The beauty of working with human writers is that every writer will have different solutions. I'm very impressed when I find someone has hooked me with a promise that I didn't realize was a promise, but it carried me right through the piece.
Don't be afraid to experiment.
(I recommend "Save as...")
Sometimes, it will be your snappy dialogue. Open with some of that. Sometimes it will be an intense mood. Open with that. Sometimes it will be an engaging narrative voice. Open with that.
(And sometimes, the answer is to cut your first scene and open with scene 2.)
(I recommend avoiding the "open with the moment before the crisis and then saying, 'she reflected on how she got into this situation' thing" because we all hate it.)
My advice to writers facing this is this:
Look at the ending. What's great about it? (Ask a trusted crit partner to help you there.)
How can you open with that?
I send a lot of rejections that say to people that I particularly loved the ending of their story, but I don't think the reader is going to get there.
This isn't to say you can't do a story with a turn like that, but there needs to be something else that runs through the whole story and is present on page 1 that will bring the reader all the way through it. That may be your gorgeous mastery of prose. That may be a very compelling main character.
Some readers really go for quiet, reflective pieces about everyday things. But when the story turns to become a gruesome story about aliens dissecting living people, they're going to hate it. Meanwhile, readers who would totally go for aliens disemboweling people stopped reading pages ago.
That doesn't necessarily mean "start with the stakes already high" (unless, of course, that's the kind of story it is), but if the opening of your story is a low-key conversation about everyday things, that's the kind of story the reader thinks they're getting.
Some unsolicited advice from an editor:
In short fiction, especially on the internet, you've only got a couple of sentences to convince a reader to keep reading.
Those first sentences are what the theorists call "the promise to the reader," letting them know if this is a story they want to read.
It's important, at least occasionally, to publish stories that are, first and foremost, fun.
Attempting to write in the pulp tradition today is fraught with peril. Subvert the tropes too much, and it's no longer the genre. Don't subvert enough, and you end up being racist, sexist, colonialist, etc.
Which is why I was impressed when J.R. Blanes sent me his attempt to walk the fine line.
I love old pulp literature, despite it being problematic. It really is, on the whole, a mess of racism, sexism, colonialism, and most any other -ism you can think of. You can't (and shouldn't) ignore that, but if you can understand it in the context of the culture of the time, it can be fun.
Hell Itself is going to be shifting to a new schedule. We will be posting one story every two weeks following our March 27 post.
The rate of submissions has slowed down, and we want to keep the quality of the stories high.
We'll pick it back up again if we find ourselves with another backlog.
I was not aware that he was going to be announced as a finalist when I decided to run the story on Friday.
That decision was made purely because I'm behind schedule and it was ready to go.
Congratulations, @davidanaxagoras.com!
There are some stories that, when you ask me what it's about or to describe it, I pause and then say, "You know what, just read it."
When this one came in, I knew it was one of those. Just read it. You'll be glad you did.
One advantage to having a publication dedicated to one thing—say weird westerns or dark fantasy—is that readers who like whatever that niche is will find it.
One of the challenges of stories that blur the lines is they don't really fit in any of those magazines.
Even when the story is beautiful.
It should come as no surprise by now that I enjoy @reggiekwok.bsky.social's work. There has to be a place in the genre for stories that are quirky and fun (and not A.I. slop), and Reggie consistently delivers. I'm happy to bring you another piece he wrote.
When this story first landed in front of me, I was struck by the strength of the imagery in it. It's not much like anything @hellitself.bsky.social has published before, but to say our tastes are eclectic would be an understatement. I enjoyed this one, and I hope you do, too.
Luckily, Hell Itself isn't flooded with submissions like some of the major publications are. A busy week will see submissions tip into double digits, whereas when I've worked at bigger magazines, we could get that in an hour.
I have time to read the slush more carefully.
And I find gems like this.
When you see the story in Hell Itself, you've got an advantage: You know that I selected it for inclusion, so, at the very least, I think it's worth reading. When we're reading slush, we haven't had that affirmation that it really is good and worth our time. Sadly, we miss good pieces.
Stories like this one can be very hard to sell, even when they're wonderful pieces like this one is.
That's because the person at the magazine who gives it its first read doesn't know that it's a wonderful story. Not everyone has Connie Willis' reputation to make us pay attention.
"Migrations" by Mike A. Rhodes reminded me of "Winnebagos" in many ways.
It's also one of those pieces where what's going on on the surface is just a tiny piece of a much, much larger story, and there's a lot of story to miss if you're reading quickly or carelessly.
When I was a young man, Asimov's published "The Last of the Winnebagos" by Connie Willis.
I remember reading it, and immediately calling up my best friend who was also a subscriber wanting to discuss it because, as I said at the time, "I feel like I missed at least as much as I got."
One of the things I love about SF/F is how it echoes our reality, changing it in ways that let us examine the real world from a different perspective. This story struck me right away as both topical and timeless.
This is another one that isn't what I usually go for as a reader or an editor, but I remember being taken in by the great character work. It's a short piece, but one I think you'll remember.
I was trying to avoid working in solidarity with the people of Minnesota on Friday, and I apparently never cycled back to hype last Friday's story.
And it's a good one.
And that beautiful blue ink that faded so gradually you never knew where your old 'zines went.
I haven't been able to figure out the front page interface, either. Click on "Full Searchable List of Recommended Works" and you'll get a list that's alphabetical by author, but you have to click buttons for each letter of the alphabet.
In my day, we had a mimeograph.
We would just like to casually point out that the @sfwa.org Recommended Reading List currently contains Hell Itself stories by @rachiea.bsky.social, @crboltz.bsky.social, @deborahldavitt.com, @reggiekwok.bsky.social, @gerrileen.bsky.social, @tedmorrissey.bsky.social, @ktwagner.bsky.social, and more!
This, incidentally, is another one I rushed through editing because current events made it eerily relevant.
I'd love to say that @ladyzinnia.bsky.social was very gracious about it, but I suspect she'd hurt me if I ever told anyone she was gracious about anything.