How It All Began
J.Scott Coatsworth
This year we held our eighth annual Queer Sci Fi flash fiction contest. We garnered 384 entries – a third more than last year and our highest tally ever. Reading through all of them took our judges a solid month, and we were hard-pressed to choose the winners.
It wasn’t always like this.
Eight years ago, Angel, ben and I came up with the idea to run this new thing – a flash fiction contest to raise awareness about the site. We came up with a one-word theme – Endings – received all of 16 entries, chose the three winners, and that was that.
The next year, when we put out the call, we had a ten-fold increase – 110 responses. We decided to make a book out of them, and I unwisely promised all of the entrants that they would be in that book, regardless of the quality or adherence to theme of their story. And so our first anthology (out of our second contest) Discovery was born.
That first year also saw the first (and last) cover contest. We received about ten entries, and unfortunately many of them weren’t high enough resolution to use. The winner, done by QSF’s Bey Deckard, is now the iconic original QSF Flash Fiction cover.
In the years since, a few things have changed. We’ve gone from 110 stories to 120, and this year we blew past our previous year total submissions. Each year the mix of character identities has become more diverse. And each theme seems to bring out a different mix of genres.
The “ink” theme seemed to work particularly well for fantasy and paranormal stories – we got a ton of those.
The themes have changed too. Each year, one of our admins suggests 3-4 possible themes, and the rest of us vote on them to choose the winner. Ryane suggested Ink, but it was proceeded by “Innovation,” “Migration,” “Impact,” “Renewal,” “Flight,” “Discovery” and “Endings.” The idea is to find something both open-ended enough to suggest a number of possible interpretations and not too tied to any one of our four genres, sci-fi, fantasy, paranormal or horror.
What will next year’s theme be? Only the Flash Gods know for sure. But join our mailing list here:
https://www.queerscifi.com/join-our-maillist/
…to be one of the first ones to know.
INK (NOUN)
Five definitions to inspire writers around the world and an unlimited number of possible stories to tell:
1) A colored fluid used for writing
2) The action of signing a deal
3) A black liquid ejected by squid
4) Publicity in the written media
5) A slang word for tattoos
Ink features 300-word speculative flash fiction stories from across the rainbow spectrum, from the minds of the writers of Queer Sci Fi.
QSF is giving away an Amazon gift card with this tour:
Direct Link: https://kingsumo.com/g/gp47qq/win-a-25-amazon-gift-card
“I love our sentient AI high school, EduTron 6000 (kids call her “Edie”). She plays soothing classical music in study hall and always listens when you have a bad day. But she’s a stickler for rules, and hates graffiti, which put a major damper on my epic prom-posal plan.” —Brenna Harvey, EduTron 6000 + Principal Vertner 4Ever
“I get out of the shower and it’s there. Dripping down the mirror—splip—and forming a rivulet of color across the tile floor. Thinner than paint, more vibrant than water. Sometimes it’s iridescent, but today it’s just…bright. A stream of colorful consciousness leading me across the bathroom, down the hall, out of…wait. I go to my bedroom and hastily put on whatever I can reach. Yesterday’s bra, the jeans from the floor, finger comb my short hair, a random t-shirt—purple. The same color the ink is today. Does that mean something?” —Geneva Vand, The Colors of Fate
“Marianne paced the length of the small hall that connected the living room, and the door to the outside, to the bedroom, and the door to the inside. Temporary steps, tracing a path towards a temporary solution to a permanent problem. Beyond the crack of the door, she saw her wife sleeping soundly in the cool of the late night. Temporary wife, temporary bedroom.” —Brooke K. Bell, Temporary/Permanent
“The round stone room that they lock the poet in contains nothing but a writing desk. The desk, of course, is fully stocked. Piles of creamy paper, elegantly carved sable-fur brushes, a pyramid of neatly-stacked inksticks, and an inkstone, its well full of perfectly still water. Sunlight streams down from a single window, high overhead and barred. Too high to reach even when she stands on the desk, its thin legs wobbling beneath her.” —Jamie Lackey, Inksticks and Paper Swans
“Rna’la arrived at Intergalactic Date-A-Thon and signed in using zir own gelatinous fluid (no scratchy ballpoint for zem, thanks!) The human woman collecting signatures blushed pinkly. Rna’la’s hearts throbbed in zir throat. Probably not attending. Ze passed several individuals in the hallway. Some bowed, some ignored zem. Not everyone recognized the current ruler of Th’ul.” —M.X Kelly, To Have and to Hold and to Hold and to Hold
- Amarilys Acosta – Heart Ink
- Emilia Agrafojo – Mixology
- Addison Albright – Cave Drawing
- Tam Ames – The Autograph
- RE Andeen – The Skinchanger’s Art
- Laura Antoniou – A Most Rewarding Quest
- Blaine D. Arden – Mending
- H. Argent – Impending Affair
- Aten – Power
- Ryley Banks – Right Place, Right Time
- Jorane G. Barton – Alternate Endings
- Joe Baumann – Babbler
- Brooke K. Bell – Temporary/Permanent
- David Berger – Indelible
- Eytan Bernstein – I Never Knew
- Gordon Bonnet – Nexus
- Die Booth – Faith and the Thorncutters
- Charlie Boynton – He Bleeds Ink
- Ryan Breadinc – The Ink Reader
- M. Burns – The Final Line
- Meghan Byers – Unmoored
- Aron Caer – Writer’s Blood
- Elsa M. Carruthers – I Am Happy to Be Here Today
- Foster Bridget Cassidy – Unfamiliar Waters
- Minerva Cerridwen – Not Alone
- Amanda Cherry – Signed
- Gwen Coholan – Ballpoint
- Rory Ni Coileain – All Myths Are True (but some are truer than others)
- Comer – Her Very Comfy Couch
- Georgia Cook – Butterfly
- Elliot Cooper – The Collection
- Bryan Crystal-Thursdton – Fluid
- Monique Cuillerier – The Present
- Claire Davon – Squid on the Beach
- Nicole Dennis – Hidden Spell
- Toshi Drake – Indelible Ink
- James Dunham – Lydia’s Back
- Allen Dyen-Shapiro – To Share the Sky
- Eason – On the Conjoined Practice of Demonology and Scribal Longhand
- P. Egry – Confessions of an Inkaholic
- B. Eyre – A Prisoner and a Captain
- Kim Fielding – Devil and Advocates
- Sheila Finch – Love is Blind
- Steve Fuson – Blank as the Page
- Jasie Gale – Pandora’s Row
- Magaly Garcia – rough draft #9/grocery list
- Isobel Granby – The Date Book
- Jacqui Greaves – A Dish Served Hot
- Sacchi Green – S/He Who Remembers
- D. Grimm – Companions
- Kaje Harper – The Pen is Mightier
- Brenna Harvey – EduTron 6000 + Principal Vertner 4Ever
- Kelly Haworth – Off Spectrum
- Sheryl R. Hayes – Panagram
- Chisto Healy – The Fine Print
- A. Hunt – Untitled
- S R Jones – So Let it Be Written, So Let It Be Done
- Dale Jordan – The Summoning
- Kim Katil – Heart Bound in Ink
- April Kelley – How to Create a Monster
- Ava Kelly – Soullink
- Laura J. Kelly – Rougarous Inc.
- X. Kelly – To Have and to Hold and to Hold and to Hold
- Adrik Kemp – Meet Cute
- Jessica M. Kormos – The Tattooist
- Barbara Krasnoff – The Inker, The Cat and The Parrot
- Jamie Lackey – Inksticks and Paper Swans
- Benoit Lafortune – Dragon Blood
- Tris Lawrence – Soul Afire
- Anja Hendrikse Liu – Stranger Stories
- Ainslie Lloyd – Off the Wall
- Nathan Alling Long – It’s What’s Inside That Counts
- Lily Luchesi – The Angel With Demon Blood
- K. Mads – The Dragon’s Price
- L. McCartney – Risotto Nero
- Paula McGrath – Free Hugs
- Helen M. Merrick – The Rose Tattoo
- Lynn Michaels – Battleground
- R. Moler – Ink is Memory
- Fiona Moore – The Muse’s Gift
- W. Murks – Just a Nudge
- S. Murphy – Love’s Portrait
- RJ Mustafa – Shadowbird
- Mary Newman – Graven Images
- Thea Nishimori – Glossaderma
- L. Noone – Openings
- Raine Norman – The Morning After
- Orion O’Connell – The Midnight Librarian
- Bradley Robert Parks – Guilty Pleasure Reading
- Dale Parnell – Belonging
- Terry Poole – Sign on the Dotted Line
- Brooke Prado – Cursebreaker
- Taylor Ramage – Inkshader
- Robin Reed – Printed Love
- S. Reinholt – Colours of Union
- Jen Rivers – The Aerium
- Jeff Ronan – Inked
- Herminia Root – Aedan
- Taylor Roth – For Death Doesn’t Part
- Jamie Sands – Toby’s Tattoo
- Rodello Santos – Told
- F. Schraeder – Spider Legs
- Ziggy Schutz – Renaming
- RJ Scott – Blood
- Alex Silver – Summoned
- Alex Sobel – Tense
- Ada Maria Soto – The Marks of a Knight
- Anna Stacy – Livename
- Susan Stradiotto – Moon Child
- Lou Sylvre – The Flight of the Telorites
- Nathaniel Taff – For Posterity’s Sake
- Naomi Tajedler – Oddities
- Sara Testarossa – Subversion
- Lauren Triola – The Unmarked
- Geneva Vand – The Colors of Fate
- M. Walker – The Hurt Patch
- Dean Wells – A Flacon of Ink
- T. Wyant – Future Perfect
- Rina Youngblood – Proof in the Telling
- Aubrey Zahn – Jumper
- Rainie Zenith – Blind Date
