Archive for the ‘SFWA Blog’ Category

The Poet’s Toolbox: Three Strategies for a Vivid Prose Voice

By Ursula Whitcher Writing poetry allows for rapid experimentation with language on a fine scale. Though there’s lots of mystique around being a poet, the key genre expectation is close attention: poetry rewards readers for noticing what’s happening at the level of a page, a phrase, or even a pair of words. But poets don’t […]

Gamifying Your Writing Goals

By Gideon P. Smith We all have writing dreams, but they often remain dreams without solid productivity goals to turn them into reality. Unfortunately, as with adhering to the Prime Directive or making the Kessel Run in under 12 parsecs, most quickly fail. Many systems have been proposed to help us succeed. SMARTER goals is […]

In Memoriam: John Maddox Roberts

John Maddox Roberts (25 June 1947 – 23 May 2024), also writing as Mark Ramsay, was a prolific and best-selling science fiction, fantasy, historical, and mystery writer over the course of thirty-five years. He was the author of many novels set in ancient Rome, including Hannibal’s Children and its sequel The Seven Hills, and the […]

How to Rewrite a Story for a Different Call

By Dannye Chase So you’ve got a solid story and a perfect publication. The problem? They don’t quite match up.  Have no fear! If you wrote it, you can unwrite it, and then rewrite it for that sweet new market.  Before we get started, it’s important to note there are some really good reasons not […]

Culture: Moving Beyond Set Dressing

by Kanishk Tantia This essay is the fifth of eight in the Publishing Taught Me: A SFWA Anthology Project. The first story I ever wrote was unabashedly my own: written with unfiltered childlike enthusiasm, completed within a single draft and, to my eyes, perfect upon completion. Two donkeys killed each other because one was purple […]

Perceiving the Wind: Finding Magic in the Mundane

by Austin Conrad As advice, “write what you know” is nearly as hackneyed as “show, don’t tell.” Both pieces of advice are essentially correct, but writers hear them so often we don’t really process either recommendation. This is doubly true in speculative fiction. After all, very few of us have ridden on the back of […]

SFWA Market Report For May/June

Welcome to the May/June edition of the SFWA Market Report. Please note: Inclusion of any venue in this report does not indicate an official endorsement by SFWA. Those markets included on this list pay at least $0.08/word USD in at least one category of fiction. This compilation is not exhaustive of all publication opportunities that pay […]

In Memoriam – Caitlin Thomas

Caitlin Rosemarie Thomas, 28 October 2002 – 17 April 2024, was a presence of joy in the genre community. The daughter of Lynne M. Thomas and Michael Damian Thomas, Caitlin often traveled to science fiction and fantasy conventions and ceremonies and was known for her excitement in interacting with other creative people. Caitlin loved stories, […]