We want you to write Lovecraft like Neil Gaiman, not Alan Moore. Because NEONOMICON creeped us right the fuck out. Also, kinda skanky.

We genuinely thank everyone who sent in stories, but — to be honest — this year there just wasn’t anything that completely knocked us out. There were some well written pieces that didn’t have a speculative element (as the guidelines expressly called for) and there were stories that did have a speculative element, which were interesting, but just not enough so that we wanted to make them the sole focus of an issue. In the end, we wanted to be super-excited about bringing the winner of our novella contest to the attention of our mighty readership and it just didn’t work out. (And just to be clear, no, this isn’t some lame-ass April Fool’s joke like, say, an Internet search engine pretending it’s able to fucking smell.)

C’est le vie. Which we’re told is French for, “The fuck you gonna do sometimes?”

There are several silver linings. First, Jody Giardina and Nick Kimbro get to stay novella contest winner and runner-up, respectively, for another year (and possibly indefinitely). We know their families are sick of hearing about it, but they get to go on bragging.

Second, our other two special issues planned for this summer are turning out to be not complete clusterfraks like the novella contest. (And that’s how we’re planning to advertise them.)

Our main focus right now is on the awkwardly if accurately named “Write Lovecraft Like Neil Gaiman” Issue, which seems to be a triumph of quality over quantity. We haven’t received a ton of submissions, but we have picked up a few really cool pieces and can already tell this issue will be amazing. But we could still use another story or two to round it out so get to typing. You’ve got till the end of the month.

The poetry issue is also going great, but — as we’ve noted in the past — it turns out poems don’t take up that much space. So we need lots of them. Check out the guidelines and send us something cool. You’ve got till June 1st.

Finally, even though we won’t have a novella for you in June as planned, we will have a regular old issue of odd and entertaining short stories. It turns out we’re still pretty good at attracting those, so sleep easy. And if you have one, send it in before nodding off.

Now if you’ll excuse us, we need to go spend our last dollar to buy a Sabrett.