The WMG offices are just now returning to normal after the weeklong Anthology Workshop, but our work has only just begun.

Kristine Kathryn Rusch and Dean Wesley Smith have hosted the workshop for more than a decade, in which writers from all over the world have the opportunity to watch editors live edit upcoming anthologies, which includes not only an inside view into how an editor’s mind works (a scary thing, I assure you) but also direct editorial feedback on their stories. In the past, DAW and Pocket published many of the anthologies. For the past three years, the anthologies our editors focused on have included Fiction River volumes.

We have a great deal of fun at this workshop, hard work be damned. If you were following us on Facebook or Twitter this month, you know what I mean. If you weren’t go check out all the photos we posted.

The one-million words that our editors read for the workshop.

Our hard-working editors—Dean Wesley Smith, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Kevin J. Anderson, Rebecca Moesta, Mark Leslie, John Helfers and Kerrie L. Hughes—read more than 1 million words of fiction for this workshop. That’s right, I said 1 million. And Mark surprised everyone the last day with the announcement that he’d be editing the second Fiction River special edition, which will be titled Editors’ Cut.

The special edition will be produced through a partnership with Kobo, although it will also be available in trade paperback and will eventually become available on other e-retailer platforms.

Watch for more information on that volume as we draw closer to its release at the end of 2016. You can find information on next year’s workshop here. It’s nearly full, so if you’re interested, please sign up now.

We’re also doing a good bit of scheming with Mark and Kobo to help promote our other volumes (she says with an evil grin).

And just as the workshop started, we received another piece of good news: Two of our Fiction River stories have been nominated for Derringer Awards.

Fiction River Special: Crime with award-nominees and other wonderful stories.

“Because” by Melissa Yi is nominated in the Best Flash category. The story first appeared in Fiction River Special Edition: Crime.

“Hitler’s Dogs” by Doug Allyn is nominated in the Best Novelette category. This story also first appeared in Fiction River Special Edition: Crime.

Please join me in offering congratulations to these amazing authors. We’re so proud to have them as part of the Fiction River family. We actually need to congratulate Doug twice, because he has two stories in the Novelette category. The other is from Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine.

You can see the full list of finalists here. And although I’d love it if you ran out and bought Fiction River Special Edition: Crime to read all of the incredible stories contained within, I thought I’d offer you the chance to read the nominated stories for free here on this website. You can read “Because” here and “Hitler’s Dogs” here.

The awards are decided March 31. I’ll have more Fiction River news for you in a couple of weeks.

Until then, have fun diving in to these amazing stories.

Allyson Longueira is publisher of WMG Publishing. She is an award-winning writer, editor and designer.

EXCERPT:

The WMG offices are just now returning to normal after the weeklong Fiction River Anthology Workshop, but our work has only just begun. Plus, we have some exciting news to announce, so be sure to read on.

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