SHOWCASE is moving, too!

As part of the general restructuring of our web strategy, we’re delighted to report that as of January 1, SHOWCASE will be moving out of its mother’s basement and into a place of its own. The landlord isn’t quite finished with the repainting or the plumbing repairs yet, but the new site will be http://stupefyingstoriesshowcase.com/ —which if you’re a long-time follower...

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STUPEFYING STORIES IS MOVING

After nearly fourteen years of being hosted by blogspot, we’ve finally run into an insoluble problem. If you’ve come to this site via http://stupefyingstories.com/, none of the links to Amazon detail pages work anymore. If you’ve come to this site via https://stupefyingstories.blogspot.com/, the links do work, but there are other problems, mostly having to do with how...

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SHOWCASE • “Market Futures,” by M. Ian Bell

—Part Three— Previously, in Part One | Part Two Two murder victims: a depraved old artist and a promising young schoolteacher. Plenty of people with a motive to kill the former but not the opportunity, but not one person with a grudge against the latter. Something must connect the two murders besides the unusual cause of death—but what? Detective Ellouise Nielson...

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Rampant Loon Press is now on twitter!

Who knew? You can now follow us on twitter, at https://twitter.com/loon_media. I really should pay more attention to what Eric is doing....

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SHOWCASE • “Market Futures,” by M. Ian Bell

—Part Two— Previously, in Part One Two murder victims: a depraved old artist and a promising young schoolteacher. Plenty of people with motive to kill the former but not the opportunity, but not one person with a grudge against the latter. Something must connect the two murders besides the unusual cause of death—but what? Detective Ellouise Nielson has had some tough...

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STUPEFYING STORIES 22 • It’s really real!

The proof copy finally arrived last night. It looks GOOD! Cover finish is nice and glossy, cover art printing is sharp and clear, colors are rendered correctly, binding and trim are perfect, and the interior text is clean and crisp. Even the interior illos turned out well—except for Mark Keigley’s author’s photo, but that was weird to begin with. But in sum, the finished...

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STUPEFYING STORIES 22 : Status Update

We’re still waiting for the proof copy we ordered to show up. We’ll be sending out contributor’s copies just as soon as we’ve confirmed that the print quality is acceptable. In the meantime, while we’re waiting, we’d like to take this opportunity to remind you once again that SS#22 is out on Amazon and ready to buy. These links should take you directly to your local incarnation...

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Status Update 12/05/2018

Well, that explains part of the problem. The reason sales have been so soft lately may be because the Amazon links in the right column have quit working. Apparently Google and Amazon aren’t playing well together (again), or perhaps it’s an undocumented feature of the latest Firefox update. In any case, the text links at the top of the right column work, but the cover...

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Talking Shop

Op-ed • "What Is Writer Success?" By Eric Dontigney • The whole notion of success as a writer is, at best, nebulous. What does writing success even look like? It’s not as simple as you might think. In scenario A, we’ve got a guy you’ve never heard of with a full-time job writing marketing copy for consumer products.   In scenario B, we’ve got J.K. Rowling....

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NOW OUT IN TRADE PAPERBACK!

Okay, it took a titch longer than expected, but Stupefying Stories 22 is available now in trade paperback! The links aren’t fully cross-connected yet—Amazon isn’t linking the paperback edition sales page to the Kindle edition sales page and sales ranking and all that—but... Hallelujah! We actually got the book out! STUPEFYING STORIES 22: Now available in trade paperback...

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OP-ED: “In Loving Memory of Cars,” by Bruce Bethke

[Nota bene: originally published June 3, 2008. It’s reappearance now is another case of “Blame Guy Stewart.” I’ll explain why in the comments.] This column is in memory of cars. No, not the Gary Numan song. I started out today to write a think-piece about cars, and specifically about a certain fondly-remembered two-tone pink 1956 DeSoto Fireflite. My writing process...

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SHOWCASE • “Market Futures,” by M. Ian Bell

—Part One— Nielson stepped into the doorway beneath the light of ten carefully positioned mag-lamps. The intensity drove spikes of pain into her eyes, but it came too with a sense of relief. A well-lit scene with the astringent taste of iron in the air. She was powerless against the loss of sleep or the headaches that followed, but at the crime scene she could reestablish...

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Coming Attractions (& Such)

Tomorrow on SHOWCASE: “Market Futures,” by M. Ian Bell A murdered man. An impossibly clean crime scene. Plenty of people with a motive to be the killer, but none with the opportunity, and no one leaves behind a crime scene that devoid of clues. Detective Ellouise Nielson has had some tough cases before, but this one might just set the record... “Market Futures,” a new...

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On Writing: “After ‘Oath,’” by Guy Stewart

Worlds are supposed to be long-lasting, apparently eternal to those that live on them and even in fact whirling around their stars for a long, long time. This is what I’ve always wanted to do when writing science fiction—create long-lasting worlds so that I could return to them again and again. Last Saturday’s SHOWCASE story, “Oath”, was the first story to grow from a...

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Status Update • 11/28/2018

We have a lot of new developments to report, so I’m going to put on my serious business face and cut right to the chase. » Print Editions: I’m delighted to report that we’ve finally solved the problem of how to generate ebooks and print books from common source files. (And no, Henry, the solution was not, “Buy a Mac.”) Ergo, next week we’ll be releasing Stupefying Stories...

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STUPEFYING STORIES 22 ESCAPES!

CYBER MONDAY SPECIAL! To celebrate the release of Stupefying Stories 22, for today only, we’re giving the Kindle edition away FREE for the cost of a click. Download it now from: » AMAZON.COM » AMAZON.CO.UK » AMAZON.DE » AMAZON.FR » AMAZON.ES » AMAZON.IT » AMAZON.NL » AMAZON.CO.JP » AMAZON.COM.BR » AMAZON.CA » AMAZON.COM.MX » AMAZON.COM.AU » AMAZON.IN (Of course, if...

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OP-ED: “A Generation Ship The Size of a Small Planet,” by Bruce Bethke

Nota Bene: You can blame Guy Stewart for this. A few days ago he sent me off on a quest into the RLP archives to find some things relating to his short story, “Oath,” and along the way I found this one again. I had a vague recollection of having written it, and had always meant to revisit the core idea for a new feature to be called either Tropisms or Books I’ll Never...

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SHOWCASE: “Oath,” by Guy Stewart

Anna Joaquim sighed contentedly, taking Dabney Joaquim’s arm and snuggling closer. She did not have eyes for him, though. Looking into the deep darkness of the Wild Lands beyond the Interstate Rail car window, she whispered, “I love you.” Dabney knew her action and words were, if not a lie, at least a gross misrepresentation of her feelings. He detected the lack of proper...

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