NOVEMBER 2026 SCIENCE FICTION MICROSTORY CONTEST (Comments/Critiques) > Likes and Comments

Theme: Space Thriller
Element: A Mask

Congrats Jot!!
And this will be a great contest!

Congratulations, Jot - Well done.

How do you define "Space Thriller"? Is this like a murder mystery?

Thanks all. The thriller part being something with suspense and anxiety. I leave the rest to the interpretation of the writer.

I downloaded the IPO for Anthropic yesterday. It's 500+ pages, so I mostly skimmed it. If you want some good material for a Sci Fi story, read the section on Risk, specifically page 45. But be aware you may not sleep for a while if you read too much.

Not sure if it will help this month, but I'm sure it will make for a good story in the future. (Maybe a future theme?).

Congrats, Jot! Great story! :)

Nice pic, Chris

Who has or has not read some version of The Thousand and One Nights, aka The Arabian Nights? The issue of whether Muslims had ever produced great literature came up in the news recently and I immediately thought of this seminal work. Reading it is probably the best training for writers because it shows how to keep an audience engaged in a story and how to write about wondrous things. I found it in my Dad's Harvard Classics collection when I was kid and just about devoured it.