PSA: We are going to start reading for The SmokeLong Grand Micro Contest on August 1st! Previously published and unpublished micros 250 words or fewer, fiction, CNF, micros that lean poetic considered. Opens Aug 1st, closes Nov 15. Grand prize $1000! Details soon!

"I wanted death to be a beautiful, positive surprise, because why not?" Mamie Willoughby Pound is our featured author this week. Read Amy Marques' interview with the author at SmokeLong. www.smokelong.com/interviews/s...

Smoke Signals with Mamie Willoughby Pound - SmokeLong Quarterly

I love the title! It has length (which can be a fun twist in flash or micros) and humor. It sets a stage for a story where there could be multiple meanings and layers of meaning and interpretation. Wo...

smokelong.com

"Appropriated trauma" - Murray Dunsmore is our featured author this week. Read Chey Dugan's interview with the author at SmokeLong, and then don't miss "Sutures," which was a finalist in The SmokeLong Quarterly Award for Flash Fiction. www.smokelong.com/interviews/s...

Smoke Signals with Murray Dunsmore - SmokeLong Quarterly

“Everyone always eventually leaves”—a belief the narrator holds that prevents him from forming deep connections. Though not an experience unique to him, his fear brings about a dissociative nature. Wh...

smokelong.com

"‘What about Sara?’ I remembered to ask one afternoon. ‘Doesn’t she mind you being gone so long?’ His whole face changed, then, and I thought that once he looked at me like that." So much packed into this micro by @laurabesley.bsky.social in @fictivedream.bsky.social fictivedream.com/2026/06/29/m...

Microfiction #63

In those final days by Laura Besley it was my ex-husband who cared for me. I like to think he did it for the children’s sake and not for some sort of praise or morbid fascination. (In our final day…

fictivedream.com

'After Pa dies, Uncle Benny shows me the storage locker and homemade arm-wrestling machine: An apple-peeler rigged with a spongy arm that looks like it once belonged to a mannequin.' Tender & propulsive piece by @kellypedro.bsky.social #flashfiction It Doesn’t Budge citronreview.com/2026/06/30/i...

It Doesn’t Budge

by Kelly Pedro   After Pa dies, Uncle Benny shows me the storage locker and homemade arm-wrestling machine: An apple-peeler rigged with a spongy arm that looks like it once belonged to a manne…

citronreview.com

I have loved and admired @thecitronreview.bsky.social for years and so I'm absolutely delighted to find my flash in its latest issue! Like so much of my flash, this story started in a @smokelong.bsky.social workshop (write about an object for sale on FB Marketplace) citronreview.com/2026/06/30/i...

It Doesn’t Budge

by Kelly Pedro   After Pa dies, Uncle Benny shows me the storage locker and homemade arm-wrestling machine: An apple-peeler rigged with a spongy arm that looks like it once belonged to a manne…

citronreview.com

Registration is now open to begin SmokeLong Fitness August 1st. You can book annually, monthly, or Try SmokeLong Fitness for two months. All options are in the SmokeLong Shop. www.smokelong.com/shop/

Shop - SmokeLong Quarterly

smokelong.com

Writers in Europe! Our EIC will be leading a workshop on bending time in flash. And Madrid is the best.

European Writers Salon@saloneurope.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Tickets for this are dwindling--don't miss out! In addition to the speakers below, we'll be joined by @christopherallen.bsky.social and @anamariacaballero.bsky.social Our programme is full of exploration, collaboration and of course, excellent food and wine 🍇 Join us!

Our current and previous workshop participants have recently reported almost 30 publications! Help us celebrate them. They're talented AND adorable. www.smokelong.com/the-smokelon...

The SmokeLong Workshop Celebration – May/June 2026 - SmokeLong Quarterly

Each month we celebrate our current and previous workshop participants’ publications reported to us through Submittable (The SmokeLong Workshop Prize). Each of the publications below, with the excepti...

smokelong.com

"The pamphlet said the cranes had been landing in this area for thousands of years. She tried to imagine this place that long ago." Gorgeous work by @thorntonforreal.bsky.social in @flashfrog.bsky.social flash-frog.com/2026/06/22/m...

Migration of the Sandhill Cranes by Lisa Thornton

The North Platte River was nearly dry, long sand banks exposed. She watched a guy in a Funyuns T-shirt eating Cheetos gas up his Penske. Passing a semi, her husband pointed at the words Isaiah 50:3…

flash-frog.com

"In my third year of teaching, the janitor discovers a portal to another world in the third stall of the girls’ bathroom and I am diagnosed with cancer. Which would you like to know about more?" Read "Portal"by Asher Kelsey in @jmwwjournal.bsky.social jmwwblog.wordpress.com/2026/06/17/f...

Flash Fiction: Portal by Asher Kelsey

The thing about portals is this: you don’t know what’s on the other side.

jmwwblog.wordpress.com

"Tonight’s life drawing model appears in a yellow bathrobe. I recognise it. Then I recognise him. The man is my neighbour. He drops the robe." What a wonderful hybrid flash by @kawalker.bsky.social in @jmwwjournal.bsky.social

Blended & Beyond: Mr. Yellow Bathrobe by Karen Walker

Tonight’s life drawing model appears in a yellow bathrobe. I recognise it. Then I recognise him.     The man is my neighbour.

jmwwblog.wordpress.com

"this sobbing three-year-old sitting on top of a pile of Monopoly money as tall as a house, who can’t bear holding this hundred dollar bill because it means he’s not holding that hundred dollar bill." Read @sagetyrtle.bsky.social in @jmwwjournal.bsky.social

Flash Fiction: Let’s Read This Picture Book by Sage Tyrtle

Skip forward five pages. Skip past the toddlers with the rubber knives and toddlers with the cardboard handcuffs and the toddlers in their severe uniforms.

jmwwblog.wordpress.com

"—freezing diamonds with our motor-control impaired our feet trudging unsteady through the fresh snow still laughing—" Brilliant flash by @damicandrea.bsky.social in @natflashfictionday.bsky.social!

Andrea Damic@damicandrea.bsky.social · 2mo ago

My first Flash Flood publication ever, yay! Huge thank you to @smokelong.bsky.social's MMM! Without your workshop, this would not have happened. 🥰This might be my first person plural story ever, as well! Yay flashfloodjournal.blogspot.com/2026/06/at-m... #flashfiction #writingcommunity #indiepress

Still floored by this honour. Thank you to The Writers' Union of Canada, jurors & readers! Like many of my stories, this winning story started in a @smokelong.bsky.social workshop 3 years ago! It's not flash anymore. Read the press release here: writersunion.ca/news/kelly-p...

The New Quarterly@thenewquarterly.bsky.social · 2mo ago

TNQ would like to extend our sincere congratulations to the amazing @kellypedro.bsky.social who has won the 33rd Annual Short Prose Competition, awarded by the Writers' Union of Canada. 📝 Congrats again, Kelly! 🥰 #CanadianWriters #LitMagLife #TheNewQuarterly #CanLit

This was such a great conversation. If you missed it the first time around, it's available now for your viewing pleasure.

SmokeLong Quarterly@smokelong.bsky.social · 2mo ago

I started watching this interview with Aimee Bender to find a quote, and I can't stop watching the wisdom. Every word. youtu.be/DH71B3XUIx0?...

Announcing the third place winner of The SmokeLong Quarterly Award for Flash Fiction, Kate Catinella for the story "Small Something"! Second and First places coming later today! www.smokelong.com/the-smokelon...

Ellen Garard has won second place in The SmokeLong Quarterly Award for Flash Fiction 2026 for the story "Fruit of Our Body!" Stay tuned for the first-place winner soon! www.smokelong.com/the-smokelon...

The winner of The SmokeLong Quarterly Award for Flash Fiction 2026 is L.A. Strycker and the story "On Trees and Treefrogs"! Congratulations also to our 2nd and 3rd place winners and finalists! We can't wait to share your stellar work on June 15th! www.smokelong.com/the-smokelon...

Here are some literary journals opening or closing for submissions sometime in June—some are open now or will close soon. Genres, themes, & guidelines vary & dates are tentative. I think these are all no-fee. There are more resources out there, including on this platform. Wish y’all well.

Such a useful resource - thanks Shome. I may even find the energy / time / will / desire to send out a submission at some point in June... ... or maybe not 🙃 And to add to this, the @welkinpress.bsky.social will be open for entries to the new genre prize! 🥳🥳 www.mattkendrick.co.uk/welkin-press...

The Welkin Genre Prize

A competition for microfiction up to 100 words. It is free to enter and aims to be a welcoming space for all writers. The competition is open to all forms of narrative prose. There is a whole universe...

mattkendrick.co.uk

shome dasgupta@shomedasgupta.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Here are some literary journals opening or closing for submissions sometime in June—some are open now or will close soon. Genres, themes, & guidelines vary & dates are tentative. I think these are all no-fee. There are more resources out there, including on this platform. Wish y’all well.

My adult neighbour is learning to ride a bike on our street and it's taking everything I have not to stop marking assignments in the yard and run after them cheering "Go! Go! You got this!" Never stop learning new things.

I've decided that when I'm grading student assignments, I need to be surrounded by candy. I've also decided that this is completely reasonable. If you need me, I'll be at Bulk Barn.

"I could get on anywhere. That was the rule. The other rule was don’t work night blues. So I worked night blues." Such a moody flash about commercial fishing by Rae Callahan in @xraylitmag.bsky.social xraylitmag.com/night-blues-... #FlashintheFeed

Night Blues by Rae Callahan

I had been told not to work night blues. There were about thirteen party boats lined up in Belmar then, and I loved every one of them. I had spent the summer with Garafano, scrubbing boats in port unt...

xraylitmag.com

Some news! Hermit Crab Flash Fiction Workshop Sunday, 9/27, 2026 1–5pm (ET) Online $80 In this highly generative four-hour writing workshop, you’ll write three flash using found forms. Lots of feedback, lots of work, lots of fun! Click here for the sign-up info: www.cherylpappas.net/events

Workshops & Readings — Cheryl Pappas

cherylpappas.net

🌟 Mark your calendars! 🌟 JMWW is reopening flash submissions June 1! We cap at 40 submissions/reading period so don't delay. I'd love to see (or not "see" since we read anonymously 😅) your work in the queue.

JMWW Journal@jmwwjournal.bsky.social · 2y ago

Submit your work here! jmww.submittable.com/Submit

We have a shortlist! Please help us celebrate the top 23 titles on The SmokeLong Quarterly Award for Flash Fiction 2026 shortlist! Anonymous judging is ongoing. www.smokelong.com/the-smokelon...

The SmokeLong Quarterly Award for Flash Fiction — The Shortlist! - SmokeLong Quarterly

Thank you to everyone who sent in work for our judges to consider this year. Narrowing down the field from 1200 entries to the list of 23 stories below has been a grand task for our 16 judges, an inte...

smokelong.com

The SmokeLong Quarterly Award for Flash Fiction Long List is Live! Congratulations to everyone on the list and to everyone who entered this year! Anonymous judging ongoing! www.smokelong.com/the-smokelon...

Do you know about The Village? It's a free space for flash writers to connect away from the noise of social media.

The Village with All of the Flash Writers@heyflashvillage.bsky.social · 7mo ago

Are you in need of a village? We are The Village with All of The Flash Writers. And here's the invitation link: smokelong-quarterly.mn.co/plans/191340...

Summer is coming! Book by May 23rd. Bring a friend for no extra dollars. This year A SmokeLong Summer is longer and fuller than ever. Did we say you need to book by May 23rd? Yes, we did. www.smokelong.com/a-smokelong-...

A SmokeLong Summer 26 - SmokeLong Quarterly

A SmokeLong Summer 26 is closer than you think. This year we’re starting early and staying late. The summer just got longer. As always, at the heart of A SmokeLong Summer is our peer-review workshop i...

smokelong.com