from Editor Smith

If you haven't checked out the fabulous February 2020 issue of Electric Spec yet, I highly recommend it! In addition, there's lots of free fiction from our fifteen years linked to the Issues page--if you were stuck at home for some reason. Feel free to share your favorite story in the comments here! :)

Like Dave and Renata, I am a founding editor of Electric Spec. It was fun to connect with them lately and share their thoughts here on the blog. As I recall, creating Electric Spec was Dave's awesome idea. I also recall the name "Electric Spec," for electronic speculative fiction, was Renata's awesome idea. Wow! Talk about ideas that stand the test of time. Hurray for them!

I've told the story of the origins of Electric Spec at cons, but I don't think I have on the blog...
Dave, Renata, and another founding editor, Georgia, were in a Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers (RMFW) critique group together. We were all sending out short stories and getting rejections. One evening, we were shooting the, ah, stuff, about this sad state of affairs and Dave said, "Hey, why don't we start our own ezine?" We discussed it and thought we could be a kinder, gentler 'zine. We thought we could encourage and nurture writers. Bottom line: we all embraced the idea immediately.
This was in the very early days of ezines, so we basically invented our own wheels. As I recall, we all helped each other with everything, but Dave was great with the legal stuff, Renata was excellent with the editing stuff, and I did a lot of the technical stuff. Happily, it all came together.

Eventually, Renata and Georgia stepped down and we got another editor, Betsy Dornbusch, who put her stamp on things. (Betsy was also in a RMFW critique group with Dave and I.) She was instrumental in creating the current look of the ezine. Eventually, both Dave and Betsy stepped down and Grayson Towler and Nikki Baird stepped up. Chris Devlin stepped up to be a copy editor. Grayson, Nikki and Chris are also in RMFW. Hmm, I'm sensing a pattern...
As our popularity has grown, we've had to get a bunch of associate editors. First Minta Monroe and Candi Cooper-Towler joined us, and recently, Lauren Slawson and Beth Chan.

All our editors are committed to nurturing writers, helping them grow, and reach a wider audience. And, all our editors are volunteers!
So, kudos, to all the editors, past and present! Thank you for making a positive difference in the world! Hopefully, we'll be nurturing writers and entertaining readers for many years to come!

Take care, everyone!