Welcome to our website. We intend to
present the finest science fiction and fantasy short stories and
serialized fiction we can find. In turn, you expect a
website that is visually pleasing and easy to navigate.
We will try to provide just that. Issue 2, Summer
2011
You may have noticed
changes to the website this issue. Bowing to popular
demand, I have added "hotspots" to the main pages.
Hopefully this will make it easier to navigate the site,
and give it a more intuitive feel.
We have also added illustrations at the beginning of
each story that we hope reflect some aspect of that
story. So far, the reaction from the authors has been
favorable. We would like to hear what you think as well.
Check out the Links page to find out more about or
contact our authors and artists. Links to other websites
we feel would be of interest will be added as we
discover them.
This being the second issue, you might
reasonably expect to see the contents of the first issue
archived under the appropriate category on the Archives
page. I am still trying to figure out how to do this in
a simple, straightforward (for me) way.
Issue 3, Autumn 2011
October1, 2011
Seems like I' m going to have to explain why this
issue is so late. Partly (mostly) my fault, I have to
admit.
Anyway, here goes. I had a medical procedure done
last week just before FenCon, which was a lot of fun, by
the way (FenCon, not the medical procedure). We had
three out of the four authors in this issue present, and
talked to three future authors and one future Guest
Artist.
Inspired by meeting everyone during that hectic
weekend, I managed to load the author's stories on the
Website so they could look at them, minus the
illustrations, before the con was over.
After recovering from FenCon, we worked on the
pen-and-ink illustrations for the four stories in this
issue. I finished getting those ready for publication
Friday night, late.
Saturday I worked on the Guest Artist page, getting
the artwork ready and gathering the descriptive and
biographical information to go along with it.
Saturday night everything went on the website for a
trial run. There are always a few glitches to work out
at the end, so I didn't finish that until late.
The last step was to move the previous issue to the
archive section of the website and set up the writer and
Guest Artist archive links. Time then for a brief moment
savoring the Autumn issue before plunging into the next
one, Issue 4, Winter 2011.
While searching for your favorite authors and artists in the Archives, it is possible to get lost. When this happens, go up to the address line in your browser and backspace until only www.4starstories.com appears. Touch Enter to take you to the
current issue Homepage.
Issue 4, Winter 2011
December 24, 2011
Seems like I'm having to apologize again this issue.
Both Mary and I have been sick the last week or so,
delaying this issue more than we would like. To
compensate, we have four really good stories and a
really great artist to present this issue Putting this
issue together was a little more routine, thankfully. I
don't have the archives updated yet, but we do have all
the stories and the Guest Art section up. Updating the
archives and the Links page will be taken care of
between now and New Years.
Speaking of the New Year, we have some really great
stories waiting in the wings for the Spring issue, so
stay tuned.
Lastly, we are looking forward to seeing everyone at
ConDFW in February of next year.
Issue 5, Spring 2012
March 24, 2012
Here we are in 2012 and at the one-year anniversary
of 4StarStories.com. It's been a wild, exciting ride,
meeting authors and artists and reading some really
great stories. We're looking forward to even more great
things this year, and we hope you will join us.
It was great seeing everyone at ConDFW. Even though
the weather was a challenge, we didn't mind because we
needed the rain. On one panel at ConDFW, we had at least
three 4StarStories authors. All together at ConDFW we
had at least six 4StarStories authors and a couple of
future contributors. While we were there, we distributed
twenty-eight Author's Submission Guidelines to people at
panels and others we met at the con. We are still
committed to presenting the best in science fiction
short stories and guest artists, and we are counting on
you to help us do that.
For those in the Dallas area, we will be attending
FenCon in late September of this year. As always we look
forward to hearing from you and seeing you in person.
April 3, 2012
Some of our regular readers have
commented that when accessing the 4StarStories.com
Website, they encountered the previous issue, rather
than the current issue they were expecting. The problem
is that the browser loads previously accessed web pages
stored in a cache, rather than going out on the Internet
to download the current page. The solution to this
problem is to refresh or reload the page. Although
generally similar, the ways to refresh or reload the
page vary from browser to browser. I have listed
directions for some of the commonly used browsers below.
Internet Explorer
Try using the Refresh button, the
F5 soft key, Control+F5, Ctrl+R, Control+Shift+R, or
holding down the Control key while clicking the Refresh
button.
A more advanced user can press F12
to open the Development Tools, select the Cache menu at
the top and then Always refresh from server to
bypass the cache.
In other words, Press F12 , then
click Cache -> Always Refresh from Server.
The always-refresh option is not a
global option, and it will not hinder overall
performance in Internet Explorer.
Firefox
By default there should be a
reload/refresh button on the toolbar. On the default
theme it looks like a circular arrow to the right of the
address line. You can also press the F5 soft key or
Ctrl+R to reload the page.
Google Chrome
Depending on how the web page was
constructed, you can do one of two things:
Right-click inside the web page and
select Reload from the pop-up window. This works
for many pages.
In the upper right hand corner of
the browser window, select the Wrench icon, then select
Clear browsing data... from the drop-down menu. A
pop-up window appears. Verify that Empty the cache
is checked. If not, click on the empty box. Then select
the Clear Browsing Data button at the bottom of
the pop-up window. This works for all pages.
Issue 6, Summer 2012
July 2, 2012
Here it is Summer again. See the
"In My Opinion" page for our take on Summer.
I'm retaining the Guest Artist
from the last issue temporarily. Rocky is fine with
that. I have some partial solar eclipse and Venus
transit pictures that I took in May that I'm going to
put on the Guest Artist page in a week or so.
Someone suggested that we
register 4StarStories with Duotrope. We did, and now we
are getting a ton of submissions. The first thing we
have to do when we get the Summer issue out is to sift
through those submissions for stories to use in the next
issue. For my part, I am explaining to potential
submitters how to save their Word files as .RTF files.
I asked the Programming Chair
for Fencon if we can have a panel with 4StarStories
writers and Guest Artists at FenCon. Haven't heard back
from her yet, but the writers I talked to who are
attending FenCon in September are very enthusiastic
about the idea. If you are a writer or a Guest Artist
published in 4StarStories and are going to be at Fencon,
let me know. We need a list of people who want to
participate.
July 12, 2012
With the
increased visibility of 4 Star Stories comes an
increased number of submissions, and we are OK with
that. At this point, however, submissions are about
evenly divided between those who follow the suggested
template and those who don't.
Unfortunately
we are reaching the point where I can't take the time to
fix format problems in stories that don't follow the
template.
Of course,
there is always the possibility that the "story of gold"
comes in that we just have to publish because it is so
good, but doesn't follow the template -- at all.
Assuming that does happen at some point, don't be
surprised (or insulted) if you get instruction to
"rewrite the story following the template this time and
resubmit".
If you have
any questions about converting to RTF format, for
example, send me an email at the Webmaster address on
the website.
Issue 7, Autumn 2012
September 27, 2012
Well, here we
are at the Autumn issue. Believe me, it seemed like a
long time coming. Summer seemed to last forever. We've
received a ton of story submissions. Two issues worth,
in fact. We have some really good ones to offer you,
this issue and next.
Time to
reiterate what I said last time. We need people to
follow the Submission Guidelines. Something I haven't
mentioned before, but needs saying is to provide an
accurate word count and signal the end of your story
with "The End", "Finis", or "[30]". We had a story
submitted that was corrupted in transmission, and I
didn't catch it until the author mentioned that the last
1000 words were missing from my copy. If I had noticed
the discrepancy in the word count and the lack of "The
End" at the end of the story, I would have been alerted
to the problem a lot sooner.
A word to the
wise: don't try to put out an issue the weekend of a
Science Fiction Convention. Believe me, it doesn't work.
Just now getting over the effects. Had a great time
seeing everyone, though. Looking forward to ConDFW in
February, 2013. So, until the Winter issue, keep those
submissions coming.
I f you have
submitted a story, but haven't heard back from us, be
patient. Now that this issue is out, we'll be getting in
touch with those we haven't contacted yet.
Issue 8, Winter 2012
12-30-12
Well, for better or worse, here we are at the end of
another year. Unfortunately, we have both been sick the
last couple of weeks. It has slowed us down, but hasnÂ’t
stopped us. We have 4 more fine stories for you in this
issue, and something new – an Artist Retrospective – of
one of our favorite artists, Chesley Bonestell, a true
space art pioneer. The effect his work had on those of
us who grew up in the 1950Â’s was enormous.
Coming up in February will be our first short-short
fiction issue, featuring 4 stories of around 1000 words.
It is our salute to February, the shortest month.
Thanks to the number of quality submissions we have
had, our March, 2013 issue is already full, so the next
openings we have are in the June, 2013 issue.
As always, please be patient if you have submitted a
story for consideration and havenÂ’t received a reply. We
will reply to your submissions as soon as we are able.
Issue 9, Spring 2013
5-17-13
Wow! Here we are almost halfway through the year. I have a lot of things to catch you up on.
For those who were at ConDFW in February, it was great to see you. For those who missed it, FenCon is coming up this Fall.We did publish the Short Short Story issue, not in February and not with four, but with six stories. We were able to get some really great stories. Check it out. Click on the icon in the lower right-hand corner of the Home page to access the Short Short Story Issue. Since it was unscheduled, we will leave it up for more than just one issue.
The SSS issue unexpectedly put us behind on the March issue, which is now the Spring issue and came out a couple of days ago. Again we have some really great stories. We are especially proud to feature David A. Cherry as our Guest Artist.
The Summer issue is scheduled to come out the week of the Fourth of July. The Autumn issue is scheduled to come out in time for Halloween, and we are calling it our "Fire and Brimstone" issue.
Issue 11, Autumn 2013
January 5, 2014
It’s been over six months since I’ve
written anything in this space. During that time 4
Star Stories was never far from my mind, although I
wasn’t able to work on it as much as I would have liked.
As for the long awaited “fire and brimstone” Halloween
issue, it is finally here. I won’t bore you with the
details of why it took so long (which really aren’t that
interesting). Suffice it to say that both Mary and I
were (are) sick, and we are still involved in a major
house-related crisis, hopefully to be resolved in the
next week or so. In any case we have four stories and a
Guest Artist revolving around a central netherworld
theme for your enjoyment.
For those of you in the Dallas-Fort
Worth area, I hope you were able to attend FenCon in
October of last year. We always have a great time and
really enjoy meeting and talking to people. ConDFW is
coming up in February of this year, and we hope to see
you there.
Here we are at the beginning of our
fourth year publishing 4 Star Stories. It’s been
an exciting, frustrating, marvelous three years. We have
met really wonderful and talented people from all over
the world. Whenever my enthusiasm lags, I get an e-mail
from one of these people, and I have the will to get
back in there and work even harder.
We have more exciting, trailblazing
stories to publish in 2014, and I will be making
improvements to the website as well. We enjoy serving
your literary science fiction/fantasy needs, and we
particularly enjoy hearing from you. Happy New Year!
Issue
12, Winter 2013
June 10,
2014
Wow, we're halfway through the year already. This year
is really flying by.
We enjoyed being at ConDFW at the end of February. It
was great to see old friends and meet new ones. We had a
great time talking with everybody and being on panels.
We always get fired up during/after a convention, and
this one was no exception.
We keep promising ourselves we'll do better, but haven't
been able to turn out issues as fast as we would like.
We do intend to maintain the quality, and we have some
really great stories this issue, as usual. Unusual this
time is that all four authors live outside the United
States. We have received fine-quality stories from
around the world to share with our readers.
We also have an Artist Retrospective for your enjoyment:
Jack Coggins. If you are not familiar with his work, you
are in for a real treat. I was tremendously impressed
with his work when I was a kid growing up in the 1950's.
I think you will agree with me that his work still
speaks to us today.
That's it for Issue 12. We are planning another Short,
Short Fiction issue to appear sometime near the end of
the year. If you have a story less than 1000 words and
you think it is 4 Star Stories-worthy, send it
along for us to look at. Till next time... keep cool.
Issue 13
October 4, 2014
You may have noticed that, in spite of my
protestations to the contrary, we did drop the season
from the issue title. We are contractually obligated to
leave each issue up on the website for at least three
months, so we would never be able to catch up with the
seasons. The idea of dropping a season to catch up is
not really appealing. The editorial will continue to be
season-appropriate because a lot of what we do at 4
Star Stories is influenced by the seasons.
We have four new stories and a bonus story this
issue. If a run of two constitutes a trend, the bonus
story is a story that we would not normally publish, but
for whatever reason, we felt it deserved a place.
We did not change Guest Artist this issue, so the
Jack Coggins Art Retrospective is up for another issue.
I was able to obtain a good copy of "By Space Ship to
the Moon", and our Epson 710 Artisan scanner did a
superb job of reproducing the colors of the paintings.
If you haven't already done so, check out the Guest
Artist page. You're in for a treat.
It's old news now, but Windows XP® has gone the way
of the dodo bird. We were particularly hard hit because
we did most of the computer-related tasks for 4 Star
Stories on an old Dell Inspiron® laptop running --
you guessed it -- Windows XP. We acquired another Dell
computer after XP support ended, but it runs Windows
8.1, None of our old programs are compatible, so we use
that one mostly for answering emails. We were really up
the proverbial creek until I was able to upgrade a
Lenovo® Netbook to run Windows 7. That solved part of
our problem, but the small screen was a real pain.
Finally, I heard that Hewlett Packard® was selling
computers running Windows 7. We bought an HP® laptop,
and that is now our main computer. Although that solved
part of our problem, we still had XP programs we wanted
to run.
Fortunately, someone at work suggested Windows XP
Mode in Windows 7, downloadable from Microsoft. Since we
now have two Windows 7 computers, that definitely seemed
the way to go.
For step-by-step instructions, go to
http://www.wikihow.com/Install-Windows-Xp-Mode-in-Windows-7
For those with more technical savvy, here's the link
directly to the Microsoft Windows Virtual PC Download
site.
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=3702
This story has a happy ending, sort of. We are now
able to run our old XP programs on Windows 7, but
Microsoft is already talking about ending support for
Windows 7. Go figure.
Issue 14
February
22, 2015
Here we are in the second month of a new year. We
attended ConDFW last weekend and had a great time. We
never tire of talking to people and promoting 4 Star
Stories. We participated in a panel on E-publishing vs.
conventional publishing. I was moderator, punishment, I
suppose, for suggesting that panel.
Recently I was able provide an archive for the Short
Short Story issue we had a couple of years ago. Just a
reminder of one of the perks of being a 4 Star Stories
author: your story is archived, so you, or anyone else
for that matter, can access it anytime.
The last couple of issues I have not been able to give
as much editorial attention to the stories as I would
have liked. What we have as a result is more the
author's flavor than the 4 Star Stories editorial
flavor. We hope the content has not suffered as a
result. A word of explanation about how we choose
stories to go in an issue. We read a story essentially
as a reader would read it, not paying a lot of attention
to the writing itself when making the first cut. When we
make our final selection, we go back over each story
with a more critical eye. We make general suggestions,
as well as more specific ones when necessary.
A word about our health situation. I have been sick off
and on since the middle of December. Mary has also been
sick with recurring bronchitis, and most recently the
flu. This issue is the result of sheer determination on
our part to get it out. We have another issue on its
heels, Issue 15, and we will start on it immediately. It
should be out about mid-year. The next task will be
looking for stories and a Guest Artist to go in Issue
16. We think that issue will be out in the fall. We
think we have stories enough, but we really need more
Guest Artist candidates.
March 13, 2015
We
are considering another Short, Short Story issue. There
seemed to be some interest when we talked it up at ConDFW.
Pretty much the stories we will consider are either
Science Fiction or Fantasy between 500 and 1000 words
(two to four pages).
We
just sent out the "Official Issue 14 Announcement" by
email. Actually, Issue 14 has been out for awhile.
Consider that a "shaking-out"
period, so we can make sure everything is OK. We have a
mailing list, mostly previous contributors and people
who have requested to be notified, but we would be glad
to include anyone else as well.
If you want to be notified when a new issue is
published, send us an email at
webmaster@4starstories.com. If you have already
requested to be notified and have not received an email,
check your "Junk" folder. If you still haven't
received notification, let us know, and we will
investigate.
Issue 15
July
23, 2015
Here we are at Issue 15. This one was a real struggle to
get out, but it was worth it because we have five really
good stories. We didn't have a Guest Artist lined up
this time, so I am offering a "Spaceship Retrospective"
in its place. I found some vintage pubic domain images,
and I am pleased with the result. I hope you are too.
I
had problems with Microsoft FrontPage(R) while creating
the new web pages. I eventually found out what was wrong
(my fault, of course), but I wasted a lot of time
figuring it out. This will probably be the last issue I
do using FrontPage. It's just too labor intensive. I do
fine tuning with Arachnophilia, an HTML editing program
that is free and has been around for a long time. Once
they got their problems with Java figured out, I had no
problems loading it on all my machines. When you have a
small change to make in the HTML code, it’s easier than
using FrontPage.
We picked out and purchased new website-design software,
but I haven't switched over yet. I
intend to make a few major changes to the website that I
have been putting off just because we are locked into
the present structure. Don’t worry. We will retain the
same clunky, vintage look, but with more pages and
probably updated features.
We are considering several changes to 4 Star Stories. We
are looking at including more stories per issue. For
example, if we were to have seven stories per issue, we
could increase our throughput from fifteen stories,
where it is now, to twenty-one per year. Another thing
we are considering is paying more for each story. Since
we are actually publishing fewer stories per year, we
can afford to pay more per story. Don't know for sure,
but $20 US is sounding doable.
If anyone is wondering why they haven't heard from us
after sending in a story in the last month or so, be
patient. Screening stories pretty much goes out the
window when we are trying to get out an issue. Be assured
that we will get to you as soon as we can. To update
where we are with submissions, we probably have enough
stories for Issue 16, which should be out near the end
of the year. That means that if you haven't heard from
us yet, your story will be considered for Issue 17,
which will probably be out in the first half of next
year.
Issues 16 and 17
1-31-17
Here we are starting a new year
again. More going on than I care to comment on.
As part of the
beginning-of-the-year festivities, I go through all the
web pages and update the copyright year, protecting all
of us. In addition, I updated the Submissions page. A
little overdue, but necessary to bring it in line with
what we are actually doing. The highlights: We are now
paying $20 US dollars for a published story. Payment is
on publication rather than acceptance, a concession to
reality as I don't think we ever did pay on acceptance,
although that was our intention when we started. We are
now requesting that the story title be included in the
Subject Line of the submission email. My life is made
very much simpler when authors follow that guideline.
We are close to publishing our
second Short Short Story issue. I thought it would go
quickly and smoothly, but here we are at the end of
January and it still isn't out yet. We have some fine
stories this issue -- all over the map, actually,
including a poem -- a first for us. We hope you enjoy
it.
As part of the Short Short Story
issue, I am including some of my pen and ink drawings.
They are not illustrating stories, but rather are
providing art for the Stories and the In My Opinion...
pages.
One of the ironies of the Short
Short Story issues is the fact that because we have more
stories we have to have more original artwork, making
our artist have to work harder and taking more time.
It's that time of year again --
time for ConDFW. Unfortunately, we will not be able to
attend this year, as it is in Fort Worth. We have had
problems with the choice of hotels the last couple of
years. This year we are sitting ConDFW out altogether.
We have been receiving many
top-notch submissions the last few months. So many, in
fact, that Issues 18 and 19 are filled. We just started
choosing stories for Issue 20. If you have submitted a
story in the last two or three months and have not heard
back from us, be patient. We are processing the
submissions as fast as we can. Now that we are out of
the holiday season, we have more time to devote to "4
Star Stories". After publication of the Short Short
Story issue, we intend to eliminate the backlog and
reply to all submissions.
Aside from a few minor issues, we
are in generally good health, thanks for asking. We can
only hope that will continue, and we will be publishing
"4 Star Stories" for many years to come.
Issues 18
9-10-17
Here we are looking at the end of
2017. Another exciting year for us. Issue 18 ready to go
with Issue 19 coming up right behind it. We have been
quite pleased with the quality of the submissions we
have been receiving this year, and we hope you see that
reflected in the quality of the issue.
We have noticed some people are
submitting more than one story, and that is fine.
However, I don't always notice at first. that I have
seen something from the same author before. We do get a
lot of submissions, and if the name is not familiar, I
may sound like I don't realize you have submitted
before. We do treat each submission as a standalone,
unless it is part of a series. Hopefully, it is a sign
that you would like to have us publish your story, not
that you are too lazy to send it somewhere else. We do
try not to publish the same author twice in the same or
consecutive issues. We aren't always able to stick to
that policy, but we do try.
We are publishing Issue 18 without
original art at this time. As you might imagine, coming
up with six or more pieces of original art for each
issue is a formidable task. We will try to remedy the
situation as soon as possible, so please be patient.
A word about the Science Fiction
Convention attendance situation. We have stopped
attending cons for the present. We both have significant
health problems, and I don'' feel as comfortable taking
long trips as I used to, especially places I haven't
been before. We miss seeing everybody, but we are having
to sit conventions out for now.
We have been including special
features to enrich the writing experience, especially
articles to expand the writer's technical background. If
there is something you would like to see that we haven't
been doing, let us know, and we will try to come up with
something for you.
###
Certain times of the year are especially busy for us, for example, March-April and November-December, so we are going to try to schedule around them. This may result in weirdness like the Winter issue coming out in January, but we would like to be able to say with assurance when a particular issue is coming out. We are going to try to stick with the season motif. That seems to have more than a casual significance to us.
Again I have to apologize for the length of time people who submit stories have to wait to find out if their story has been accepted. We have a large pile of submissions to work through (yes, we print them out), and we will get back to you as soon as possible.
I regret to say that we may not be able to give every story the personal attention it deserves. I have tried in the past to critique the stories that we reject, but as you might imagine it takes a lot of time and effort to do that for stories we are not going to publish. If we have had your story a month or more, and you have not heard from us, you can drop us an email. I know that is not considered professional, but I can try to give you an idea where your story is in the process.
For technical comments and webmasterly things like
exchanging links, click on
Contact Webmaster to send me an email.
We thank you for your support.
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