Menu

Menu
Prompts
Contests
Stories
Blog
Featured stories
Activity feed

Discover weekly, the best short stories

Looking for a steady supply of adventure short stories? Every week thousands of writers submit stories to our writing contest.

8520+ Adventure Short Stories to read

Submitted by writers on Reedsy Prompts to our weekly writing contest. From riding the high sea to climbing behemoth mountains, there isn’t any action that’s out of reach when it comes to adventure stories.

Adventure Short Stories – Page 26 of 569

The 4 leaf clover club

Submitted to Contest #285

This is how I remember the story as I read it in the local newspaper. I was twelve at the time and wished it had happen to me and my friends. My mother kept the article on our fridge’s door for a while because she always says that nothing ever happens in this town. The sky is darkening by the minutes, they have to shout to hear themselves as the wind is picking up. “You sure it’s in there?” shout Sarah to her best friends. “I don’t know, but we have to find out!”says Matt looking at the two other friends standing over their bicycle in front ...

15 likes 4 comments 4
Read story

Flume of Doom

Submitted to Contest #285

Content warning: Strong language The infamous' Flume of Doom' is like an enormous roof gutter running north to south through Utah, channeling summer run-off from the Wasatch Range.    And here you are, with your girl, Debbie, and best friend, Kirk, peering down at the rushing water. This is the entry point for daredevils and idiots. And you, sir, are no daredevil.    This is where you and your friends might be cutting your little road trip short because you're about to stand on the brink of uncertainty...

5 likes 2 comments 2
Read story

Pesky Breathing

Submitted to Contest #285

There was a steel leader attached to the end of the old surf fishing rod, but no hook. I’d forgotten to bring something for bait anyway, so I climbed below to check the junk drawer in the cabin cruiser’s galley for any stray lures. The rhythmic, steady sound of the engines was a bit muffled from the cabin, but a steady ocean breeze coming through partially opened windows would keep you awake. There was a lure in the back of the drawer that was larger than I wanted to use, about five inches or so. It did have a menacing treble hook in the mid...

4 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

The Long Distance Call

Submitted to Contest #285

Lisa stretched the beige phone cord as far as it would go from its base in the kitchen, the coiled plastic extending like a compressed spring as she walked into the living room. The cord snaked around the corner, catching slightly on the doorframe. She could hear her mother sighing in the kitchen, probably wanting to make dinner but unable to move too far from the phone's mounting point on the wall. "Hello?" The voice on the other end was scratchy, distant. "Mrs. Henderson? It's Lisa Mitchell." "Oh, Lisa! Darling, I can barely hear you. Are ...

7 likes 1 comment 1
Read story

Zelda's trip

Submitted to Contest #285

Zelda’s tripBy Randy NelsonGuards surround Zelda as she boards the train. Not a trip she’d planned, her attorney struck a deal with the judge. She must complete this assignment, or be incarcerated.Strolling past onlookers she considers her decision. I wasn’t given much of a choice, twenty years, or help with this mission. Twenty years seems like forever for someone who’s thirty. Entering her private coach she notices food, and a note on the table, as well as her old friend propped in the corner.Overlooking the table she rushes toward the bla...

19 likes 11 comments 11
Read story

A Saturday Exploit

Submitted to Contest #285

A Saturday Exploit I remember Saturday afternoons. They dangled like a carrot at the end of the school week—golden. Dad would be at work. Mom would be occupied with the littles. Saturday meant freedom.I had seven siblings, and I was blessed to be number five. The middle ones get the least attention which was the way we liked it. Me and my brother, the brother one up from me and number four, we were best friends. He had fun friends, too.The two of us, plus his friends, always meant adventure. Like the time we rode the swollen stream on a raft...

8 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

THE OLD MAN AND THE RIVER

Submitted to Contest #285

I remember the summer I turned twelve, the summer that changed me forever. It was the summer I met Old Man Jenkins, the summer I learned to love the river, and the summer I discovered the secrets it held. Our town was small, nestled between two great oak trees and the winding river that gave us life. Everyone knew everyone, and we all looked out for one another. But there was one person who kept to himself, one person who was a mystery to us all: Old Man Jenkins. He lived in a small cabin on the outskirts of town, near the river's edge. Some...

14 likes 8 comments 8
Read story

Lost in Time

Submitted to Contest #285

In the year 2026, Eliza Trent was a brilliant physicist known for her groundbreaking work in quantum mechanics. Her lab housed the world’s first functional time machine—a sleek, pod-like device that used a controlled wormhole to bend space and time. Although intended for observation rather than travel, Eliza couldn’t resist the temptation to take a small leap into the past, just to test her theories firsthand. On a quiet night, with her colleagues gone, she set the machine to transport her to 1995—a year she remembered vividly from her child...

3 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

One More Time

Submitted to Contest #285

Opening my lids is like sandpaper raking across the inside of my eyes. Breathing is laboured, almost as though I am struggling to catch my breath through something heavy and cloaking, but by blinking a few times against the beams of light that creep through the wooden walls – I can see this isn’t the case. The sounds of screaming and far off attacks of some sort invade my ears like thunder, but I hear something closer… something more familiar. It’s a shuffling sound with irregular bumps every now and again and... something, someone else. Som...

7 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

Time traveling

Submitted to Contest #285

The hum was a low, persistent thrum that vibrated through Dr. Alistair Finch’s bones. It was the sound of the Temporal Displacement Unit, tucked away in the repurposed bunker beneath his family’s ancestral estate. He’d spent the better part of a decade perfecting it, fuelled by a relentless need to understand the past, not just read about it. Tonight, that need had become an obsession.Alistair was a man of order, of meticulous planning. Yet, as he adjusted the chronometer, setting it for June 12th, 1998, a tremor of something akin to fear ra...

3 likes 2 comments 2
Read story

Paris Éternelle

Submitted to Contest #285

I remember Paris. Not Paris of Troy, but Paris, the city of love—the city we all love, even when her mood turns grim on winter days.Paris has seen and been the stage of much change; I’ve always been there to witness it all. I’m not sure who I am, but I know who she is. I know her every street and corner, from the vast and damp catacombs to the most minute inscriptions on the cross perched at the top of the Sacré-Coeur, her most passionate lovers and her greatest enemies; sometimes, it’s hard to discern where I end from where she begins.My fi...

9 likes 1 comment 1
Read story

Back Then

Submitted to Contest #285

I never believed my Dad until he died. Even then, I had to go back in time and verify his fairy tales. I loved him. Still do. But the stories he told me were irrelevant to the space I occupied. His outpourings were outlandish, and they just did not belong in my world. I could not comprehend the world of lack that he spoke so fondly of. My Dad was the best man I ever knew. But he had these oddball moments and in those moments he was a bizarre parody of himself. He’d have this wistful expression and I knew what was coming even before he looked...

15 likes 17 comments 17
Read story

The Pirate

Submitted to Contest #285

                                                   My life came crashing down when a robbery took a deadly turn, claiming two lives. The judge sentenced me to thirty years to life. I had settled into prison life when a scientist approached me a year ago with a proposition, ...

5 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

Sonny Learns a Lesson

Submitted to Contest #285

Grandpa, when did openly discussing the high cost of bread ($3.25) and cigarettes ($1.25) become unacceptable?"Isn't it terrible, Sonny?""It sure is. Especially since, in your day, it must've been so cheaper for you to buy what you could then in bulk and sell it wholesale now that the prices have risen so high for half the price and still make a profit? No?""But, Sonny, who has the wherewithal to think that far in advance or to have a warehouse that large?"Sonny asked, “Was it you, grandfather? Did you have the wherewithal? If refrigerating ...

10 likes 0 comments 0
Read story

A Journey Through Time: Jane’s Unforgettable Adventure

Submitted to Contest #285

“A Journey Through Time: Jane’s Unforgettable Adventure” By Edward J. McCoul “I remember a day I was so excited because I was going to the Clark Gable Museum in Cadiz, Ohio! What would take place was the furthest thing from my wildest imagination that would happen!”Jane had always been a fan of classic Hollywood films, and visiting the Clark Gable Museum was a dream come true. As she wandered through the exhibits, admiring the memorabilia and photographs, she felt a sense of nostalgia and wonder. On the second floor, she noticed a small, inc...

10 likes 0 comments 0
Read story
RBE | Illustrated Short Stories | 2024-06

Bring your short stories to life

Fuse character, story, and conflict with tools in Reedsy Studio. All for free.