Table of Contents, February 2026
A new crop of short stories to check out this month
Welcome to another installment of Table of Contents: a roundup of the latest short fiction hitting the web for the SF/F world.
You can check out last month's installment here – it's been newly updated with the stories that came out over the course of January 2026, and you can check out prior installments of this column here.
Apex Magazine (Spring 2026, Issue 152)
Subscribe here.
Fiction
- "Unsettled Nature" by Jordan Kurella
- "Piglet Delivers" by Maria Haskins — 2/17
- "Shrinkage!" by Ashlee Lhamon — 2/10
Nonfiction
- "Musings from Maryland" by Lesley Conner
- "Intellectual Colonialism and the Erasure of South and Eastern European Writing Voices: Another Tikka-Masala" by Sophia-Maria Nicolopoulos — 2/5
- Interview with Author Maria Haskins by Marissa van Uden — 2/19
Clarkesworld Magazine (February 2026, Issue 233)
Subscribe here.
Fiction
- "Remember Me in the Meat" by Sarah Pauling
- "Chip" by D.A. Xiaolin Spires
- "Think of Me Before I Disappear" by Raahem Alvi
- "A Sleeper Ship Is Like a Game of Go" by Claire Jia-Wen
- "The Iron Piper" by Fiona Moore
- "Painstaking" by Rich Larson
- "Three Fortunes on Alcestis as Told by the Fraud Baeliss Shudal" by Louis Inglis Hall
Nonfiction
- Will Tiny Black Holes Solve Dark Matter by Terry Franklin
- The Literary Buffet: A Conversation with James Sallis by Arley Sorg
- The Wondrous Nature of Existence: A Conversation with Michael Swanwick by Arley Sorg
- Editor's Desk: 2025 Readers' Poll Finalists by Neil Clarke
The Dark (February 2026, Issue 129)
Subscribe here.
Fiction
- "In Absentia" by Suzan Palumbo
- "Nā Heʻe" by Wailana Kalama
- "Hunger" by Michael Kelly
- "Within the Pink Paisley Walls" by Kelsea Yu
Dark Horses Magazine (February 2026, Issue 49)
Fiction
- "Helpless" by Andy Kumpon
- "Whoever Said" by Stephanie Halldorson
- "Harold The Harbinger" by Rain Sullivan
- "02:28 Hours To Yuma" by Wayne Kyle Spitzer
- "The Queen’s Justice" by Solar Hoàng
- "I Miss You" by Jeremee Nute
- "Islands In The Stream" by Zeke Jarvis
- "Lifelong Sentence" by Robin J. Bartley
- "A Full Moon Botheration" by Lesley L. Smith
- "Long Ride Home" by John Tavares
The Deadlands (Winter 2026, Issue 41)
Subscribe here.
Fiction
- in which orpheus is a hmong daughter" by Phoua Lee (poetry; online 2/2)
- "On the Anthology Entitled “Frames of Colour and Un-Colour" by Dmitri Akers (fiction; online 2/5)
- "Mushaboom" by Jeremy Morris (fiction; online 2/12)
- "Babe" by gray lindsey (poetry; online 2/16)
- "A Woman Is Screaming" by Joe Koch (fiction; online 2/19)
- "Sole" by Aliya Whiteley (fiction; online 2/26)
Nonfiction
- Bible Verses for the Dying and the Heathen, Robin Wheeler (nonfiction; online 2/9)
- Ask a Necromancer: C’est ici de l’empire de la Mort, Amanda Downum (nonfiction; online 2/23)
Flash Fiction Online (February 2026, Issue 149)
Donate here.
Fiction
- “Me an’ Streeter (an’ Vince) Chase a Comet” by Christopher Degni
- “This Blue World” by Samantha Murray
- “A Thimbleful of Need” by Christine Hanolsy
- “Everyone Hates It When The Alien Shows Up At The Club” by Elijah J. Mears
- “A Lesson On Learning Your Place In the Universe” by Thomas Price, and
- “In Brightness and in Darkness, We Sit” by Christopher Blake
GigaNotoSaurus (February 2026)
Fiction
- "The Winter of the Icebergirl" by Renan Bernardo
Lightspeed Magazine (February 2026, Issue 189)
Subscribe here.
Fiction
- "Death Echoes Overlapping" by Megan Chee (2/5)
- "Six Sides of a Fairy Tale" by Audrey Zhou (2/5)
- "The Worldbuilder" by Phoenix Alexander (2/12)
- Dream Destinations (From the Lost Traveler’s Tour Guide) by Alexander Weinstein (2/12)
- "Sensor Ghosts" by Deborah L. Davitt (2/19)
- "The Salt and the Cure" by Rukman Ragas (2/19)
- "Warren’s Tentacle" by Susan Palwick (2/26)
- "A Handbook to Spirit-Hunting" by Modupeoluwa Shelle (2/26)
Nonfiction
- Editorial: February 2026 by John Joseph Adams (2/5)
- Author Spotlight: Megan Chee by Phoebe Barton (2/5)
- Author Spotlight: Alexander Weinstein by Erik Grove (2/12)
- Book Review: The Best Weird Fiction of the Year Volume One by Michael Kelly, ed. by Arley Sorg (2/12)
- Author Spotlight: Deborah L. Davitt by Robin Jeffrey (2/19)
- Book Review: The Hospital at the End of the World by Justin C. Key by Melissa A Watkins (2/19)
- Author Spotlight: Susan Palwick by Delia Cullity (2/26)
- Book Review: Reliquary by Hannah Whitten by Chris Kluwe (2/26)
Nightmare Magazine (February 2026, Issue 161)
Subscribe here.
Fiction
- "The Ghost in Apartment 5K" by Everdeen Mason (2/4)
- "Rest Stop" by Pedro Iniguez (2/11)
- "Twelve Facts About the Dermestid Beetle" by Marisca Pichette (2/18)
- "when i die" by Matthew Wollin (2/25)
Nonfiction
- Editorial: February 2026 by Wendy N. Wagner (2/4)
- Author Spotlight: Everdeen Mason by Devin Marcus (2/4)
- The H Word: Snakes Beneath the Kudzu by Elizabeth Broadbent (2/11)
- Author Spotlight: Marisca Pichette by Carrie Finch (2/18)
- Plumbing the Depths: Haunted Writers and Haunted Writings by Mike Thorn (2/25)
Small Wonders Magazine (February 2026, Issue 32)
Donate here.
Fiction
- "Drinking the Heron" by RJ Aurand
The Sunday Morning Transport (February 2026)
Fiction
- "Wounds" by Celia Marsh
Uncanny Magazine (Issue 68, January / February 2026)
Subscribe here.
Fiction
- Words That Wither, Words That Bloom" by Jules Arbeaux
- "The Memory Hounds of Bak-Ankham" by A. W. Prihandita
- "This Story Does Not Exist" by Kylie Lee Baker
Poetry
- "A Field Guide for Broken Sons in Transit by Joemario Umana
- "The Parsley Girl by Theodora Goss
Nonfiction
- I Write in English Because I Can by Jana Bianchi
- Frognative Dissonance by Riley Silverman
- Interview: A. W. Prihandita by Caroline M. Yoachim
Remember to check back at the end of the month for updates as new stories come online, and to let me know in the comments what caught your eye!