How Many Submission?!?!

The open call for Pathways to Imagination - Whispers Made Flesh is officially closed. And the response has been staggering. More than 1,000 stories arrived. Each one trying, in its own way, to give shape to something invisible. Some stories came in softly. Some were clawing at the door. They arrived wearing the masks of Horror, Fantasy, or Science Fiction. Most refused to behave. Exactly what we were hoping for.

When I first chose this theme, I kept thinking about how stories actually begin. Not with a polished draft. Not with a plot outline. Not even notes in a book. They begin with something much smaller. An image that won’t leave you alone. A feeling that wraps itself around you. A line of dialogue that appears out of nowhere. A strange question that lingers for days. A quiet emotional pressure that keeps pushing, desperate to be let out.

This is where stories start.

A whisper.

It’s the whisper that says: Write this. Sometimes it’s a hushed fear or longing. Other times it’s a quiet pain or memory that refuses to stay buried. Often times it’s the drive to play, with words, with sensations, with ideas.

So I wondered. What if I gave those whispers a place to be heard. A way to be given shape and form. That question opened the door for this anthology. And wow, did everyone run through it.

Now all those stories sit within the hands of The Reading Syndicate. The pages are turning. The work has started and the fun begins.

Somewhere in this thousand story storm a book is beginning to emerge.