Our 2019 Pushcart Nominations

Each year, the Pushcart Prize invites literary magazines and small presses to nominate their best short fiction to be considered for both a prestigious prize and a "best of" anthology. We published two short fiction anthologies this year, and chose six stories between them to nominate.

Scroll down to find out our 2019 Pushcart Prize nominees — for stories published in 2018 — plus a brief excerpt from each story. Congratulations to these authors, and good luck!

"The Spider and the Stars" by D.K. Mok

From Glass and Gardens: Solarpunk Summers
Anthology edited by Sarena Ulibarri

DK Mok is a fantasy and science fiction author whose novels include Squid’s Grief and Hunt for Valamon. DK has been shortlisted for four Aurealis Awards, two Ditmars and a WSFA Small Press Award. DK graduated from UNSW with a degree in Psychology, pursuing her interests in both social justice and scientist humour. DK lives in Sydney, Australia, and her favourite fossil deposit is the Burgess Shale. Connect on Twitter @dk_mok or www.dkmok.com.

"Fyrewall" by Stefani Cox

From Glass and Gardens: Solarpunk Summers
Anthology edited by Sarena Ulibarri

Stefani Cox is a Los Angeles-based speculative fiction writer and lapsed urban planner. She’s an alumna of the VONA/Voices of Our Nations Arts writing workshops and an associate editor for PodCastle fantasy fiction podcast. Stefani also works as a communications consultant, and spends her free time practicing yoga, hiking, and being an insatiable bookworm. She holds a master’s in City and Regional Planning from UC Berkeley. Find her on Twitter @stefanicox or her website stefanicox.com.

"The Heavenly Dreams of Mechanical Trees" by Wendy Nikel

From Glass and Gardens: Solarpunk Summers
Anthology edited by Sarena Ulibarri

Wendy Nikel is a speculative fiction author with a degree in elementary education, a fondness for road trips, and a terrible habit of forgetting where she's left her cup of tea. Her short fiction has been published by Fantastic Stories of the Imagination, Daily Science Fiction, Nature: Futures, and elsewhere. Her time travel novella, The Continuum, was published by World Weaver Press in January 2018, with a sequel forthcoming. For more info, visit wendynikel.com.

"New Siberia" by Blake Jessop

From Glass and Gardens: Solarpunk Summers
Anthology edited by Sarena Ulibarri

Blake Jessop is a Canadian writer, lecturer, and poet. You can read more of his science fiction in the 2018 Young Explorer's Adventure Guide from Dreaming Robot Press, or follow him on Twitter @everydayjisei.

"Breaking News!" by Romeu Martins

From Solarpunk: Ecological and Fantastical Stories in Sustainable Worlds
Anthology edited by Gerson Lodi-Ribeiro, Translated from the Portuguese by Fabio Fernandes

Romeu Martins is a journalist, specializing in scientific dissemination, and an author of fantastic literature. He began writing fiction in 2008 for his own blog, Terroristas da Conspiração (Terrorists of the Conspiracy), where he also published a few dozen other writers. Today, he has work in books by three national publishers, and an excerpt from his short story has been selected and translated into English for the Steampunk Bible by Americans Jeff VanderMeer and S. J. Chambers. With Editora Draco, he debuted as a short storyteller in Sherlock Holmes—Aventuras Secretas (2012).

"Xibalba Dreams of the West" by André S. Silva

From Solarpunk: Ecological and Fantastical Stories in Sustainable Worlds
Anthology edited by Gerson Lodi-Ribeiro, Translated from the Portuguese by Fabio Fernandes

André S. Silva is a carioca (native of Rio de Janeiro), a civil servant, and a student of Letters at UFRJ. He started writing fanfictions inspired by the X-Files series in the late 1990s. He collaborated with OTP Filmes in the screenwriting of short films and had short stories in the 2011 Literary Challenge and the Henry Evaristo Prize for Fantastic Literature 2012, both on the website A Irmandade (The Brotherhood). For Editora Draco, he participated in two anthologies, Dragões (2012) and Excalibur (2013). Find him on Twitter @andressilva

The anthologies

Previous Pushcart Anthologies