It’s been a busy year for WMG Publishing! While we added to some of our most popular and familiar publications and series, we also launched a whole bunch of new ventures.
We ran eight Kickstarters, all of which funded, most of them within an hour of launch. And we published more than a dozen books as a result of those Kickstarters, including two books in award-winning author Kristine Kathryn Rusch’s fan-favorite and bestselling Diving series. Those were The Court-Martial of the Renegat Renegades and Ivory Trees.
We had the annual subscription drive for Pulphouse Fiction Magazine, which was not only successful but also marked the change from six issues a year to monthly! The first monthly issues featured new works from Kristine Kathryn Rusch and Pulphouse regular Annie Reed. Upcoming featured authors include Scott Edelman and Kevin J. Anderson. If you haven’t subscribed yet, it’s not too late! Click here.
In January we participated in Kickstarter’s Make 100 projects with our third Make 100. We started with Colliding Worlds, 120 sf stories in six volumes in 2021; followed that up with Crimes Collide, 100 mystery stories in 2022; and in 2023 we did Fantasies Collide, 100 fantasy stories. Each series has five volumes (with the exception of Colliding Worlds, which has six) and fifty stories each by Dean Wesley Smith and Kristine Kathryn Rusch in every volume.
And we’re planning a new Make 100 project this January! This time, it’s all about Romance…
Kristine Kathryn Rusch and Dean Wesley Smith curated five StoryBundles in 2023, everything from Fantasy/Steampunk, to Cattitude, to Halloween and finally Good Cheer this Christmas holiday season. In addition, in June Kris curated The Write Stuff StoryBundle, and out of that we published the 21st WMG Writer’s Guide, Kris’s How Writers Fail: Analysis and Solutions, the following month.
All of the above-mentioned books and magazines are now available in our new online stores. Designed and put together by our brilliant new Advertising & Accounts Executive, Stephanie Writt, these stores offer all of our publications plus some very cool new merchandise—direct to the reader with no vendors such as Amazon or Apple or Barnes & Noble involved. We can give our readers and subscribers all kinds of discounts and bargains!
In total the four stores have more than 1,000 items for sale, including ebooks and fun things such as mugs and calendars, sweatshirts and blankets, and much, much more. Paperbacks are coming soon!
The Mothership at wmgbooks.com has all things WMG. OK, we are still adding some of the hundreds of individual short stories we publish, but we’re nearly there. With the scores of stories by Kris and Dean, it’s been an exciting challenge to get everything listed!
Pulphouse Fiction Magazine has its own store now, too, with all of the issues of the current iteration of the magazine, plus all of the Pulphouse books and tons of fun merchandise.
Our fourth store to launch is the WMG Holiday Spectacular. It has all the themed anthologies from our very first Holiday Spectacular Calendar of Stories in 2019 through the 2022 anthologies, plus the mega-compilation volumes with every story from every year. There are lots of beautiful holiday items from cozy blankets to mugs for hot beverages to coasters and pillows, all with classic holiday art from the wonderful Giordano Studios. We just wrapped up the 2023 WMG Holiday Spectacular Calendar of Stories today, but if you missed it, you can preorder the annual compilation, which will release in July.
Dean and Kris continue to expand the workshop offerings for writers on Teachable. They started several new series in 2023 including Motivational Mondays, The Decade Ahead, a virtual course where participants could attend the Licensing Expo with Dean as guide, courses such as the Indie Writer’s Guide to Shopify that includes weekly Zoom meetings, courses on creating merchandise for your fans—and lots more.
Very exciting courses and challenges for writers, and there’s lots coming in 2024, including the return of the Anthology Workshop!
So, it’s been a super busy year at WMG Publishing, with lots of new books, products, stores, workshops and magazines!
We wish you all a Happy New Year, and we look forward to hearing from you in the days ahead!
Merry Christmas to all who celebrate! We at WMG are home celebrating this joyful day with our families.
And so, instead of the usual blog, here is a gift from us to you. A delightful free story about Christmas and families by Kristine Kathryn Rusch called “Christopher’s Crummy Christmas.”
First, the2023 Good Cheer StoryBundle, curated by Kristine Kathryn Rusch, and featuring 10 story collections perfect for the holiday season.
Here’s a quick overview about the bundle:
Make time for great fiction during the holidays: Read a holiday short story or two. Or three. Or a hundred. The Good Cheer StoryBundle gives you dozens and dozens of holiday stories, all to suit your mood. From mystery to science fiction, from Solstice stories to the traditional Christmas fare, the Good Cheer bundle has something for everyone—even people who only have a few minutes to read.
This bundle features three WMG titles (Jingle My Bells, Winter Holidays, and Stories for the Cold of Winter) as well as three StoryBundle exclusives (Uncommon Holidays, Unexpected Santas, and Holiday Hope).
Speaking of great holiday short stories, for Pulphouse Fiction Magazine #24, editor Dean Wesley Smith gathered some of the best Pulphouse writers and their best fun and unexpected holiday season stories.
This issue also includes a special original holiday story by Annie Reed.
Here’s a look at the table of contents:
“First Chair” by Annie Reed
“Scrooge and Marley” by David H. Hendrickson
“Krampus and His Theoretical Heart” by Rob Vagle
“Santa Sata-ni-fied” by Stephannie Tallent
“Desperate Housewitches” by Dayle A. Dermatis
“The Pain” by O’Neil De Noux
“What Fits” by Nina Kiriki Hoffman
“Harsh Expectations” by R.W. Wallace
“It’s a Wonderful Death” by Robert Jeschonek
“Up On the Rooftop” by Kristine Grayson
“Minions at Work” by J. Steven York
Click here to buy this issue of Pulphouse. And click here to check out the holiday Pulphouse merchandise.
Happy reading, and from all of us here at WMG, we wish you a very merry and happy week full of fun and festivities, no matter what you happen to celebrate!
Allyson Longueira is publisher of WMG Publishing. She is an award-winning writer, editor and designer, working mother, and brain tumor survivor.
These are the last few days for the very special Kickstarter called Never Before Seen: Six Original Mysteries by Kristine Kathryn Rusch. This is the first time Kris has experimented with doing a Kickstarter for her work of this length, and we’re so pleased with the success it has already achieved.
But we’re not done yet. We’ve hit XX stretch goals so far, and we have at least one more special stretch goal up our sleeves.
These six mysteries come with any reward, and we’ve also put together rewards with some of Kris’ and WMG’s other mystery titles, so you have plenty of options to choose from.
Plus, there’s the special workshop— a brand-new DOWN IN THE DETAILS series of classes called HOW TO WRITE PERFECT CRIMES THROUGH THE AGES—and the special BUY EVERYTHING lifetime subscription to every ebook WMG publishes!
We’re launching a very special Kickstarter just in time for the holidays. This one is ebook only and will be fulfilled by Christmas, so if you’re shopping for mystery-lovers, we’ve got the gifts for you!
Kris is known for her award-winning mysteries, and getting six new stories at one time is really special!
Here’s a look at the new covers.
These six mysteries come with any reward, and we’ve also taken the opportunity to put together rewards with some of Kris’ and WMG’s other mystery titles, so you have plenty of options to choose from.
Add in the special workshops, which will be announced when the Kickstarter goes live, and the special BUY EVERYTHING lifetime subscription to every ebook WMG publishes, and it’s a mystery wonderland!
Happy Cyber Monday! I know that’s not a real holiday. It’s a made-up retail holiday. Just like Black Friday and Small Business Saturday. But still. Deals!
We celebrate all of those here at WMG because we are a small business with a series of online stores. And we’re celebrating all that this year with a huge sale and some brand-new holiday merchandise!
Now through midnight PST on Tuesday, Nov. 28, you can save 30% on books, 25% (plus free shipping) on merchandise (US only), and 50% on everything we offer on WMG’s Teachable site.
That 30% off on books goes for every ebook we have for sale (and we have many, from short stories to magazines to collections to novels) at the WMG Holiday Spectacular Store, the Diving Store, the Pulphouse Fiction Magazine Store and The Mothership (wmgbooks.com).
Plus, festive merchandise like blankets, mugs, puzzles, and the newly created holiday stockings and ornaments on all three specialty stores (Holiday, Diving, and Pulphouse) all at a 25% discount and free shipping (US only)!
And gift cards! You can buy gift cards on the Holiday the Diving stores and give them as gifts to be delivered at the date you choose!
And last but not least is an item that is NOT part of the sale but is a hell of a deal that we’re offering for the FIRST TIME EVER!
With the new WMG Books BUY EVERYTHING Lifetime Subscription, you can get access to every eBook on the WMG shelves. EVERY eBook. Now and published in the future. That’s already more than a thousand titles.
