Welcome to Bion.
Dear listener, I'm so happy to have you join me today for another segment of the editor's desk.
“In this segment I get to talk to you directly about what's going on at Bion and how that reflects what's going on in the world.”
Today I will share some thoughts on how Bion picks the stories that we publish. And that in turn ties into broader topics of competition, awards and gatekeeping, all of which are worthy topics to consider. Before I jump in I want to ask you personally to consider supporting this show on Patreon. At Bion we pay authors for every story we publish because we believe good art and hard work are worth something. It warms my heart when we get a note from an author saying that the payment they got from Bion means finances are a little easier for them that month.
I'd like to pay authors more for their work in the future and with your help I will be able to. So check out the link in the description and sign up. Even two dollars is a huge help and I will be personally grateful for your support. So how do stories that appear on Bion get picked?
For a publication like Bion, it almost always starts with the hopeful author.
After they've written in Polish to story that they put their heart and soul into, authors search for a home for that story. If they come across Bion and they feel their story aligns with the types of stories that Bion publishes, authors will submit their stories to us through our link on our website. I'll include the submission link in the show notes so you can check it out and see it for yourself. Submissions are open to everybody and we've been lucky enough to receive and accept stories from around the world.
About a third of the stories in seasons one and two are from authors outside the US. At the time we read stories, we don't see where the authors are from though. Because we ask authors to remove all identifying information even their names from the submissions. This kind of blind reading helps us cut down on biases that could influence the way we think about the stories. Once a story is in our queue, we give the story a read.
The very best ones stand out from the very first line.
“I think of your favorite openings from other books and stories you may have read.”
In a hole in the ground, they're lived a habit, or it was the best of times, it was the worst of times. These openings are confident and immediately give a sense that you're in skilled hands. A strong opening isn't all though. A biome we look for stories with movement. Sometimes that means a more traditional story arc with a defined conflict and resolution.
Sometimes it's a more subtle type of transformation, where circumstances or mental states of characters have shifted and evolved. Often, beautiful language and imagery help us make a decision over whether we want to publish a piece. Sometimes there is just a detail or two in a story that is so sublime we know we want to share it with our listeners. Above all, we look for stories that will stay with you. Roman poet Horace explained in his masterful arse poetica that the purpose of stories and of any literary work more broadly is to entertain, to educate, or to do both.
So we hope that biome stories can take you to far off worlds, or let you see this world in a new light, giving you the chance to step away from the everyday. As a show that can only share a few stories each season, this also means we have to turn away a lot of stories. That way, the editors at biome are gatekeepers, a term that has acquired some serious pejorative inflections over the last couple of decades. It may be time for the term to get some rehabilitation. Today we live in a world that is overflowing with content, pictures, stories, videos, and more.
Now imagine the podcasts and magazines don't exist. A world in which the only option anyone has for sharing their stories is on their own personal blogs or YouTube channels.
“What are the chances that you dig through everything online to try and find a story that you enjoy?”
With shows like biome, you don't have to dig. The authors and editors have done the work for you. When you come to biome, you can be confident that we have selected some of the best new fantasy and science fiction and speculative stories from around the world. None of it is AI-generated, and all of it has been carefully refined by authors who have been practicing their craft for years. This also means that there are a lot of stories that we decide not to publish.
I'm proud to say that biome is one of the few publications that responds to every single story that authors submit with a personal note sharing what elements of the story did and didn't work for us. At biome, we believe that listeners and audiences will get the best stories if the entire ecosystem of authors and storytellers is thriving. So we try and make sure our comments are helpful and kind. We try and give back to the authors even when we have to say no to a story. The ultimate form of editorializing or gatekeeping probably comes in the form of prizes and awards.
The most widely recognized speculative fiction awards in English today are probably the Hugo, Nebula, Locus and Shirley Jackson awards.
Each of these gives out just one top prize in each of their respective catego...
Each prize has a different criteria for how stories are entered for consideration.
And each one chooses its top winners in different ways, whether it's the Hugo's where winners are chosen by a popular vote at a world con, or whether through a jury composed of distinguished writers and academics such as for the Shirley Jackson awards. The process of selecting and awarding these prizes tells its own kind of story.
“What do the public and jury value? What do they enjoy? What do they want to draw attention to?”
When these prizes are awarded, we can't say that they always mark the very best story in any specific sense.
A chosen story might not have the best dialogue. It might not have the most riveting plot. Its word choice might not be the most original or its character is the most likable. But these prizes do say that at a specific time, in a specific place, a certain group of people decided that a story was notable enough that it was worth elevating to a wider audience. You might not agree with the story or the author he gets the top prize. And that's okay. Just like you might not love every single story by own releases, although I hope you do.
“But I think that rather than debating whether a grand prize was awarded correctly or not,”
it's actually more interesting to have a discussion about why a certain jury or audience chose to highlight the stories and authors that it did. Can we try and understand that value for ourselves? Can we use that to enrich our own understanding of the world? At the time of recording, WorldCon 2026 has just wrapped up, and the Nobel Prize in Literature is scheduled to be announced in about a month. If you decide you want to check out the winners, I invite you to approach them from a place of curiosity and discovery.
I'll include links to recent Hugo and Nebula Awards for you to check out in the show notes if you so choose. Next week, I will be sharing the final author interview before the start of season 2.
“I will be chatting with J.M. J. Brewer, author of our seventh story from season 1 titled "Anemony," a haunting and unique story.”
If you have a moment, I invite you to go back and give that story another listen before the interview for an even deeper appreciation of that conversation. After our interview, biome season 2 starts on Tuesday, September 29th, featuring homecoming by proxy by Aaron Colon. I absolutely cannot wait to share this story with you so mark your calendar. And if you can't wait until the 29th, Patreon supporters get early access in addition to supporting the authors and the writing community more broadly.
As always, Shinella, our biosphere level patron, I am especially grateful for your support.
Well, dear listener, that's all I have for you today. Tune in to next week's interview, and until then farewell, wherever the days take you. [Music] By online, you ask yourself what is your wish for? What not is the live shopping app on which you can share your advice on the advertising market in real time.
You can also ask questions and then directly ask questions. And the next Pokémon card, collectibles, mod, vintage, chat and more. And more, and at the same time, with a community that has a relationship with your relationship. Curve-shorts, inclusive. Although now, the WORDNOT app and the number of the 20th-year-old employees are now looking for WHAATNOT MFSTOR.
