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- VIDEO — How I Create A Character Who Can Lead My Short Story in this workshop video excerpt with award-winning author Lavie Tidhar.
- Markets and contests with submissions open or opening soon.
- SATURDAY, May 23 - Award winning author Lavie Tidhar presents, Ready. Set. Go! How To Write Perfect Openings whether it's for a short story or a novel.
- Care to drabble with us? Each week our drabble community writes 100 words (or they don't—their call) to a single-word prompt.
- This Week's Prompt. An interesting item from the news to provide you with fodder for your creativity. This week, 40 years after chernobyl, wolves may be adapting to live with radiation.
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The short story is usually driven by a single main character. So it’s important for that character to be potent enough to hold up under such weight. How do published authors, like Lavie Tidhar, approach this challenge?
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“Names are actually incredibly, incredibly important. It’s something not enough people pay attention to. Names tell you pretty much everything about a person. It tells you where they’re from, what culture they’re from, what period of time they’re from,” says award-winning author Lavie Tidhar in this excerpt from his workshop on writing the Science Fiction short story.
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Markets and Contests
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Many thanks to Scribophile for sponsoring this week's open submissions. Scribophile is a free welcoming community of writers where you're guaranteed to get solid critiques on your work. You can also get 20% off your first purchase using coupon code APEX20.
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- 🔥 Prarie Fire is looking for personal essays on the theme of “Lost and Found: Things Forgotten, Things Remembered”. Send them work of up to 5,000 words before May 4th. No submissions fee! 💰Paying market!💰
- 🌱 Biome is open to submissions of speculative short stories on the theme of "life, ecosystems, and organisms in all their dazzling variety – on Earth or beyond it." No submissions fee! 💰Paying market!💰
- ⚡️ In a Flash is open to submissions of flash nonfiction on the theme of “Goodbyes”. Send them essays of up to 500 words before May 15th. No submissions fee! 💰Paying market!💰
- 🍽️ Tableware Magazine is open to submissions of stories, essays, poems, and everything in between. Send them up to 15 pages of writing in any genre before May 15th. No submissions fee! 💰Paying market!💰
- 📖 MB Publishing is open to submissions of books for children and MG readers. Send them a query letter, synopsis, and full manuscript. No submissions fee! 💰Paying market!💰
- 📚 Everything With Words is open to submissions of full-length novels for MG readers, teens, and adults. For their adult list they’re only looking for literary fiction, but accept all genres for their younger demographics. Send them a synopsis and the first three chapters. No submissions fee! 💰Paying market!💰
- 📗 Atlantic Books is open to submissions of literary fiction novels and short story collections. Send them a one-line pitch and one-paragraph blurb along with a full manuscript. No submissions fee! 💰Paying market!💰
- 🪐 Two Two One is open to submissions of creative nonfiction, poetry, drama, and performances on the theme of “Orbit”. Send them personal essays of up to 7,500 words, up to three poems, scripts of up to 20 pages, or videos of up to 20 minutes before May 5th. No submissions fee!
- 🗞️ Revel Literary Journal is open to submissions of work from new writers who haven’t yet been published in a major magazine. Send them up to 25 pages of prose writing, or up to five poems, before May 9th. No submissions fee!
- 🐯 Quibble Lit is open to submissions of poetry on the theme of “Jungle”. Send them up to three poems before May 11th. No submissions fee!
- 🌟 Star 82 Review is open to submissions of flash fiction, creative nonfiction, text poems, and visual poems such as collage or erasure poetry. Send them up to 750 words of prose writing, up to five text poems, or up to two visual poems. No submissions fee!
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Join award-winning author Lavie Tidhar for an in-depth look at crafting that all-important story opening, whether for a short story or a novel. Learn how to “hook” the reader’s attention and how to best prepare your manuscript for agent or editor submission.
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In this workshop, we will:
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- Study classic openings and what they do, in genre and out
- Explore Lavie’s own successful openings, from short stories to award-winning novels
- Learn the who, why, where, when and how of a successful beginning
- Identify the “telling detail” and the how to make use of effective dialogue, action and description
- Prepare that critical three chapters submission package
- Understand what agents and editors look for
- Become aware of the common pitfalls, traps and clichés of ineffective openings
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DATE: May 23, 2026 – Saturday
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TIME: 1PM ET | 12PM CT | 11AM MT | 10AM PT | 17:00 UTC
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RUNTIME: Approximately 90 minutes
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Each week our drabble community writes 100 words (or they don't—their call) to a single-word prompt. No fame. No fortune. Just fun. Well, maybe a teensy bit of fame if you count the animated adaptations we create and share on social media. Check 'em out on our YouTube channel and Bluesky.
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This Week's Prompt
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In the isolated forests encroaching on the ruins of the Chernobyl exclusion zone, too dangerous for humans to inhabit, wolves are mysteriously thriving.
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Thank you so much for being a newsletter subscriber. We love our supportive, weird, and wonderful community. Don't hesitate to reply to this email if you have something to tell us. I read every email and will respond.
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