Fish Prize Anthology, July 2025

  • “Salt,” Exeter Writers Short Story Prize, June 2025

  • “Stargazing,” Toronto Journal, Winter 2025

  • “Israeli Hitchhiking Rules,” subTERRAIN Magazine, Spring 1997

Bitter Waters

She’s the only female scholar at the Sura rabbinic academy—and the only person who clear her brother’s name.

When a kitchen maid is found dead in the academy infirmary, Lior Ben Yochai’s apothecary brother is accused of the girl’s murder. Lior is convinced of Caleb’s innocence, but seventh-century Persian politics and cultural expectations make it difficult for the quick-witted young scholar to uncover the truth.