Hello readers and writers of fiction on Substack!
I’m Niccolò, author of Adventure Story, and I’m very excited to present to you this month’s newsletter blast containing ten selected works of fiction. Whether you’re a reader looking to discover new stories or a writer looking to build community and audience, this is the place for you.
I received over fifty submissions for inclusion in this month’s newsletter and it was of course very hard to trim that down to just ten. There were many other deserving candidates and if you’re not on the list today don’t despair, there will be plenty of other chances to get featured. In the meantime, please feel free to drop a link to your writing in the comments!
Please show today’s featured writers some love by re-stacking, liking, and commenting. Please go through the motions even if you don’t have time to read each one - it doesn’t make you disingenuous, it’s just showing support. This is the path to audience building and community synergy, and it’s how we’re going to take back the fiction explore page and knock all the shitty non-fiction clickbait writing down into the abyss where it belongs, along with all AI writing. And don’t forget to share this post so more people can join the community and participate in what I hope will be one of Substack’s biggest fiction growth snowball effects.
Without further ado, let’s get into today’s list. I have no doubt these will get you through the weekend very satisfied.
We’re starting off today with a really engaging and tight piece by
. A young man ventures into the land of the giants, hunting for a trophy and renown; he has what he came for, but can he escape?Next, from
we get SEARCH, an ongoing science fiction-mystery-thriller serial, told in the form of phone recording transcripts, emails, letters. It's based on the audio drama of the same name, following the story of the McNair family as they investigate mysteries hidden within Scotland. Using the epistolary novel format makes it feel like a found footage story in written form. Shades of Justin Cronin’s The Passage with all the email chain communications, and a nice balance of humor thrown in there as well. A really fun read and creative format:Next we have Chapter One from
’s The Legend of Leanna Page. The legendary Leanna Page is known throughout all Elenvia for her trials and adventures which led to their better world. Now, that legend is being introduced to our world by Cedar Flyte, themself the descendant of an Elenvian, in a fast-paced mythopoetic queer literary fantasy. As Flyte writes in their Dedicatory Epistle, “Perhaps [The Elenvian’s] stories can be a lesson in their world’s attainability, but if you rather not consider it so then consider it only as thus: It is a tale, magical and romantic and filled with adventure at every turn.” In a world divided in two, Leanna – born directly into the center of that division – must find a way to bring all the different parts of her dangerous world together... or risk her life, love, and freedom trying.Next we have chapter one of
’s fantasy series Storm God:From the world-building expert
we have Chapter One of Dark Device of the Great Chasm, a very immersive read:
Next we have the first chapter of
’s massive Tranith Argan series:For a break from fantasy we’re going now to something very much real-world grounded by
:Next we are going to the desert for The Winds of Lut by
:Next we have the first part of
’s The Glaciermen:And last but not least,
brings us some really strong descriptive writing grounded in the real world:Thank you to everyone who submitted for this round! Keep your eyes open for when submissions open up for the next one, and in the meantime please share this post so we can get more eyeballs on our featured writers above. Leave a comment and let us know which was your favorite! Like, share, print them out and tie them to a carrier pigeon, put a message in a bottle, translate them into Morse Code and beam them up into space, anything you have to do to get the word out so we can carve out a bigger spot for fiction on Substack!
Until next time…
Thanks for including my story, “The Winds of Lut”! Can’t wait to read the rest!
Great work to all parties involved!!