Welcome to this week’s installment of The Never-ending FAQ, the constantly evolving adjunct to our Submission Guidelines. If you have a question you’d like to ask about Stupefying Stories or Rampant Loon Press, feel free to post it as a comment here or to email it to our submissions address. I can’t guarantee we’ll post a public answer, but can promise every question we receive will be read and considered.
Today, instead of answering questions from the mailbag—and oh boy, are there a lot of questions from the mailbag waiting for answers, but we’ll get to them next week—today we’re going to follow up on the July 10 Never-ending FAQ, and introduce you to the first iteration of F.O.S.S.: the Friends Of Stupefying Stories.
The F.O.S.S. list is a new section we’ve added to our online bookshop, where we promote books written by people we know and like. We have no financial interest in these books. We just know these people, like their work, and think you should take a closer look at what they’re doing, even if we didn’t publish it.
My gosh, we’re being altruistic, aren’t we? What’s wrong with us?
Never mind, we’ll figure that out later. This month’s F.O.S.S. list begins with…
by Anatoly Belilovsky
Pride of place goes to Dr. Belilovsky, in large part because he created the F.O.S.S. list. Inadvertently, it’s true, but nonetheless, the F.O.S.S. list wouldn’t exist without his inspiration. If you’ve been following Stupefying Stories you know that Anatoly has been with us since his story “Picky” appeared in issue #1, and in the years since we’ve published so many of his stories I’ve lost count. (I think “The Sound of Music” is still my favorite, though.)
Now you can either hunt for his stories, which are scattered far and wide across space, time, and the Internet, or you can find a lot of them here, collected in one volume. Enjoy!
by Jamie Lackey
Jamie Lackey is another of our favorite writers, whose career we’ve been following with great interest ever since her story “Music from the Air” showed up first in our slush pile, and then in issue #4. Ms Lackey has since gone on to become a hugely successful author with an enormous pile of books to her credit, but since the bookshop software only lets us link to one title, A Metal Box Floating Between Stars is it.
If you are not following Jamie Lackey, you should be.
by Beth Cato
Beth Cato is yet another of our favorite writers, whose burgeoning career we continue to follow with interest as she piles up success after success and novel after novel. “Red Dust and Dancing Horses” holds a special place in our hearts, though, as we were the first to publish it, in issue #5, way back in 2012.
You definitely should check out Beth’s list of publications on Amazon, or at least take a look at this story. Yippie-ki-yay!
by Brandon Nolta
Brandon Nolta has been a staunch supporter of Stupefying Stories since so far back, I can’t actually place a date on it. While we’re really happy with his story “Cloudbreaker Above” in Stupefying Stories 25—and if you haven’t read that yet, you should—for the F.O.S.S. list we’ve selected two of his books that we didn’t publish: Iron and Smoke, which is a Weird Western with a very different twist, and…
by Brandon Nolta
…a collection of his short stories that moved one reviewer to say, “anyone can see that Nolta is up there with Bradbury, Vonnegut, Harlan Ellison, and Thomas M. Disch.”
Having known Bradbury, Disch, and unfortunately, Ellison—yeah, I can see that. Plus Brandon is a lot easier to work with than Ellison ever was, too.
by Richard J. Dowling
Richard J. Dowling has been one of my personal favorites ever since we published “Dragonomics” on the old SHOWCASE site. We don’t get a lot of stories from Richard, but when we do, they’re always very good, and always very well-received by our readers. (Right now his story “gastronomic” is our #1 most-read story of 2024.)
Of his snarky, satirical SF novel, How to Sell the Stars, let me just say that if you’re old enough to remember Pohl & Kornbluth, you’ll enjoy this one.
by Richard Zwicker
Richard Zwicker is another old friend of Stupefying Stories who’s been with us since issue #5. What really sold me on him, though, was “Riddle Me,” which first appeared in issue #7, and which we liked so much we reprinted it in SHOWCASE last year.
Some might think Zwicker’s stories are a little too literary for science fiction. I say, what’s wrong with that?
by Richard Zwicker
Case in point, “The Reopened Cask.” You have read Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado,” haven’t you?
If you’re the sort who enjoys stories that build on the classics—for example, imagine a story in which Victor Frankenstein’s great nephew accidentally reanimates the Thanksgiving turkey—you should check out Richard’s books.
by KC Grifant
Not everyone on the F.O.S.S. list is an old friend. Some are quite new: for example, KC Grifant began to show up in SHOWCASE just last year, with a very short and disturbing story, “The Sighting.”
If you like your horror straight up and shocking, KC Grifant is definitely a writer you should consider.
by Angelique Fawns
Likewise, Angelique Fawns is a writer who began to show up in our virtual pages within the last year, first with “Graveside Dining.” Actually there are three books in the Horror Lite series, and I really should take a closer look at them, as I’m seeing that quite a few writers we publish are also publishing there. Perhaps there is a synergy to be found.
In any case, the bookshop will only let us tout one book, not a series, so Cursed & Creepy it is.
of Gustavo Bondoni
Argentine writer Gustavo Bondoni is another new friend who began showing up in our pages about three years ago, and who has since written so many stories for us I’ve lost track of just how many we’ve published. I’m still rather fond of “Siren,” though.
While he’s new to us, if you look at his author’s bio, you’ll see that he’s written a lot of stories and novels, and has years of accumulated publication credits. With all the books on his c.v., Thin Air is the one he wants on the F.O.S.S. list. So here it is.
by Ephiny Gale
Ephiny Gale first showed up at about the same time Gustavo did. She’s written relatively few stories for us, but the ones she’s sent us have all been unforgettable. Today my favorite is “This is (Not) My Beautiful Cat,” but I might have a different favorite tomorrow.
Her debut short story collection, Pick Your Potion, comes out in September, but is available for pre-order now.
by Eric Fomely
If you’ve been following SHOWCASE at all in the past two years, you can’t have missed Eric Fomley’s brilliantly executed flash fiction stories. There are days I’d really like to see what Eric could do with a longer format, but he seems content to keep producing perfect miniatures, like “Getting Sponsored” or “Seedling.”
If you like very short and really fast reads, check out Flash Futures.
by Devan Barlow
New friends don’t come much newer than this. We just published “Without My Flaws” less than two weeks ago. But Devan definitely has the writing skills, and this novel—a mashup of a rom-com fairy tale stage musical with tap dancing—definitely gets points for originality.
The book is available on a wide variety of e-readers, so you can click on this link to get it for, say, Kobo, but as usual, our bookshop works best with Amazon Kindle links.
of today’s newspapers
by John Wilander
Just when I thought I was done with putting together the F.O.S.S. list for this month, this actual physical book showed up in my mailbox. I will admit, whenever anyone uses the expression “ripped from the headlines” in advertising copy I start to laugh, because I’ve known so many hopelessly clueless headline writers. But I’ve exchanged email with Wilander, and he seems like a decent and knowledgeable sort, and two chapters into the book he seems to know what he’s writing about, so I am cautiously optimistic that this will be a worthwhile read.
Hope springs eternal, you know.
And with all this said, remember: likes and hearts are nice, but shares and retweets boost the signal!
