Once again, you curse the gods of literature: Your “short story” turned out to be the first chapter of a novel, and you really wanted a short story. How do you keep things short? Try to limit the number of important characters to two or three. Use one point of view. Keep the conflict simple, the way that postage stamp artwork is memorable but simple. Compress the time frame. Aim for a single effect. Include only the most essential information. If you need a short story idea, here are a few.
• This is a fantasy story in which a gem broker becomes obsessed over a new kind of stone that appears at a roadside market.
• This is young adult story in which a panic-stricken alien learns self-defense from a dog.
• This is a competence p0rn story about an incorrigible lunar pioneer who endangers the settlement by sloppy habits that introduce lunar dust, which has damaging and dangerous sharp edges, into living and working quarters.
Here are some things published in 2025 that you may wish to consider nominating for an award — just a reminder. Some are my own works, some are my translations.
Science fiction and fantasy short stories by me
“To Defeat Water” Short story, 1175 words. If you curse Poseidon, he might curse you, too, time and time again. And life after life, you can fight back. Read it here: The Lorelei Signal, July 2025.
“Journey to Apollodorus” Novelette, 8760 words. In my novel Dual Memory, an AI named Par Augustus discovers a story about robots in the Apollodorus Crater on Mercury. This is the story. It focuses on the humans who struggle to create and maintain a scientific team when a lander sent to Mercury behaves unexpectedly. Success can be as stressful as failure. Oxygen Leaks Magazine, March 2025 (no longer in publication, contact me for a copy).
Novella translation
ChloroPhilia by Cristina Jurado. Translation of a novella, 20,200 words. Would you sacrifice your humanity to save the world? Nominated for Spain’s Ignotus Award, this strange coming-of-age story addresses life after an environmental disaster, collective madness, and sacrifices made for the greater good. Buy it here: Apex Books, January 2025.
Science fiction short story translations
“Trees at Night” by Ramiro Sanchiz. Translation of a short story, 6050 words. A librarian at a hospital-like sanatorium befriends a young patient named Federico for reasons that eventually become clear. Read it here: Clarkesworld Science Fiction and Fantasy Magazine, November 2025.
“Proxima One” by Caryanna Reuven. Translation of a short story, 4020 words. A machine intelligence called Proxima One sends probes into the galaxy on long journeys filled with waiting and yearning in a search for intelligent life. The probes cope with unexpected wonders, loss, and profound changes — but there is always possibility and hope. Read it here: Clarkesworld Science Fiction and Fantasy Magazine, May 2025.
“Bodyhoppers” by Rocío Vega. Translation of a short story, 5290 words. Minds can hop from body to body, but there’s always a problem because the system is designed to create them. One day, you can’t return to your own body because it’s occupied by someone with more money. Now you have no home, and you’re still madly in love. Clarkesworld Science Fiction and Fantasy Magazine, February 2025.
Poetry translation
Liquid Sand / Arena Líquida by Jorge Valdés Díaz-Vélez. Book of poetry translated by Christian Law Palacín and myself. This is the first major bilingual collection of poems by Jorge Valdés Díaz-Vélez, one of Mexico’s most respected contemporary poets. It gathers 42 of his works selected from six previous collections that span more than two decades of writing. Shearsman Books, November 2025.
The 30th annual Parsec Short Story Contest is open for submissions until March 31, 2026. This year’s theme is “metamorphosis.” Entries should be unpublished and be no more than 3,500 words. The contest is open to writers who have not met the eligibility requirements for SFWA full membership. No entry fee. Full contest rules and information are here.
The winners will be chosen by a team of three judges. I’m one of them. What will I be looking for? A good story, well told, of course. I’ve judged other contests, and I’ve seen a number of otherwise excellent stories that drop the ball at the end. The manuscript reaches “the end” a paragraph or two before the story does, failing to complete the emotional arc of the characters. Just saying. Good luck!
My flash fiction piece “The Souvenir You Most Want” won second place in the 2002 Parsec Contest, which had the theme “Met by Moonlight.” Read it here.
My short story “Think Kindly on Our Fossils” appears in the 2007 Triangulation: End of Time anthology, published by PARSEC Ink. You can purchase it here.
Let’s start with Spain, since I used to live there. The word of the year for 2025 is arancel (tariff), according to Fundéu, which advises on questions about Spanish language use for news reporting. Due to US policy changes, issues of tariffs for imports and exports have been in the news a lot in Spain.
The runners-up give a peek into other issues in Spanish news: apagón (power outage), macroincendio (massive wildfire), preparacionista (prepper), boicot (boycott), dron (drone), generación Z (Generation Z), macrorredada (massive roundup, specifically ICE arrests in the US) rearme (rearm, as with weapons), papa (pope), tierras raras (rare earths), and trumpismo (Trumpism).
The Economist magazine, Australia’s Macquarie Dictionary, and Merriam-Webster Dictionary all chose slop. “Slop merchants clog up the internet with drivel,” the Economist opines. Merriam-Webster defines slop as “digital content of low quality that is produced usually in quantity by means of artificial intelligence.” The Macquarie definition specifies “low-quality content created by generative AI, often containing errors, and not requested by the user.” All three sites have long lists of runner-up words.
For Oxford University Press, the word is rage bait, “online content deliberately designed to elicit anger or outrage by being frustrating, provocative, or offensive, typically posted in order to increase traffic to or engagement with a particular web page or social media account.” Oxford adds, “The Oxford Word of the Year can be a singular word or expression, which our lexicographers think of as a single unit of meaning.” The runners-up are aura farming and biohack. (Robert Reich points out that rage bait is profitable.)
Dictionary.com chose 67for 2025. “Most other two-digit numbers had no meaningful trend over that period, implying that there is something special about 67,” the site informs us, adding that “we’re all still trying to figure out exactly what it means.” Dictionary.com’s runners-up include an emoji. Both CNN and AP agree 67 can be annoying. The comic xkcd has additional information about funny numbers.
Canada’s Queens University picked maplewash, “the deceptive practice of making things appear more Canadian than they actually are.” That is, maplewashing encourages buying Canadian-made products rather than US imports. The word edged out elbows up. Both words speak to our times, and as an American, I apologize to our nice neighbors to the north.
Cambridge chose parasocial: “involving or relating to a connection that someone feels between themselves and a famous person they do not know, a character in a book, film, TV series, etc., or an artificial intelligence.” It adds, ominously, “The emergence of parasocial relationships with AI bots saw people treat ChatGPT as a confidant, friend or even romantic partner. These led to emotionally meaningful – and in some cases troubling – connections for users, and concerns about the consequences.” Sloppy consequences.
Collins Dictionary picked vibe coding, which “refers to the use of artificial intelligence prompted by natural language to write computer code.” (See also: slop.) Collins, too, has a runner-up list, and some of those terms will sound familiar.
Global Times reports that the Trilateral Cooperation Secretariat has chosen future as the China-Japan-South Korea Spirit Word of the Year. The secretary-general of TCS said future reflects the optimism and determination of the people of China, Japan, and South Korea to build closer ties in the future.
Time chose “the architects of AI” as Person of the Year 2025. (See also: slop.)
Pantone chose its color of the year, Cloud Dancer, “a lofty white that serves as a symbol of calming influence in a society rediscovering the value of quiet reflection. A billowy white imbued with serenity, PANTONE 11-4201 Cloud Dancer encourages true relaxation and focus, allowing the mind to wander and creativity to breathe, making room for innovation.”
As reported by NPR and Today, not everyone is impressed by the color, although Homes and Gardens points out that “white is timeless.” I should mention that my home office is painted white. In my case, it’s because I was too lazy to think harder.
I wrote this piece as a Christmas present for my nephew in 2004.
This is your first Christmas, Sean, and since you’re only eight months old, I know this story might not impress you much, but it seems like the right time to tell it.
Your father was not quite three months old on his first Christmas, and I was ten years old. I knew enough about babies to know they don’t really do much at first, but eventually they grow into real people. That was the exciting puzzle. What was this new baby brother going to be like? We didn’t have many clues, but we watched for them all the time. Who was Louis Peter Burke?
Your Grandmother Burke died well before you were born, so you don’t know much about her. Here is her Christmas tree decorating theory: More is better. In architectural terms, it was rococo baroque.
During Christmas Eve day, we decorated the tree. First the lights went on — big lights, small lights, steady lights, twinkle lights, colored lights, white lights, all the lights we had, and there were plenty. Second, we hung every single ornament we had on the tree, and, again, there were plenty. If one was ugly or beat up, it went way in the inside where it could add color or sparkle without really being visible. The only rule was smaller stuff on top, bigger stuff on the bottom. Finally, we added tinsel and garlands of various types and colors to be sure there was maximum sparkle.
Then we waited for nightfall, since only a darkened house could do justice to the masterpiece we had created.
Meanwhile, we dressed your father in a red-and-white-striped elf-costume pajama set that an aunt had given him, complete with a pointy cap. He didn’t care for the cap but we made him wear it anyway, at least long enough for a photo, which may still be around somewhere. He looked more silly than elfish. He certainly had no idea about what was going on. He was too little to understand much of anything.
The moment to light the tree arrived. We turned out all the lamps and closed the front curtains to block the streetlight. With a flip of a switch, the tree flashed on, providing enough sparkling light to read by.
Your father’s eyes got big and he couldn’t take them off the tree. He liked it! He liked it a lot! Even when we turned the room lights back on, he continued to stare at the tree, fascinated.
It was a clue, the first clue I remember, about your father’s personality. He liked colorful, beautiful things — at least, we thought the tree was beautiful, and in a rococo way, it certainly was. We lit the tree for him throughout the holidays for the sheer fun of watching him enjoy it.
I don’t remember much else about that Christmas, like what I got as presents, what anyone else got, whether there was snow, or what we had for Christmas dinner. All I remember is the intense look of surprise and delight on your father’s little face, and how merry a Christmas he made it for all of us because we could make him happy, and because we had learned a little bit about him.
Finding out who someone is takes a long time. I’m still learning things about my brother Louis. Fatherhood, for example, has revealed new aspects of his personality and interests. In the same delighted way that I first saw so many years ago, he could not be more curious and excited to learn about you. Who is Sean Patrick Burke?
This is your father’s first Christmas with you. I hope it is merry.
Sue Burke 