Greetings loyal Clark's World Citizens. I'd like to welcome you to the first

podcast of 2010 and with that some very warm wishes for a very successful and happy new year.

Now here at Clarks World, we've mapped out a couple of new changes in the coming year.

In 2009, we experimented with publishing longer stories. In 2010 we're making

the change official. Our new upper word limit is 8,000 words. Pay is 10 cents per word for the first 4,000 and 5 cents per word after.

Our preferred length is still around 4,000 words,

but we no longer feel the need to tie our hands with that limitation. Also, starting in the second quarter, we will add a reprint fiction track to the magazine.

Stories will be serialized from a trade paperback anthology to be published by Worms sometime in late 2010.

So keep your eyes out for that one.

We've also received some excellent news in regards to two of our authors that were featured

in the year of 2009 for Clarks World magazine.

Kids Johnson, with her story entitled Spar, and Catherine and Valente with her story

entitled The Radiant Car Thy Sparrow's Drew, were both selected in two years best anthologies.

So a hearty congratulations to both of them.

And the big news. For the last 18 months, Clark's World has been podcasting short fiction on a monthly schedule.

Starting in January, we will change our podcast publication schedule to twice a month.

Stories will be podcast on the first

and the 15th of each month. So you know what that means? It means that you're going to be

able to hear my lovely voice twice a month. Aren't you lucky? You can subscribe for free to our podcast at iTunes and

Podcast Valley. So if you haven't done that, please do so. And speaking of

which, the next story that I'm about to read to you is from the immensely talented Peter Watts.

No, I'm not going to lie. I was absolutely privileged to listen to Peter Watts read part of this story back at Worldcon in Montreal

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