a new contest, some micro markets

David Dunwoody, author of the zombie novel Empire, has started a cool little limerick contest. Write a limerick about the grim reaper (or any other personification of Death) and you could win a bunch of cool prizes. Find all the details here. (Deadline is July 29th.)

Despite my staunch ignoring of it, Twitter has continued to grow increasingly popular. There are now several paying Twitter markets for fiction and poetry 140 characters or less. If you can write good short fiction, it's not a bad way to make a couple extra bucks. Here are a few of the markets:

- Tweet the Meat: looking for horror/weird stories. Sometimes has themes. Pays $1/story.
- Thaumatrope: publishes speculative fiction. Currently only open to serials. Pays $1.20 per acceptance.
- Nanoism: wants literary fiction, but open to genres. Pays $1.50 per unpublished story, $1 if previously published online.

In other news, Star*Line is now open to general poetry subs, and moonset's deadline for their autumn/winter issue is August 1st.