C. Alex Smith's Blog

  Hook Your Reader   on  the First Page A Uniquely Formatted Online Course to Create a Compelling Opening and Writing Community   What to Expect: Starting  6/3/26 , participants have 13 days to watch 4 instructional videos and do exercises via a private webpage.  Participants spruce up or create a dynamic opening for a book, memoir, or short story of up to 300 words.  Two  Ask Me Anything  video calls will take place during that time to clear up any confusion about the videos or the exercises and to help you make your opening as compelling as possible. And I do mean "Anything"–even questions about writing that fall outside the course are welcome. By  6/15/26 , opening pages are submitted and distributed anonymously to the other participants via a link. Participants review other writers’ openings and answer three questions by  6/29/26  (14 days):  Does it make you want to turn the page and keep reading?  What hook...

 A deep-dive into the eight books I'll be watching for a potential Hugo Nomination. Cherrie’s 2026 Award Prediction Spreadsheet GoodReads Choice Awards 2025 Listopia Hugo Awards List 2025

  Learn The Advantages and Artistry of Writing Short Stories 10 am-3pm  Saturday, Nov 8 & Sunday, Nov 9 Luke AFB Recreation Area 415 Battalion Rd Fort Tuthill, Flagstaff $125 for Weekend Workshop **Lunch Included** Deadline to Register 11/5/25 Classes will discuss: Story Structure – Once a writer understands the structure of a story, it’s easier to write one. We will discuss three common structures: L inear, In Medias Res, and In Finis Literary Devices –Learn to access hundreds of literary devices including: Metaphor, Simile, and Analogy. Setting and Scene –Learn to implement a chosen literary device in a scene to improve the impact of your story. Characterization –Learn about attachable characters and non-attachable characters and the purpose of each. Create a character to integrate into your story. Point of View –  Learn various ways to tell their story: known narrator, unknown narrator, animal, inanimate object, or entirely through dialogue and action. Di...

Gunships and Goodbyes by Casey White The last time Rick encountered the invincible aliens known as the Tamani, he lost his left arm, his best friend, and his self-respect. Nursing such devastating losses, he decides to quit the corporate military unit protecting off-world settlers, TerraCorp, and take up the life of a Duster—a mechanic who flies between remote worlds fixing the outdated tech that keeps the colonies running.  Zooming about the galaxy, his life is safe, but he’s alone except for a cat that he inherited when he purchased his ship—a cat who hates him. Then an old friend calls to check up on him and tells him TerraCorp has discovered the Tamani are about to annex sector Rimward 27-A. TerraCorp knows they can’t evacuate all the settlers in that sector, so they are just quietly slipping away and abandoning the colonists to certain death.  Rick’s a long way from Rimward 27-A, but it’s the home of his best friend’s widow—a woman he’s sworn to protect. He races his sm...

Awards Watch: The Nebula Awards Suggested Reading List is produced through the collaborative efforts of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers Association's 2500+ members, and provided to the public as a service in finding last year's most noteworthy fantasy and science fiction works. It's a dense list of single-line titles that's six pages long. I'm trying to widdle down the number of novels that voters might choose in August at the Seattle Con to a number that I can actually read. To that end, I'm looking at the buzz each leading novel has generated. I've assigned a rather arbitrary value to each nomination and prize and totaled them in my Best Novels of 2024 spreadsheet. Every Newsletter has a link to this spreadsheet at the bottom.  So far, the top 6 SFF and top 3 Horror novels are: Top Contenders for 2024 Title Author Genre The Ministry of Time Kaliane Bradley Sci-Fi A Sorceress Comes to Call T. Kingfisher Fan...

  Awards Watch Hi! Welcome to Speculative Fiction Picks. This newsletter follows all things speculative fiction, but it centers around the annual  Hugo Awards . First presented in 1953 and presented annually since 1955, The Hugo Awards are science fiction’s most prestigious award. The Hugo Awards are given to media in 15 categories voted on by members of the World Science Fiction Convention (" Worldcon " ). Anyone with a ticket to Worldcon can vote on the winners. I have a LIST of 115 Science Fiction or Fantasy novels and 20 Horror Novels from 2024  that are eligible. I’ll be watching these books over the next few months to try to predict the winner. Feel free to weigh in on my Facebook page or Threads site with your opinions and reviews. New Novels We/re starting out this year with an Amazon Editor's Choice in Eiren Caffall's All the Water in the World .  In the tradition of Station Eleven, a literary thriller set partly on the roof of New York’s Museum of Natura...