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POETRY
Cottonwood by Hazel of Of Potatoes and Poets [Literary Fiction]
When the moon beams high (First Line)
MICRO/FLASH FICTION
The Happy News by Sharron Bassano of LEAVES [Literary Fiction]
"To hell with him, she thinks … who needs him anyway?" (Any Line)
Mobius Me by Gregory Blair of Gregory Blair - Scribbling Entertainment [Horror]
I slipped in the mushy, muddy muck of the forest floor and scrambled to keep myself upright and moving forward. (Any Line)
SHORT STORY
Slipping by Jenifer Jorgenson of Snark Floats [Speculative Fiction]
The stranger sitting at Rosie’s counter looked like he’d wandered in from the wrong century. (First Line)
Only Death by Hamish Kavanagh of The Sudden Walk [Speculative Fiction]
Many men go down to the cross roads, none leave with what they wanted. (Any Line)
The Crypts of Lieberkühn by Layne Mercer of The Vermilion Border [Speculative Fiction]
"When you turn on the Nature channel and see a lion eat a gazelle, you don’t call it a psychopath, do you?" (Any Line)
SHORT SERIAL
The Ashnavian Recipes of War [Part 3 Enemy Cloaked] by Angelique Fawns and Rachel Luttrell of The Ashnavian Recipes of War [Science Fiction]
The King had pressed his hand to her cheek and told her that her gift was a powerful and untapped resource. (Any Line)
SERIAL
Off to College [Daedalia, Ch. 25] by Ben Wakeman of Catch & Release [Literary Fiction]
I ate lunch on the campus of the University of Virginia today. (Any Line)
Eisenmauer [Ashes of an Empire, Ch. 2] by Kaze Nguyen (Fiction) of Ashes of an Empire Official [Fantasy]
“Now,” he drew his dagger. (Any Line)
Ink [Ch. 1] by Jim Cherry of In Between the Lines [Speculative Fiction]
Los Angeles. (First Line)
Hey ya’ll,
There has been a lot going on just in the past week. In many ways I feel like Substack with all my updates/features I’ve just been pushing out! If you haven’t checked it out yet, The TiF Library now has its own dedicated website. It’s been a long time coming. I strongly felt that using Google Forms and Notion was simply not viable or clean and what was needed to make the whole process simple and clean and professional for the future was a centralized location.
But before you head on over to our new site (and share it with your own subscriber list in your next newsletter) I want to tell you what’s new and improved as of today:
ISSUES Page - I’m Beta Testing a “Like” feature exclusive to this page. What this will be is an opportunity for readers who have come to use and rely on Top in Fiction to let me know how I’m doing with the selections being made every week by clicking the Heart Icon whenever you read a story that you like. I realize this might be counter-productive as the writers of the stories you like would also appreciate receiving a Like on their own story on their page. Hence why it’s very much in Beta and might go away if my idea doesn’t pan out. What will happen over time is that the default view for visitors will be the stories with the most “Likes” at the top but also any visitor can choose their own “Sort” view that has been added. So, visitors can just see Featured Stories or Most Liked. I would love to be able to pull in the Likes that a story already receives from their own story on their own Substack, but in order to build and sustain something like that I would need a few permissions, not to mention money.
NEW Annual Recap Page - This is totally brand new to the site! It is a listing of what Featured writers from 2024 and 2025 felt were the best of the best of their work that they’ve written during those respective years! These should require very little to get you to read their story, beside searching for Category (Short Story, Serial, Poetry, etc.) or Genre (Mystery, Comedy, Speculative Fiction, etc.). Whatever you choose should not be behind any paywall nor should the link be broken. Should you come across an issue, please let me know ASAP so I can try to fix it or remove the story. In the interest of fairness and providing smooth reading I strive not to include anything behind a paywall. And for any writers who are listed here, please do check your name as it is the one and only place where clicking it will take you to your Substack Profile. If it’s not right, let me know ASAP and I’ll fix it.
Submissions Page - Only one fix was made here to make sure the Week dropdown adhered to our wonky demands of Saturday to Friday dates. And for those wondering why this page doesn’t include stories that were submitted in 2024 and the first 2 months of 2025, that’s because submissions were done via the Comments section of the posts calling for submissions using a Template. If you were around during the early days you’ll remember that process. And I think it was Claudia Befu who suggested we even use a Template which was a game changer! It meant that I could pull the information into a spreadsheet, which I did. But there were a lot of inconsistencies and link issues and believe me when I say, before I feel comfortable pulling in anything I still need to go over it all with a fine-toothed comb. I do hope to do so soon.
Submit a Story Page - This is a FUTURE update (meaning it’s coming NEXT weekend when the form opens again on Friday, July 3rd). I’m really excited to announce that we are adding TWO NEW GENRE’S: Thriller and Cozy! I know, they could not be more different from each other but I feel they are strong contenders to be added. With Thriller I hope it will give the writers of Mystery and Horror a new home who have been forced into one or the other. And Cozy is not being pinned down to any specific genre but being separated out for one simple rule that any “cozy” read follows: It doesn’t contain any extremes. What does that mean? Well, a Cozy Mystery can have a murder but the description won’t be graphic. A Cozy Romance can have love of any kind but won’t have any sex scenes, light kissing, think “Hallmark Movie” vibes. Or how about a Cozy Fantasy? It takes place in a fantastical place with swords and sorcery, but the reader can expect less blood and guts and violence. Doesn’t have to be exclusive to Young Adult either. I think you get the point? The one caveat with selecting Cozy is that the pressure is on you to let potential readers know which genre of Cozy your story is! One suggestion I have is to take better care to share your genre either in an intro at the beginning of your work or in the Sub-Title.
VISIT THE TIF LIBRARY NOW
As of June 23rd the Heatwave has officially started! I’m sure many of us are contending with the extremely high temperatures the best way we can. But now it’s time to put your storytelling skills to the test! Write your best heatwave story!
The guidelines? Let’s keep this very simple.
Short short story. Under 1,500 words (but any length you decide is fine). Any genre.
How the heatwave affects your story is totally up to you.
Write it now and be prepared to share it along with others on Friday, July 31st 10am EST!
Just five more weeks to break a sweat or try to beat the heat.
IMPORTANT UPCOMING EVENTS
TiF Summit 2027 Sign-Up (June 15th to August 15th) - Would you like to join us and read your fiction on a Substack Live? You can rewatch many of those Voices here. The link to express interest and gain access to The (new and improved) Scheduler can be found here.
Right now I’m looking to fill 75 spots (a 50% increase). Don’t miss out!
SUBSCRIBER UPDATES
Consider becoming a MONTHLY subscriber and you’ll help us reach our goal of paying for exclusive short stories right here on Top in Fiction that you can read early before it is made available to everyone else.
Paid Monthly Subscribers will get early access to the TiF Story Story of the Month, for a period of two weeks, after which time the story will then be made available to all subscribers. Writers will be paid from the monthly subscribers.
- Erica Drayton, Editor-in-Chief 😈
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