A bit of a delay from when this actually happened, Thursday, January 15th. But I wanted to make sure you had an official record of how our 2025 went before I share the State of the Union, where we look forward to what’s to come in 2026:
Let’s look at the numbers:
52 Weekly Issues
12 Monthly Recaps
The Breakdown:
# of Writers in 2025? 598
# of Submissions in 2025? 2,442
Genre Tracker of 2025? (Across ALL submissions)
Climate Fiction [13]
Historical Fiction [58]
Romance [75]
Comedy [94]
Poetry [109]
Mystery [119]
Science Fiction [218]
Speculative Fiction [274]
Fantasy [363]
Horror [420]
Literary Fiction [589]
Other [110]
# of featured stories in 2025? 1095
Writing Contests & Events
The below will be published Anthologies in 2026:
Eye See You - 27 submissions. 22 entered the contest. 5 just participated in the event. 3 judges. 19 stories will be in the anthology (17 from the submissions + 2 judges).
Inanimate Objects - 31 submissions. Everyone entered the contest. 4 judges. 26 stories will be in the anthology (22 from the submissions + all 4 judges).
Writing Events
Secret Santa Plot Swap - 24 participants. 24 plots swapped. 24 presents unwrapped on December 22nd.
TiF Disruptions
Mostly events put on, and organized, by members of the fiction community who allowed Top in Fiction to help them amplify what they were doing or interviews and events hosted by Top in Fiction.
A TiF Sociable [March 2025] - Before there was the TiF Summit this year, you could say we had a bit of a practice run with our sociable. 6 readers joined me Live to read their work to us, a captive audience! [Group A] [Group B]
Interview w/ John Ward [April 2025] - We chatted about The Midnight Vault I among other things.
The Future of Nature [April 2025] - An Earth Day event organized by Julie Gabrielli and Claudia Befu.
A CJ Sansom Event [April 2025] - Hosted by our very own Historical Fiction expert, Holly A Brown. We discussed who CJ Sansom was and his importance to the historical fiction genre.
Small & Scary / Big & Beastly [May 2025] - An event hosted by Garen Marie to help highlight the fiction community both big and small.
A Discussion On Serials [August 2025] - With three leading ladies in the serialized fiction department: Hanna Delaney / Bridget Riley / S.E. Reid
Monthly Recap Live Interviews - [In order of appearance] MARK of the BRAND / J. Curtis / Shane Bzdok / Mr. Troy Ford / CB Mason | YA Dystopian+Sci-Fi / Bryan Pirolli
Join me for my next live video in the app.
