Table of Contents: July 2025

A rundown of this month's short fiction

Images: Analog, Apex Magazine, and Fiyah

Short fiction is the lifeblood of the speculative fiction genres: it's worth checking out, reading, and subscribing to these publications, because they're often the starting point for many authors who'll go on to great careers as writers. You can check out last month's installment here. (Stay tuned, I'll be updating links for that piece when I get a free moment.

Here's this month's roundup of the short fiction that's publishing in July 2025.

Apex Magazine (July-September, Issue 150)

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Fiction

"My Song at the Conclave of Many Sorrows" by Daniel A. Oluremi
"Moebius Syndrome" by Storm Humbert (7/10)
"A Rare and Exceptional Delicacy" by G.M. Mitchell (7/22)
"What the Crab Apple Tree Near Miranda Spaceport Saw" by Elijah J. Mears (7/29) (Flash)
We Who Hunt Alexanders Excerpt by Jason Sanford (7/31)
"As Ephemeral as Bubbles" by Akis Linardos (8/7)
"A Final Song for the Ages" by Pedro Iniguez (8/14)
"Denizens of My Face" by Emil Morel (8/19) (Flash)
"Changeling" by Frey Lylark (9/9) (Flash)
"Mother Sun" by Amy Nagopaleen (9/23)

Nonfiction

Musings from Maryland by Lesley Conner
Interview with Author Daniel S. Oluremi by Marissa van Uden (7/15)
Interview with Artist Makayla Bounds by Bradley Powers (7/24)
Interview with Author J.S. Oriel by Marissa van Uden (8/12)
"Words for Thought: Short Fiction Review" by AC Wise (9/30)
"Review of The Inescapable March by Hana Carolina" by Rebecca E. Treasure (9/4)

Analog Science Fact and Fiction (July/August 2025, Vol. XCV No. 7 & 8)

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Fiction

"Analytical Laboratory Results out of "Some Warm Little Pond," Part 1: "Rifters" and the RNA World" by Kelly Lagor
"Biolog: Kelly Lagor" by Richard A. Lovett
"The First Velodrome on Mars" by Marie Vibbert
In Times To Come
"Desert Soul" by David Gullen
"Hidden Achievement" by Shane Tourtellott
"Patient Was the Doctor" by Victoria N. Shi
"Last Dam Standing" by Dawn Vogel
"If the Algorithms are Gentle" by Bernie Jean Schiebeling
"Low-Tide Salvage" by Matthew Claxton
"Unknowns Edited by Alec Nevala-Lee: Back to Square One" by Rachel Fabi
"Eri" by James Dick
"Mother Hubble's Elegy for Rhessi: (2002-2023) April 19, 2023 by Sandra J. Lindow
"Jennifer Does Pushups" by Joseph Weber
"Imaginary" by Daniel D. Villani
"Your Entry to Paradise Memorial Experience" by Robert Morrell Jr.
"The Marks We Leave" by M. Ian Bell
"Ready for New Arrivals?" by Sean Monaghan
"Under the Moons of Venus: A Tale of a Princess Altivolant by Jay Werkheiser and Frank Wu
"North Station Blues by David Gerrold
"Our Lady of the Atom by Josh Pearce (Poetry)

Nonfiction

Guest Editorial: Three Gates by Steven Barnes
Alternate View: LUCA, Earth Life’s Universal Common Ancestor by John G. Cramer
Reference Library by Rosemary Claire Smith
Brass Tacks

Asimov's Science Fiction (July/August 2025 Vol. 49 Nos. 7 & 8)

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Fiction

"The Chronolithographer’s Assistant" by Suzanne Palmer
"Most Things" by Rich Larson
"Another Mother on Mars" by Dominica Phetteplace
"In the Gardener’s Service" by Michèle Laframboise
"Pirates of Highship" by Stephen Case
"Perri’s Fate" by Robert Reed
"In the Halls of the Makeshift King" by Tobias S. Buckell
"Worm Song" by Derek Künsken
"Aftermath" by William Preston
"The Courier" by Lavie Tidhar

Poetry

"Styx Seasons" by Robert Frazier
"Try to Explain the Concept of Teeth to My Alien Roommate" by Rachel Linton
"What Death Reads" by Mary Soon Lee
"Matter/Antimatter" by Lynne Sargent
"Vivienne" by E. H. Lupton

Nonfiction

Editorial: The 2025 Dell Magazines Award by Sheila Williams
Reflections: Another Ancient Encyclopedia by Robert Silverberg
On the Net: Writers’ Workshops by James Patrick Kelly
On Books by Peter Heck

Clarkesworld Magazine (July 2025, Issue 226)

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Fiction

"Missing Helen" by Tia Tashiro
"The Walled Garden" by Fiona Moore
"Welcome to Kearney" by Gary Kloster
"Serpent Carriers" by K.A. Teryna, translated by Alex Shvartsman
"Bits and Pieces on This Floor" by Eric Del Carlo
"A Land Called Folly" by Amal Singh
"Hunter Harvester" by Bam Bruin

Nonfiction

Wilderness Resurrection and Compromise by Priya Sridhar
Who Owns A Story: An Interview with Allison King by Arley Sorg
Diverse Bodies: A Conversation with Annalee Newitz by Arley Sorg
Editor's Desk: Taking a Moment to Smell the Roses by Neil Clarke

The Dark (July 2025, Issue 122)

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Fiction

“Skin and Bones” by Gary McMahon
“No Mirrors Here” by A. Katherine Black
“Window” by Charlie Hughes
“The Sisters” by E.M. Linden

Dark Horses Magazine (July 2025, No. 42)

Fiction

"Chafing" by Jimmy Lis
"Fred Baker is Not Quite Himself These Days" by Karen Lee Ziner
"Monsters" by Mark Barlex
"Rustlings in the Dark" by Jon Adcock
"The Low Rumble of Distant Thunder" by Wayne Kyle Spitzer
"The Last Sip" by Daniel Gauss
"The Navigator: An Allegory" by D Bedell
"The Reception" by Bryan Fagan
"Trembling Earth" by Trevor James Zaple
"Daydreamer" by James Michael

Fiyah: Magazine of Black Speculative Fiction (Summer 2025, Issue 35)

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Fiction

"The Time Grandma Jumped into a Lake and Transformed into a Kung Fu Warrior" by E.A. Noble
"Heavenly Harpoon" by Erin Brown
"The Cut" by SJ Powell
"Fire is Hot in Every Universe" by Brandie Marsh
"Red Wings" by Sheila Smith McKoy
“Post Bender Epiphanies” by OLLY NZE
“Resurrected in the Sky” by Ivan Ndoma-Egba

Flash Fiction Online (May 2025)

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Fiction

“Recitations” by Jacob Baugher
“A Concise History of the Goldfish Trade” by Jason Pearce
“To Ashes” by Emlyn Meredith Dornemann
“The Sacred, The Sacrificial” by Kel Coleman
“My flesh, my beating heart, a willing meal that refuses to remember the danger of being eaten” by Deanna J. Valdez
“The Harrowing of Hell (Third Circle, Sausage Counter, Contracts Office)” by S.L. Harris