Luna Station Quarterly

Hi everyone!

I am so, so thrilled to present to you this 11th slice of genre fiction pie. There are a ton of awesome stories, as always. All woman-written and I think they’re really gonna knock your socks off!

I want to once again thank the awesome Evan Mariah Pettit and Cheryl Wood Ruggiero, LSQ’s assistant editors, for all their hard work sorting through our record number of submissions. Hi ladies, I’m going to keep thanking you loudly.

So, if you’re wondering where to sink your teeth into this issue (I think I might be a bit hungry), I suggest you start with our featured story of the week, “Magic on the Cliffs of Moher” by Amy Holt. Then do continue on with the banquet of stories we have on the table.

And, if you’d like to help support LSQ and its authors, please feel free to spread the word on Twitter and Facebook and Tumblr and all that jazz. If you’d like to do something a little more substantial, the issue is available as an ebook for purchase. You get all three major formats for one low price (only $2.99) and all the proceeds go right back into LSQ’s author fund!

Thank you all for your support and HAPPY READING!

Hello dear readers!

Our submission period ends on Tuesday and that means it’s time for LSQ to get a little quiet, update-wise. We’ll be busily prepping the issue and I can’t wait to share it all with you. Evan and Cheryl, my amazing assitant editors have done some tireless work on this issue and I want to formally thank them for all their hard work. A-mazing, ladies!

If you haven’t yet plucked up the courage to send in a story, you’ve still got a couple more days! Check out our submissions page for all the details!

Thanks to all our readers for your support. See you with a new issue on September 1st!

We’ve got a lovely and growing pile of submissions for our next issue. There are so many great stories coming your way, you have no idea! As we start wrapping up our submission period (it ends August 15th), things will get a little quieter around here, but I encourage you to follow us on Facebook or Twitter to keep up with the latest.

While you wait for the next issue, why not take a little time to read our featured story of the week, “The Look in Her Eyes” by Kathryn Hinds? And if you like that one, there are a bunch more waiting for you in the rest of the issue. 

Thanks for stopping by! 

The lovely editors of LSQ are hard at work preparing the next issue for you (due out September 1st, which is closer than you think). Stories are coming in that I’m excited to share with you! If you would like to add your own to the pile, we’re accepting submssions until August 15th. You can find all the details on our submissions page.

If you prefer to read instead of write, you have come to the right place! I can recommend our featured story of the week, “Folk Songs” by Vivian Caethe, as a great place to start. There are a ton of wonderful stories in our current issue, and our back issues are chockablock with great tales, too.

I can also see ebook versions of our archives on the horizon. I can’t wait to share the work of our talented authors with you in those shiny new formats. If you’d like to be notified when they’re available (as well as other LSQ news) you can sign up for our publisher’s newsletter. (It only comes out once or twice a month, it’s not too inbox-filling) Of course, you can also just follow us here or on Twitter and Facebook.

Thanks for stopping by and I’ll see you again next week as the end of our submission period looms closer!

I’m just posting a quick, little update here as things are crazy busy behind the scenes! I’m preparing the Luna Station Press releases for August and also reading through all the wonderful submissions for the next issue of Luna Station Quarterly. Want to give me more work to do? I would love it! Seriously! Just use that Submissions link over on your right and send your story in! You know you want to. Be brave, like Merida. Take a chance. Send that beloved story in, you never know where it might lead.

You might end up lik the author of our featured story. This week, the honor belongs to  ”Lydia’s Tree” by Lauren C. Baker. As always, I highly encourage you to read it and then read some of the other stellar tales in this issue. 

Want to take LSQ with you? We have ebooks available (see those links on the left?) and every dollar we net goes to support the site and our authors. 

We know times are tough, too, so if you love LSQ and want to help out, you could always send a tweet or like us on Facebook and it would be a great help in spreading the word!

Thanks for your support and happy reading!

Hello readers! We know it’s really hot out right now (at least for those of us here in North America) and we would love to occupy your imaginations and distract you from the weather. Of course, if you love that kind of temperature, just take us with you to the beach!

You can start with our featured story of the week, “Giant’s Island” by Elizabeth J. Kepsel. A great story among a wondeful collection of tales in our current issue. We highly encourage you to go and read it along with the rest. 

If you’re interested in supporting LSQ, you can use our donation button, of course, but you can also purchase an ebook of our current issue! We’ll also be releasing our archives in ebook format in the coming months!

We also have a bit of author news to share:

I have a bunch of wonderful news to share! I love spreading the work about our fabulous authors and the stories they’ve written and one of the missions of LSQ is to support our authors, especially when they’ve been published. Yes, this means even when their stories go to someone else. 

Before I share the news, I’ll announce that this week’s featured story is “Harvesting Wishes” by Mary E. Lowd. Please do go and enjoy it, as well as the other fine tales in this issue! There are some wonderfully incredible stories just waiting for you.

Like what you see? Please spread the word! You can find us on Facebook, Twitter, and follow these updates on Tumblr. 

And now for the author news:

We are once again open for submissions. If you have dreamed of having your short story published, why not consider sending it to us? You can find all the details on our submissions page. 

Our featured story of the week is “Storm’s Spawn” by Ann Gimpel. I hope you enjoy it and the other wonderful stories in this issue.

And finally a bit of publishing news to share from our authors:

J.C. Martin’s novel, Oracle, a crime thriller, will be published with J. Taylor Publishing in July 2012.

R.S. Pyne’s historical horror short story was published in issue 2 of Lisette’s Tales of the Imagination & another will appear in Bete Noire in July 2012.

Dawn Baird’s non-fiction story, “My Husband Married a Woman Named Donna” was included in the Chicken Soup For the Soul: Here Comes the Bride.

A quick note to begin: I’m shifting the tone of these entries a bit and making it more personable. I found that while being a little less professional, it definitely warmed up the feeling of the last entry. So, from here on out, whoever writes in this space will use “I” instead of “we”. There, isn’t that more friendly?

But that’s of little importance when we have such exciting news this week! First, though our featured story:

This week’s story is “Medusa Redux” by Nikki Vogel. I highly encourage you to go and read it, then check out the rest of the fabulous stories in this issue.

And now, the big news: 

It is my great pleasure to announce that Cheryl Ruggiero is joining Evan Pettit as our second Assistant Editor on Luna Station Quarterly!

Cheryl has had a fair number of stories published here at LSQ, but beyond that has been a strong supporter and cheerleader for our little corner of the internet. Newly-retired and looking to find a way to use some of that recently discovered time, I was thrilled when she accepted the position.

Cheryl is a great fit for LSQ, being a contributing author since the early days and always supportive of the magazine. She embraces our mission of spreading the word about women speculative fiction writers and her own stories show the kind of courage in her writing that we embrace whole-heartedly. She’s also full of wonderful energy and ready to tackle whatever I’m going to throw at her. 

What does this mean for the future of LSQ? Well, with Cheryl on board, there will be another set of eyes on every story we read, increasing our already high quality standards. It also pushes forward the possibility of tackling a few projects that I’ve had up my sleeve for a while now. News on those to come soon!

So please join me in congratulating Cheryl. Welcome! I’ll be sure to give you plenty of work! 

We’re very excited to make a few huge announcements along with this release, so grab a tasty beverage and get settled.

First, this is our 10th issue! How exciting! There are a ton of fabulous stories ready and waiting for you. We love putting these issues together for you and this one was a pleasure from start to finish. We’re humbled that so many talented women chose to send their stories to us.

We heartily encourage you to go enjoy the issue. We have science fiction, fantasy, creepy stories, light-hearted stories, and odd things that defy categorization; the scope is as wonderfully varied as the women who wrote them. You can start, for example, with our featured story of the week, “Deep Deck 9” by Charlotte Nash. Then continue on to the next and just keep going. We’ll be here when you get back.

The second huge announcement is rather huge and effects the mission of LSQ and its scope.

As Editor and Publisher of Luna Station Quarterly, I am thrilled to announce the formation of Luna Station Press!!! 

And as this project is so personal, I’m stepping out of ‘we’ to talk to you all like the friends you are. :)

This huge, exciting, new venture is built on the foundation of LSQ. The last two and a half years I have worked to grow LSQ and its mission of bringing women speculative fiction authors to a larger audience. I’m very excited to have this issue of LSQ be part of the first batch of releases (along with a short novel and a poetry collection). 

As part of this new press, LSQ will now be published as a true ebook! Available in a variety of formats (epub, mobi, and PDF) your purchase options are also varied. You can buy direct from Luna Station Press (which puts the most money back into the kitty and toward paying the authors) or you can purchase from DriveThruFiction, a site that’s wonderfully supportive of independent genre publishing. 

In the coming months, all of the LSQ archives will be converted to ebooks. As soon as that conversion is done, back issues will be sold singly as well as a package of all the issues for a discount.

Speaking of pricing and selling and all of that, the price of these ebooks is a very reasonable $2.99 per issue, and you get all three major formats! (EPUB, MOBI and PDF) I also want to assure you that LSQ will always be free to read online. Women’s voices need to be heard and I believe in giving them the biggest megaphone I can muster. 

And just a reminder that the money being raised is to pay the LSQ authors. LSQ has been a ‘for the love’ market since its foundation. I have always wanted to pay the wonderfully supportive authors and this is our first step in raising those funds. All profits from the sale of the LSQ ebook editions go directly toward that goal.

The same goes for that little donation button to your right. All donations go directly back to the authors, starting with issue 013, next year. 

Is that enough news for you? I know I’m very excited and I hope you are, too. There are a few more announcements that will be coming down the pike over the summer, so be sure to watch this space, follow us on Twitter, Tumblr, or Facebook!

Or, if you’d like, you can sign up for the Luna Station Press newsletter. Once or twice a month there will be news about upcoming releases, sneak peeks and, of course, the occasional coupon and little surprise.

Thank you so much for stopping by and I hope you enjoy some stories while you’re here. Happy Reading! 

P. S. - If you would like to know a little more about the whys and wherefores of how I decided to take this leap, you can read my editorial from this issue. And if you’d like to learn more about the press itself, you can visit the shiny, new website. :)

P. P. S - Authors: The Press is also now officially open for submissions! Slots are available for our late-2012 release and beyond. You can check out the Luna Station Press submissions page for all the details. If you’d like to be notified of when we are open and closed for regular submissions as well as submissions to LSQ, you can sign up for our special author newsletter.