On Spec Managing Editor, Diane L. Walton, is a participant in this month’s ASK THE EDITORS Zoom call on Saturday June 3. The session begins at 8 a.m., Pacific time, which is mercifully at noon, Atlantic time for Diane.
If you are a writer and have questions about submitting to On Spec and other short fiction and poetry markets, this is a great place to get your questions answered.
It appears we are having problems with our PayPal link for potential subscribers. If you have had no success, you can do a couple of things.
We will investigate the problem and try to get it fixed as soon as we can.
We’re happy to announce the publication of issue #123, VOL 33 No 1. Yeah, that 33 means 33 YEARS we’ve been doing this. And it’s still both a challenge and a rewarding experience for us to find the writers and artists and put together these issues for you.
We are pleased to update our web site with something of interest to readers of Canadian SF & F novels and short fiction.
Emad El-Din Aysha was formerly an adjunct assistant professor at the American University in Cairo. Currently he is a freelance journalist, translator, academic researcher and science fiction author with one anthology to his name, and a member of the ESSF and its chief translator.
Recently he offered On Spec the following round table conversation he had with some Canadian SFF writers whose names should be familiar to you. It is quite a lengthy discussion but filled with very interesting content abut our genre and some of its Canadian creators. Click the link below to access it.
We are thrilled to announce that an On Spec story, “Bottom’s Dream” by Glenn Clifton ( Issue #121) has won Gold in the Short Fiction category at tonight’s Alberta Magazine Awards banquet! Pictured here, proudly holding the plaque, is editor Lareina Abbott.
And the final Aurora Awards ballot was released today, and we’re so pleased to find On Spec as a finalist in the Best Related Work Category, along with Swati Chavda for Best Cover Illustration, Melissa Yuan-Innes for Best Poem, and Peter G. Reynolds for Best Short Story. They are just a few of the creators whose works help us to make such a fine magazine. Congratulations and best wishes to all the nominees!
A potential subscriber alerted us to a problem with the PayPal link on our website. We will look into this, and hope it gets solved soon. Meanwhile you can go through your own PayPal account and send the subscription money directly to onspecmag(at)gmail.com and then send us an email with the particulars (address and amount paid) so we can match our records.
Here it is, the cover of our new issue by artist Judy Helfrich. It’s at the printer now, so subscribers should see their copies in the next couple of weeks. If you know that you subscription has expired, now would be a good time to renew.
Recently, one of our Poetry editors, Charlie Crittenden, resigned from his gig with On Spec to pursue his own writing ventures. Charlie has been a great asset to the group and we wish him well.
We are happy to report that his successor has accepted our invitation to join us on our journey, and we couldn’t be happier.
Colleen Anderson is no stranger to the pages of On Spec. We have published her poetry and her short fiction over the years, and she is a good friend to several of our editorial staff. In her own words, Colleen has been a published and award-winning writer for many years, and we are excited to have her join us and work with fellow Poetry Editor, Celine Low.
Just a reminder for the next Ask the Editors sessions coming up. Our Managing Editor, Diane Walton will be participating on June 3. These sessions (you can watch previously-held ones) have some very valuable advice to writers at all levels of their career.
We are in the process of proofreading our newest issue, which has been delayed by some unavoidable circumstances. It should be in our subscribers’ hands by early May, but here’s a heads up. There’s an ad in this issue for FREEFALL Magazine’s annual Prose and Poetry contest.
The deadline for entries will be April 30, 2023, so by the time people get the copy of issue #123, it’s too late for them to enter. We have provided the link above to the contest, and we hope our followers can share it with anyone they know who might be interested in entering. Thanks!
