Zoë Fairbairns

Short Stories

Bus Ticket

Short stories sometimes have long lives. One of my shortest, Bus Ticket, was written in 1974 and published in 1978. It was republished in 2003 as part of a longer story, Bus Ticket Revisited.

It has now been revisited again. Click here to read Bus Ticket Revisited Revisited. 

Other short stories by Zoë Fairbairns

Cover - How do you pronounce NULLIPAROUSHow Do You Pronounce Nulliparous?

These stories, set mainly in London and its more-or-less fashionable suburbs, occupy the spaces between words and actions, beliefs and realities. A 40-year-old woman who has never had children and never wanted to, revisits her decision. A little girl wonders why she attends a school run by a religion that neither she nor her parents belong to. 50-something lefties discover things that they might have preferred not to know about their pensions. A woman goes to meet her partner’s new love, and tries to be friendly.

Published by Five Leaves Publications.
Available from the publishers, from bookshops and libraries, or through this link to Amazon.co.uk

Boot Camp in Quality Women’s Fiction 50.

“Sir, the recruit doesn’t know why she’s here, sir!”
Boot camps take many different forms.

Daffodil Dell on BBC Radio 4.

“An anaesthetist with no-one to anaesthetise can only be bad news.”
 Tooth extractions don’t always go according to plan…
Click here for more information.

Pink Mist in Tales of Psychotherapy

edited by Jane Ryan. (Karnac Books)
“I’ve got a meeting directly after this, so could we get started? We have started? Oh.”
Some forms of brief therapy are briefer than others.

Bus Ticket Revisited

in Mechanics' Institute Review
“I’m not sitting with a bunch of asylum seekers.”
Public transport is full of stories.

Decisions in The Yellow Room.

“In the immediate aftermath of a bereavement, you should avoid making big decisions. Everyone knows that. But some decisions won’t wait.”

Other short fiction

  • - "Bus Ticket", "Acts of Violence" and "You Only Have To Say" in Tales I Tell My Mother (Journeyman, 1978)
  • - “Spies for Peace” in Voices from Arts for Labour, (Pluto Press, 1986)
  • - "Lots of Love", "Mrs Morris Changes Lanes" and "I was a Teenage Novelist" in More Tales I Tell My Mother (Journeyman, 1986)
  • - "Relics" in Despatches from the Frontiers of the Female Mind (Women's Press, 1986)
  • - "Covetousness" in The Seven Deadly Sins (Serpent's Tail, 1988)
  • - "Mrs Morris Changes Lanes" in Finding Courage (The Crossing Press, 1989 )
    - "Fortitude" in The Seven Cardinal Virtues (Serpent's Tail, 1991)
  • - "Relics " in The Penguin Book of Modern Fantasy by Women (Penguin 1991)
  • - "The de Montfort Essay Cup" in The Man Who Loved Presents (Women's Press, 1991) Also on BBC Radio 4, 1995, 1996
  • - "Neck and Neck" in Serious Hysterics (Serpent's Tail, 1992)
  • - "One of the Family", my short story dramatised by John Petherbridge, BBC Radio 4, 1993
  • - "By The Light of the Silvery Moon" in By The Light Of The Silvery Moon (Virago, 1994)
  • - "The Rules" BBC Radio 4, 1998
  • - "Stop The City" BBC Radio 4, 2003
  • - "Bus Ticket" in Short Stories for the English Class (Les Cahiers Pedagogiques de L'AIRDIL, 2004)
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