Shearman's first book, a collection of short stories called Tiny Deaths, was published by Comma Press in November 2007. It was shortlisted for the Edge Hill Short Story Prize and made the longlist for the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award. In November 2008, it was named Best Collection at the annual World Fantasy Awards. In 2009, one of the stories from the book, 'No Looking Back', was selected by the National Library of Singapore for the Read! Singapore campaign, ensuring the story was published separately as a mini-book and distributed all over the country in English, Chinese, Malay and Tamil; the author was flown over to Singapore to give talks and interviews.

His second collection, Love Songs for the Shy and Cynical, was published in late 2009. An odder, darker book than the first, it won the British Fantasy Award, the Edge Hill Short Story Reader's Prize - making Shearman the first writer ever to be nominated twice for this award - and the Shirley Jackson Award. A special collector's edition
contained 'The Hidden Story'; a tale about letters found within books, each copy was handwritten by the author, and contained in envelopes within envelopes in a Russian doll effect.

In the same year, Mad Norwegian Press published Wanting to Believe, a book by Shearman that examines The X-Files and its spin-off series (Millennium and The Lone Gunmen) in a critical fashion. Also in 2009, Shearman collaborated with comedian Toby Hadoke to watch and comment on every episode of Doctor Who from the programme's debut in 1963 to David Tennant's final story. The resulting discussions are being published by Mad Norwegian Press in three volumes as Running Through Corridors: Rob and Toby's Marathon Watch of Doctor Who.The first volume, covering the 1960s, was published in 2010; the second volume, covering the 1970s, is scheduled for release in November 2011.

In 2010, Big Finish published seven of his better known stage plays as Caustic Comedies.

His third collection, Everyone's Just So So Special, is "half short stories, half novel" and was published in June 2011. The collection is the history of mankind as told through twenty-one tales of the comic and the macabre. As part of the collection, Shearman started the One Hundred Stories project.

His latest collection, Remember Why You Fear Me published by ChiZine Publications, gathers together his best dark fiction, the most celebrated stories from his acclaimed books, and ten new tales that have never been collected before.

See his full bibliography here.