Welcome! Welcome! Welcome!
Hola, readers and writers,
Welcome to the very first issue of The NightWriter Review, the literary journal of SLO NightWriters, the writers’ organization in San Luis Obispo, on California’s Central Coast.
SLO NightWriters was founded in 1989. We currently have more than 130 members. Our organization includes everyone from ambitious amateurs, eager to get their works in print, to seasoned veterans, some having written dozens of published books.
Our members fall into three broad categories: writers of fiction (novels and short stories), writers of nonfiction (writers of memoirs and a wide variety of other nonfiction), and poets.
We offer monthly programs, featuring presentations by authors, agents, and editors. We also conduct biweekly critique sessions, during which writers can get their work critiqued by their peers and by more advanced writers and get the opportunity to review the work of their colleagues. The aim of these critique sessions: to help us support each other and to develop our craft.
Every year, we sponsor the Golden Quill Writing Contest, which awards cash prizes to the winning authors in each of our categories. It is open to both NightWriter members and nonmembers. For many years, we have published the winning entries online.
Now, for the first time in our history, we will memorialize the best contest entries in print in our new publication The NightWriter Review. It will also include entries of great merit that didn’t win awards, as well as selections from our general submissions. We plan to publish annually.
Our intention: to provide readers with the finest, most memorable, most touching, most thoughtful, most entertaining, funniest, most provocative examples of the writing craft, work that our members have created, as well as work submitted to us by nonmembers, work that has never been seen in print before.
We hope that you find these pieces entertaining, instructive, and encouraging. We’d love to have you enter the Golden Quill Writing Contest and give us the opportunity to publish your best work. The 2025 contest will open April 1st. Our goal as a publication and as an organization is to inspire writers at all levels and to serve as a supporting connection between writers everywhere.
Good reading—and comments are welcome.
Harvey Ardman
Editor-in-Chief
The NightWriter Review