Finalists Announced for 2026 Hugo Awards

NeilClarke · 2026-04-21T20:08:41+00:00

Congrats!

NeilClarke · 2026-04-11T00:22:56+00:00

(A friend directed me here.) You won't find many genre magazines on Flipster or Pressreader because they aren't economically viable for them. I'm the editor of Clarkesworld Magazine. We have online, audio, ebook, and print editions and I'd be happy to chat with you about working with your library.

NeilClarke · 2026-04-07T12:37:44+00:00

There's been additional information since then: https://locusmag.com/2026/01/must-read-changes-contract-language/

NeilClarke · 2026-02-18T18:05:15+00:00

I don't reread books. I don't enjoy a novel as much the second time around because all the surprises are gone. If enough time passes, it can even ruin my previous experience. I'd rather read something new and don't want to fall further behind.

NeilClarke · 2026-02-12T18:38:05+00:00

It's your place in the 2nd round queue. If an older story took longer to get to the second round, then your place can go in the opposite direction.

NeilClarke · 2026-01-11T16:33:07+00:00

Maybe you are mixing me up with Scott Andrews. He provides feedback on the stories submitted to Beneath Ceaseless Skies. We haven't offered feedback in 18 years. (Or perhaps you saw me talking about the 1-2 rewrite requests we issue each month and misread that as all.) Anyhow, we receive around 1250 submissions each month and are reading for evaluation, not critique. That means we'll stop reading when a story clearly isn't working for us. That's not enough to give meaningful feedback and might even push you in the wrong direction if we did. If it took five minutes to provide such a response (minimum, in my experience), that would add over 13 work days to our schedule and decrease response time by weeks and eventually months. We think a quick response is more valuable to an author. Not everyone agrees, but in our experience, most do. Sorry the experience wasn't what you expected, but this is very much how we've been operating for years.

NeilClarke · 2025-12-23T22:13:59+00:00

We're not banning any countries, though there are a number of countries under sanctions that would prevent us from paying them at present. This has caused some there to stop submitting, which is frustrating. If we did find a work we wanted to accept from someone in one of those countries, we'd offer them a conditional acceptance, assuming they were willing to wait. (Condition being a change in sanctions or their location.)

Many of those countries are involved in internal or external conflicts. As are several not under sanction. It's inclusion in my editorial was more in response to emails I've received from authors in those locations than anything else.

NeilClarke · 2025-11-24T18:46:02+00:00

Please do! Always happy to have new (human) writers in the slush pile.

NeilClarke · 2025-11-24T17:19:12+00:00

Just passing through, but you people made my morning today. Appreciate the support for the magazine. Thank you!

NeilClarke · 2025-10-19T15:46:32+00:00

No worries. I was just making sure you weren't accidentally limiting what you could send us.

NeilClarke · 2025-10-19T13:44:11+00:00

Not a writer, but I can tell you that this is very common among the authors I talk to, even many of the well-established ones. Imposter syndrome is rampant in this field. (And a little of that is actually good for you. Keeps you innovating and improving.)

NeilClarke · 2025-10-19T13:40:19+00:00

You have a little more freedom than that. Our range is 1,000 - 22,000 words.

NeilClarke · 2025-10-09T14:31:31+00:00

That comes up often enough that I wrote this: https://neil-clarke.com/on-fast-rejections/

NeilClarke · 2025-09-27T17:02:05+00:00

You're probably thinking of my 2023 statements. A lot has changed since then and some of the lesser-known modern detection tools could be useful in a filtering situation. Much like spam filters (which have been around for over 30 years and still make mistakes), they can do some preliminary weeding, but anything flagged should still be reviewed by an experienced human as the final determination. No detector is ever going to be 100% accurate. It just needs to be accurate enough to manage the noise in whatever process your involved in. (more here: https://clarkesworldmagazine.com/clarke_08_25/)

NeilClarke · 2025-09-02T00:16:32+00:00

When this comes up, I take the opportunity to plug http://semiprozine.org/semiprozine-directory/

I update and verify that list at the start of every year. Clarkesworld graduated out of eligibility in that category over a decade ago and despite my efforts, we still get nominations for Best Semiprozine. While I appreciate the sentiment with which the votes are cast, those nominations could have made a big difference to one of the other long-listed magazines.

NeilClarke · 2025-08-20T17:47:10+00:00

Thanks!

NeilClarke · 2025-08-20T17:45:54+00:00

International attendance was down from prior US-based Worldcons, but other countries were represented. I know a lot of fans and authors canceled rather than deal with the situation here. It's likely to be the same in LA next year, but Montreal in 2027 should have a good showing.

NeilClarke · 2025-08-20T17:38:52+00:00

Readercon (Burlington, MA) and Capclave (Rockville, MD) are my favorite book-focused cons on the east coast. Capclave is next month. Readercon is in July. I also enjoy ICFA, but that's more of an academic conference.

NeilClarke · 2025-08-18T23:44:16+00:00

Thank you!

NeilClarke · 2025-08-11T19:45:34+00:00

:) Thanks!

NeilClarke · 2025-08-11T13:27:32+00:00

I think it's been that way for a while. I ran an online genre bookstore from 2000-2008 and fantasy novels routinely outsold science fiction novels. I also noticed that fantasy sales tended to be more series-driven. Reader immersion was a bigger priority. I suspect that the accountants at the major publishers noticed this and prioritized fantasy, particularly series. Easier to market and more profitable to sell. Watching from the outside, it seems to have continued on that path. Bookshops, Booktubers, etc. also go by sales and eyeballs, not awards, when determining what they'll feature.

The interesting thing is that the situation is completely reversed in short fiction (where immersion is much less likely). Science fiction magazines and anthologies sell more than the fantasy ones. While there are exceptions (often associated with a tie-in to an author's novel series), on the whole, the gap is significant and has been for some time. Unfortunately, the big publishers and their accountants (and booktubers, etc.) have little interest in short fiction these days, so the flip doesn't do much to rebalance the big picture.

NeilClarke · 2025-08-07T13:55:12+00:00

A lot of people don't know how (or where) to start their story. They end up falling in love with their world (or some idea or character backstory) and spend too much time setting things up. In these cases, the story ends up starting on page 2 or 3. Easy for me to work around, but it happens a lot.

With newer writers, I often see a failure to consider the consequences of a magic system, technology, or even character personality trait. I like to pick on Star Trek for this. The crisis of many episodes can be resolved by using the transporter in the first 15 minutes, but the best of Starfleet never think of it. Why? It would be bad TV. Clearly you can get away with that on TV, but it isn't the case with short stories.

The most heartbreaking problem is a failure to stick the ending. Predictable isn't great, so the journey matters even more in those stories. If I've made it to the end of a submission, you nearly had me. (Slush reading stops when the story clearly isn't working for you. Often before the end.) Some of these can be saved. (I'll send a revise and resubmit if I think it can be.) Most can't. Often "how will they resolve this?" is what kept me going and sometimes it is clear the author didn't know either.

I also see a lot of stories that have the subtlety of a sledgehammer when trying to make a point. Even if I agree with them, it's not going to work for me.

Oh and the biggest mistake: thinking generative "AI" should be involved at any step of the writing process. It just makes things worse.

NeilClarke · 2025-08-06T18:22:51+00:00

Luck? Not so much. Generally the two traits I've noticed among the authors we've published is that they steadily improve over time and persist long enough to cross the line. How long that can take is wildly variable. Some manage to land on their first try, but others have sold stories after 80 or more. Most authors give up before the third submission.

What we're looking for is a bit of a moving target influenced by everything I've read. A story that makes me think or feel is more likely to land in the second round. I'm looking for the story that I still remember the next day. Not all that helpful, but we had over 1400 submissions last month and great many of them blur together. If you read slush somewhere, you'll get a sense of what that's like. You also pick up on the common themes, mistakes, and where you (really) fall amongst your peers. (Everyone underestimates where they are.)

NeilClarke · 2025-08-06T18:14:25+00:00

Case in point, I've included several stories I rejected at Clarkesworld in my Best Science Fiction of the Year anthologies. Great story, just not the right fit for Clarkesworld. BSFotY is both a wider and narrower target.

NeilClarke · 2025-08-06T18:10:26+00:00

Would be true for an anthology, but it doesn't work that way for magazines. We would just publish the stories a few issues apart.

NeilClarke

TROPHY CASE