Sign Ups for the 2026 Writing SF & Fantasy Workshop are Open!
Welcome to the Speculative Literature Foundation!
The Speculative Literature Foundation is a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting literary quality in speculative fiction. We encourage promising new writers, assist established writers, facilitate the work of quality magazines and small presses in the genre, and work to promote a greater public appreciation of speculative fiction. Our mission is to promote literary quality in speculative fiction through our grants, programming, and more!
Speculative fiction is an umbrella term for any literature with a speculative or fantastical element, anything that isn’t strictly realist, such as science fiction, fantasy, folklore, fairy tales, ghost stories, and more.
The SLF serves the speculative literature community through support from people like you. We’re a 501(c)3, and all donations are tax-deductible in the U.S. You can make a one time donation or become a member to receive cool perks like discounts for our courses and events, access to our bi-monthly writer’s encouragement letter, yearly anthology, and more!
2026 Illustration of the Year: "Cosmic Allure" by Santiago Rosas
“The idea for this piece came to a friend and me as we were talking about our mutual admiration for moths and butterflies. I have a Luna moth tattooed on my arm, so we went into thinking what if moths were actually selenites. What if there were a whole universe of winged beings beyond the cosmos?“
– Santiago Rosas
Video Playlist from May Deep Dish Uploaded
Check out our readers from our Deep Dish reading event from May 2025. Our featured readers were Fannie Price and Beth Kander with rapid-fire readings by Richard Chwedyk, James Kennedy, Philip Janowski, and more!
The Older Writers Grant Opens in May!
Award: $1000 USD
Submissions: May 1 - May 31
Winner Announced: July
Since 2004, the Older Writers Grant has been awarded annually to writers who are at least fifty years of age at the time of application to assist such writers who are just beginning their careers as speculative fiction writers. These funds may be used as each writer determines will best assist their work.
Ep. 72 of MRAH Out Now: "A Time of Turmoil"
Hey Humans, welcome back to the MRAH podcast for 2026! In this episode, Mary Anne and Benjamin talk about the tumultuous times we live in and how to combat or even just navigate them.
New Portolan Project Addition: K. Tempest Bradford
“They were essentially recreating the day [September 11th] because they started at whatever time in the morning everything kicked off…and I was like whoa, y’all are doing some heavy ritual magic here. So, I started thinking about that and I started thinking about ways to get into that, the thinking around rituals around death and how we deal with it, especially when it’s a mass death event…”
– K. Tempest Bradford
We recently charted an interview we had with Bradford, an award-winning teacher and media critic who writes speculative fiction steeped in Black Girl Magic. She’s the author of the Nebula nominated Ruby Finley vs. the Interstellar Invasion and over a dozen short stories.
Check out our Deep Dive with Bradford on ritual magic, grief, memory, structure, travel research, and more.
Deep Dish Monthly Spotlight: Richard Chwedyk
Chicago born and bred, Richard Chwedyk won a Nebula Award in 2002 for his novella, Bronte’s Egg, and has been nominated for the Hugo, Sturgeon, and Rhysling awards. He’s best known for his “saur” stories, about a group of bioengineered dinosaurs, sold as toys but abandoned and living in a sort of shelter home. Currently, he’s a moving target in the ever-changing, ever-shrinking academic environment at Columbia College Chicago, teaching creative writing, fantasy writing, and Tolkien. Like most science fiction writers, he is “mostly harmless,” but approach with caution.
Our Latest Blog Posts
2026 Illustration of the Year Winner Santiago Rosas
2026 Illustration of the Year Winner Santiago Rosas Thank you Santiago Rosas, for your wonderful submission to the SLF’s 2026 Illustration of the Year, “Cosmic
SLF’s 2025 Working Class Writers Shortlist
Here is our shortlist for our 2025 Working Class Writers Grant! All of these talented writers were hand-selected by our jurors to be a finalist.
Donate
Our mission is to promote literary quality in speculative fiction through our grants, programming, and more.
The SLF is made possible by the kind contributions of those who believe in our mission—people like you. We’re a 501(c)3, and all donations are tax-deductible in the U.S.
For gifts over $1,000, gifts of stock, or to explore funding a grant, please contact our Development Director, Sue Bedry, and she’ll be happy to assist you. We encourage you to apply for matching funds from your employer if possible!
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