Shred a short volume (4)
I believe the answer is:
atom
'shred' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'a short volume' is the wordplay.
'short' means to remove the last letter.
'volume' becomes 'tome' (I've seen this before).
'tome' with its last letter taken off is 'tom'.
'a'+'tom'='ATOM'
(Other definitions for atom that I've seen before include "Part of molecule" , "A mighty particle, can be explosive" , "Nucleus plus electrons" , "type of bomb" , "Tiny bit" .)