Call for Submissions on Theme of "The Unknown": Shooter Literary Magazine

Shooter publishes themed print issues twice a year, and runs competitions for short fiction during spring/summer and poetry during autumn/winter. We also run a monthly flash contest online.

General submission guidelines are as follows:

Writers:

Writers should send short stories and non-fiction of 2,000-6,000 words and/or up to three poems on the theme The Unknown, adhering to the guidelines below, by the deadline of September 24th, 2023.

We’re looking for stories, essays, memoir and poetry on anything to do with unfamiliar people, new places, strange experiences or foreign exploration. Work might revolve around culture clashes, romantic encounters, fears about the future, immigration, travel, or otherworldly realms altogether.

The theme is open to wide interpretation, but please adhere to the submission guidelines. In addition to thematic relevance, we seek engaging, elegant writing that maintains a high literary standard.

Documents should be in Word format, 1.5 or double spaced, with word count indicated at the end of the (prose) piece. Please submit only one piece of prose and/or up to three poems per issue.

Please include a brief biography in your email, noting any prior publishing experience, and send work to:

submissions.shooterlitmag@gmail.com

by September 24th.

Simultaneous submissions are fine but please let us know if your work is accepted elsewhere. Any non-fiction or journalistic work selected for publication will be fact-checked. All work must be previously unpublished either in print or online.

Successful writers can expect to hear from us within a few weeks of the deadline, if not before; all other submitters will be informed of the outcome within two months.

Rights:

Shooter acquires first rights for print and online/e-book publication and reserves the right to publish work that has appeared in the magazine on its website and related social media.

Payment:

Upon publication, writers will be paid £25 per story and £5 per poem. Stories that fall below the requested minimum of 2,000 words will be paid at poetry rates. Artists will be paid £25 for use of their work as magazine illustration. UK contributors will receive both payment and a copy of the issue in which their work appears; non-UK contributors may choose either cash payment or a copy of the magazine.

Writing Competition on Theme of "Re-imagining Healing & Transformation with Cancer Through Poetry, Art, Letters, & Stories": LIGHT

Deadline: Nov. 1, 2023 

 

Awards:

1st place--$500

2nd place--$375

3rd place--$125

 

No entry fee.

 

LIGHT seeks submissions in response to the question:

 

How might we re-imagine healing and transformation with cancer through art, letters, stories, and poetry?

Maybe it’s you who has had cancer and are now in remission. Maybe it’s your father, mother, brother, sister, aunt, uncle, grandparent, or friend who has cancer and are living with it or has had cancer and has passed with it. Maybe it’s you (or someone you know) who never took a simple test, like a pap smear, and you’ve discovered it when it’s already too late. Maybe you are barely living with it; maybe you’re dying with it. Maybe you are the one coping with cancer, or maybe you are coping as a loved one or a friend, even a caregiver, of someone who has cancer.Creativity, like mediums such as poetry, art, letters, and stories, can be used to re-imagine, transform, and process one’s experience with cancer. It can be used to fuse the personal and the public, to ask unsettling questions that provoke thoughts or force us to dream. When a member of our team lost a family member to cervical cancer, she turned to poetry and the Cancer Journal from the Late Audre Lorde for healing and transformation. Audre Lorde described her experience with coping with cancer as an opportunity to transform silence into language and action. The poet Lucille Clifton also described cancer as the dreaded word that leaves you staring at life with your own living eyes.

But what do you call it? How might you re-imagine healing and transformation from an experience with cancer?

Shed light on your journey. We are calling on the fluidity of your imaginations and potency of your truth, from your poetic vision to any attempts at social justice, from the tender trees planted in gardens in memory of lives lost to the single-breath pieces that help all of us to inhale and exhale through any experience with cancer. Through your art, letter, story, or poem, those walking a similar path or in similar shoes can know they are not alone and begin the process of healing and transformation.

 

Note: At this time, submissions will only be accepted if written in English. Submissions should not have been previously published and should be properly formatted with little to no grammatical errors. Submissions will be accepted via Submittable. Please do not include any identifying information in your uploaded file.

If you have questions about this contest or how/if your piece fits into our guidelines and answers the open call question, please view our “frequently asked questions” section on our website or contact us via email at:

 

info@light4ph.org 

 

Disclaimer: Entries not related to re-imagining healing and transformation with cancer will be disqualified.

 

Before submitting to LIGHT, you will be asked to acknowledge and agree to the following:

• I assure that the work I am submitting to LIGHT is original work, owned by myself, OR I have partial ownership of the work and am submitting the work with consent from the person or people who also have ownership of the work. I, or we (if submitting with others), take full responsibility of its veracity falling to myself or my team as authors.

• I attest that the work I am submitting has not been previously published elsewhere (an exception is if it has been published on a personal website, blog, Spotify, etc.).

• I give LIGHT the right to edit, duplicate, and publish my creative work in their open-access literary journal and disseminate this work for promotional reasons via any type of media to a broader audience.

• I understand LIGHT reserves the right to refuse to publish any work that may be deemed harmful, slanderous, or malicious, etc., regardless of how well written it is.

• I acknowledge that I will not receive any compensation for LIGHT's use of my creative work, except that of a monetary prize if my creative work places as a top submission (see LIGHT’s open call prizes for more details).

• I understand that I cannot make a claim as a violation against usage rights against LIGHT related to the use of my creative work. If submitting concurrently, I will withdraw my submission if it is accepted elsewhere.

• I understand that I own all rights to my submission post-publication, and I will credit LIGHT as the original publisher if I choose to publish my creative work elsewhere.

• If my submission is selected to be included in the LIGHT journal, I recognize my name will be published with it.

• If submitting as part of a group, I agree that all group members consent to these terms

Confidentiality

 

Kindly note the privacy of individuals should be protected. Public health practitioners who write about individuals and communities should alter identifying details and characteristics.

 

References:
1. Clifton, L., & Girmay A. (2020). How to Carry Water. BOA Editions Limited.

2. Lorde, A. (2020). The cancer journals. Penguin.

 

Enter here.

Call for Submissions on Theme of "Environmental Justice": Reckoning

Reckoning is a journal of creative writing on environmental justice; we’re looking for fiction, creative nonfiction, essays, poetry and art.

For Reckoning 8, we want thinking, writing and art about … this. All of this, right now. We want to hear about active resistance to the patriarchofascist, corporate-captured extractive state. Show us what it means that in order to build Cop City*, a massive facility intended to train a new generation of lethal enforcers into an institution directly descended from slave patrols, the state of Georgia and its actors must first level a forest and label protestors “domestic terrorists” as a precursor to murdering them.

Help us understand how strategies of repression and control all over the world concentrate agency in the hands of the few at the expense of all other life. We are looking for work in opposition to a broad, insidious fascism that treats water, trees, and bodies as exploitable, expendable resources rather than sacred, essential components of our global, infinitely interconnected and interdependent web of life.

As always, we’re seeking work from people of all genders or none, all sexualities or none, of all neurotypes, all levels of physical ability, from all racial and ethnic backgrounds, in all parts of the world. We’d love to add all languages to that, though we publish in English and are currently limited to reading submissions for potential translation in Spanish, French and Swedish.

Payment is 10 cents/word, $50/page of poetry, $50 minimum per piece of artwork. We don’t charge submission fees.

We’re always open to submissions.

Deadline for Reckoning 8 is the solar equinox, September 22, 2023.

More information and submission portal here.

Call for Submissions: Pyre Magazine

Winter/Fall Issue
Submissions open: Aug 17 - Sep 18
Issue Release: Nov 16

What We Look For:

We are most interested in dark genre-bending works in the realms of horror, sci-fi, the weird, the macabre, fantasy, and magical realism. We want stories that grab us by the throat and ask questions about what it means to be human. Make us feel something long after we are done reading.

The Editor is particularly fond of stories in the vein of The Twilight Zone, Black Mirror, Night Gallery, The Outer Limits, and Creep Show. When it comes to literary inspiration, think of Shirley Jackson, Richard Matheson, Ray Bradbury, and Mary Shelley.

The Editor also enjoys almost anything produced by A24.

Think of Pyre as a bonfire — a place of storytelling and sacrifice. Take a seat near the fire and listen or spin a yarn of your own. Here at Pyre, we worship at the altar of storytelling done well. We love genre work that tells us something about the human condition.

Pyre is personally funded and maintained by the Editor. he asks you are patient with him as he gets back to submissions.

• We accept simultaneous submissions. We only ask you to notify us and withdraw if your work is accepted elsewhere.

• Pyre Magazine currently pays a small honorarium of $10 US , paid via PayPal, for every piece published. We hope to increase this in the future as the magazine grows. 

• Due to the high submission rates you may not receive a verification email. 

• We ask for First Electronic Rights for the works we accept for publication. Upon acceptance, your piece may not appear anywhere else until we publish it.

• We ask you to credit Pyre Magazine as the first publisher when you republish the work that originated with us. We also reserve the right to archive, reprint, and of course, promote your writing or art. 

• We will not publish blatantly sexist, racist, ableist, homophobic, xenophobic, or any sort of discriminatory pieces.

• If you have any further questions feel free to email us at:

   pyremag@gmail.com

  For more information and to submit, go here. 

Call for Submissions: Canthius

Submissions are open from August 15-September 15.

Canthius is an intersectional feminist magazine that publishes poetry and prose by writers of marginalized gender identities, including trans, Two Spirit, non-binary, agender, cis women, genderqueer, GNC, and intersex writers. We are committed to publishing diverse perspectives and experiences and strongly encourage Indigenous women, Black women, and women of colour to submit. We also welcome submissions in Indigenous languages.

GUIDELINES

We consider unpublished work of poetry and prose (both fiction and creative non-fiction). We welcome experimental works. Please limit prose submissions to 2500 words and poetry submissions to three poems. We accept simultaneous submissions, but please let us know if another publication accepts work you've submitted to Canthius.

Along with your submission, please include a cover letter with your name, home address, email address, phone number, the date, and the name(s) of the piece(s) you're submitting. If you are comfortable disclosing your racial background and/or gender identity in your cover letter, we encourage you to do so. This information will be held in confidence and will be used solely to help us uphold our mandate to publish diverse work. For prose submissions, please include a word and page count in your cover letter. Finally, your cover letter should include a short bio that tells us a bit about yourself and lists your previous publications, if any. Please include a header on each page of your submission with your name.

We respond to all submissions by email. Our average response time is 12 to 15 weeks. Please be sure to designate Canthius as an approved sender to prevent our response from being caught in your email spam filters.

Writers accepted for publication will receive $50 for one page, $75 for two pages, $100 for three, $125 for four pages, and $150 for five pages or more, regardless of genre. Contributors will also receive a complimentary a copy of the issue and a discounted price on any further copies of the issue in which their work appears.

Thanks for sharing your writing with us – we can't wait to read it!

Please note that Submittable caps the number of submissions we can receive during each calendar month. Every first of the month, the cap is reset and the forms will open again. For this reason, we open submissions across different calendar months. Please plan accordingly if you can, and reach out to us if you have any difficulty submitting during our open submission periods.

Call for Submissions: The Dawn Review

We accept all written work, so long as it is literary in nature! We also publish visual work. There are no restrictions on who can submit, and our issues are not themed. We want you to send us something new– a new form, a new combination of words, a new perspective. We love work that is striking and honest– that creates the truth by refracting it. Send us your best!

We welcome pieces that deal with difficult subjects, but please make sure that your message is not hurtful.

Please submit up to 10 pages of written work and up to 10 pieces of visual work per reading period. We have no spacing or formatting requirements.

Deadline: Oct. 31, 2023

To submit, please fill out our online form. Please submit written and visual work separately. As long as you've submitted the form, your submission will go through– we don't send confirmation emails. If you are unable to link your pieces using the form below, you may attach them in an email to:

 thedawnreviewsubmissions@gmail.com 

along with any feedback requests and a short third-person biography.

If you have previously been published in the Dawn Review, we ask that you wait for two full reading periods before sending us your work again.

We provide free feedback (~300 words) to all submissions upon request.

We accept simultaneous submissions, but we would prefer if your pieces have not been previously published. Please let us know if your piece is accepted elsewhere before we have a chance to get back to you. 

The Dawn Review receives first electronic serial rights to your piece upon publication. After publication, all rights revert back to the author. If your work appears elsewhere later, please acknowledge The Dawn Review as the first place of publication. We nominate published pieces for The Pushcart Prizes and Best of the Net.

Call for Submissions: Hawaii Pacific Review

Deadline: Jan. 1, 2024

Hawai`i Pacific Review is Hawai`i Pacific University’s award-winning online literary magazine. It features poetry and prose by authors from Hawai`i, the mainland, and around the world. While we often publish work about Hawai`i and the Pacific, we accept great work from all regions and on all subjects. Our work has gone on to appear in the Best of the Net Anthology and the Pushcart Prize Anthology.

HPR publishes work on a rolling basis, as opposed to issue-by-issue. We post poems, stories, and essays one piece at a time, several times a month. All contents are archived on the site.

We are seeking work that has not been previously published (apart from a few rare exceptions). We do not consider work by faculty or students of Hawai`i Pacific University. Simultaneous submissions are accepted, but please notify us immediately if your work is placed elsewhere. (And please withdraw your submissions via this site).

Submissions are accepted August through February, or until our backlog grows too large to review by the end of the spring semester. HPR is edited by the students and faculty at Hawai`i Pacific University.

Should your work be accepted, Hawaii Pacific Review asks for First Serial Rights. This is the right to be the first publisher of your work. After the work is published with us, all rights revert back to you. We ask only that you acknowledge HPR as the first publisher of the work, should it subsequently appear elsewhere.

Submit your work here.

Residency: Monson Arts Winter Residencies for Artists and Writers

Monson Arts Winter Residencies 2024

Open Call: Aug 1, 2023 - Sep 15, 2023

Monson Arts’ residency program supports emerging and established artists and writers by providing them time and space to devote to their creative practices. During each of our 2-week and 4-week programs throughout the year, a cohort of 5 visual artists and 5 writers are invited to immerse themselves in small town life at the edge of Maine’s North Woods and focus intensely on their work within a creative and inspiring environment.

They receive a private studio, private bedroom in shared housing, all meals, and $1,000 stipend for 4-week programs or $500 for 2-week programs.

 The Abbott Watts Residency for Photographers offers access to the photography studio and darkroom of Todd Watts in nearby Blanchard, adjacent to the former home of Berenice Abbott and takes place concurrently with the other sessions.

Winter Residencies:

1/8 - 1/18: 2 Week Residency

1/22 - 2/15: 4 Week Residency (Abbott Watts)

2/19 - 3/14: 4 Week Residency

Residencies are open to artists at all stages of their career. Both US Citizens and non-U.S. citizens (with working knowledge of English) may apply. Applicants must not be currently enrolled in a BFA or MFA program. PhD's may apply if the time will support research. All forms of art are welcome to apply.

Apply here.

Call for Submissions: Across the Margin

Across the Margin strives to publish only the best in fiction, poetry, and nonfiction, and we enthusiastically tout an open door policy. In fact, we don’t even have a door, something we are damn proud of! All are welcome, just come correct. Even though we frequently feature writers with previous credits, we are also very much interested in less experienced or unpublished writers who exhibit exceptional potential.

WHAT WE WANT FROM YOU 

• Only previously unpublished works will be considered for publication (print & online).

• We allow simultaneous submissions, but we would be thankful if you could immediately withdraw work that has been accepted elsewhere.

• We accept international submissions.

• We expect that you will proofread and spell check your work prior to submission.

• If inclined, please include a brief bio written in the third person.

WHAT WE DO NOT WANT FROM YOU 

Any work that is racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, hateful, etc.

LEGAL/RIGHTS INFO

We reserve first printing rights, including publication in Across the Margin in both printed, web and ebook formats, and the right to excerpt portions of an accepted work online in order to promote you, your work, and the magazine. The copyright for work published by Across the Margin is always held by its authors. If we publish your work on the website, we reserve first North American electronic publication rights and the right to keep it here in our archives indefinitely. All other rights remain property of the author. If you want to reprint any work that originally appeared in Across the Margin, we ask that you credit the author and the publication.

NOTE: Fiction or nonfiction submissions over 5,000 words that we’re interested in publishing may be published in serial form.

POETRY SUBMISSIONS NOTE: Across the Margin welcomes submissions of your previously unpublished poetry. Please send 2 or more (max = 5) of your best poems for our consideration. Throw in a brief bio and publication history and remember, we have no aesthetic allegiance or ideological bent. Our only goal is to publish as much excellent poetry as we can!

WE’VE CREATED THREE EASY WAYS TO SHARE YOUR WORK WITH US 

• E-mail us your work directly via acrossthemargin@gmail.com (Preferred!)

• Share your work with us using cloud-based services like Google Drive’s Documents or Apple iCloud’s Pages. Just be sure to invite us to your piece using our e-mail address acrossthemargin@gmail.com

• Or you can submit your work to us by providing the following information and pasting your work into the “Message” part of our form here.

Call for Submissions: Punk Monk Magazine

Punk Monk Magazine

Submissions open!

Please read guidelines thoroughly.

You can now sign up for free editorial feedback and/or priority response rates via our Patreon.

We want writing from the gut: your loves, your losses.

Paint splatters. Mosh pits.

Healing. Hope. Hurts.

Mistakes. Misgivings. Misfits.

We want honest, gripping work exploring the breadth and depth of humanity. Mere shock value has no place here. #OwnVoices strongly preferred.

We like stories/poems with an "untucked shirt." (If you get the reference, this is definitely your scene!)

We are excited to lift up femme/non-binary voices, though all (within the realms of moral sanity) are welcome. We're especially interested in a feminine perspective w/ edge. It's rare to see the two combined, and rarer to find spaces curating those fab punk femme gems.

Think:
Kathy Acker
Elizabeth Smart
d'bi Young
Assata Shakur
Zadie Smith
Helen Oyeyemi
Sylvia Plath (her memoir, not her poetry)
Elise Cowen
Sophie B Watson
Ntozake Shange
Leslie Feinberg
Saul Williams
Joy Harjo
Tommy Orange
Zora Neale Hurston
Diane di Prima
Sherman Alexie
Maggie Nelson
+ a Stoic/Spiritualist sensibility.

(Haven't read any of the above? Please do so before submitting.)

(NO: fancy shit, scatology, hate speech. <- Including misogyny; misandry is equally uncool.)

Punk Poetry:

• We prefer if you submit 1 poem at a time, but up to 4 will be considered.

• Shorter poems are more likely to be considered for print editions.

• Accepted genres: General, Contemporary, Experimental. Non-rhyming/free-verse preferred.

• I iterate: no fancy shit. We do not dig Gothic or Literary poems. No fancy formatting. No five dollar words. We want it to feel real.

Check out Em Ramser's amazing poem to see what we're looking for.

Punk Prose:

• Flash fiction only. Micro-fiction welcome. (Only submit longer-length fiction upon request from our EIC.)

• We want tight, terse, tender.

• Accepted genres: General, Contemporary, Urban, Literary, Experimental, Hybrid.

• (No Genre fiction. Ie, no Horror, Sci-Fi, Fantasy. This means no robots, ghosts, monsters, or mutilations.)

• We want it to feel real.

• Excerpts welcome, incl from unpublished or self-published work.

• I iterate: #OwnVoices strongly preferred.

Jenna Best's flash fiction is a great example of what we want.

Fierce Features:

• Seeking essays, reviews, interviews, etc.

• Special interest in feminism, sex work, BLM/ALM/ILM, LGTBQ+, mental health. (For these topics, we maintain a firm #OwnVoices policy.)

• Excerpts welcome, incl from unpublished or self-published work. Send a completed work up to 5K. (Flash preferred.)

Read Mekdela's piece on fatphobia for inspiration.

Audacious Art:

• Open to all art forms. If it explores punk philosophy, healing, mindfulness, fierce femininity, or anything wonderful and weird, we want to see it!

• Open to mainstream art as long as it's meaningful/beautiful.

• Black n white productions more likely to be included in print editions.

Get a gander of Laura Brant's Come Get Some! and Seriously? by Kay Hogan for reference.

Also:
Our Sunflower Series in solidarity for the Ukraine will remain open until the invasion ends. Send us any interpretation of a sunflower, from mainstream to experimental.

The Music Margins:

• We want your music! Send a Bandcamp song link or YT/Vimeo link + a small blurb featuring 1-3 quotable factoids about your band + a photo.

See this feature on LastMinuteHero for an idea of what we need.

The Om Zone:

• Send your meditation videos/tracks from your YT/Vimeo channel!

Stitches:

• Comedy is an amazing art form! Send an embeddable clip of your stand-up (ideally 5 min or less) w/ a small blurb featuring 1-3 quotable factoids about your work. (I iterate: no hate speech.)

ALL SUBMISSIONS:

PASTE submission in the BODY of your email to:

 punkmonkmagazine(at)gmail(dot)com (Change (at) to @ and (dot) to . )

(For art, attach as a PNG or JPG file.)

(If your words aren't pasted into the body of the email, your submission will be rejected, as it indicates you did not clearly read our guidelines.)

Please include your Twitter profile link so we can tag you, and remember to Follow us!

(If you don't include a Twitter handle, we will assume you do not have one, and will not tag you in the publication. Please note Twitter is our sole outlet for promoting your work.)

You can sign up for free editorial feedback and/or priority response rates on Patreon.

• Reprints/simultaneous subs welcome.

• No multiple submissions (ie wait to hear back from us on one submission before sending another, including in multiple categories.)

• (If you send in multiple submissions, your submissions will be rejected, as it indicates you did not clearly read the guidelines.)

We reserve the right to make edits to any work (incl previously published), and first-time publication/serialization rights. You retain all other rights to your work (as it should be.)

We're not picky about cover letters. Please stick to gender-neutral greetings.

Call for Submissions: Defuncted

Defuncted is a home for poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction that has been previously published but was abandoned when the journals that published them shut down but did not archive the work.

Submission periods are as follows:
April 15-May 15, August 15-Sept 15, December 15-January 15

NOTE: These are fluid submission windows. We may, without notice, close to submissions BEFORE the stated closing date.

OUR SUBMISSION GUIDELINES HAVE CHANGED SINCE LAST READING PERIOD, PLEASE READ CAREFULLY! IF YOU DO NOT FOLLOW GUIDELINES YOUR SUBMISSION WILL BE REJECTED.

If you have your own abandoned work and would like us to give it a new home, please email:

defunctedjournal@gmail.com

Please indicate in the subject line the type of submission, e.g., submission — poetry or submission — fiction or submission — cnf (CNF=creative nonfiction). We do not publish novel excerpts, please do not send those.

Submit up to three pieces or up to 3,000 words. If you have something that’s longer than that and you think it really belongs here, please email with the word count and we will consider.

More information here.

Call for Submissions from Writers with Strong Connections to Texas: Infrarrealistare Review

How to Send us your work

You must reside in, or have a strong connection to, Texas.

We accept simultaneous submissions. Do let us know if you are accepted elsewhere.

For all submissions, email:

 

infrarrealistareview@gmail.com 

 

with your name and “Submission” in the subject line. Please include a brief bio and few words about your piece.

Poetry

 

Please send your poem(s) (up to five) as a PDF (sometimes the line breaks don’t transfer the same way) an artist statement, or few words about your sendmission, your bio, and your preferred method of payment. We pay $50 dollars per poem.

 

Fiction & Non Fiction

 

Please send one piece at a time. Use a 12 pt font. Double-spaced, MLA or AP style margins. We pay a flat rate of $100 dollars per piece. Our word limit is at 1,300. Please submit your bio, artist statement, and your preferred method of payment.

 

Reviews

 

Please share one review. We pay 15 cents per word. We pay $100 dollars per review. Our word limit is at 1,300. Please submit your bio, artist statement, and your preferred method of payment.

 

Illustrations

 

Please share up to 3 illustrations, an artist statement, your bio, and your preferred method of payment. We pay a standard rate of $50 dollars. 

 

For more information, please visit our website.

Call for Submissions: Copper Nickel

Copper Nickel accepts submissions of poetry, fiction, essays, and translation folios from August 15 to December 15, January 15 to March 1.

Please submit four to six poems, one story, three flash pieces, or one essay at a time, and please wait at least six months between submissions. For prose we do not have any length restrictions—but longer-than-normal pieces have to earn their space.

For a translation feature, submit five to ten poems or a piece of prose (fiction or nonfiction). If we accept, we’ll ask for a contextualizing introductory essay of 800-1200 words.

We DO accept simultaneous submissions, though we ask you to contact us if submitted work is accepted elsewhere.

To withdraw full submissions, please withdraw through submittable.

To withdraw individual poems or flash pieces but not a whole submission, please message us through submittable indicating which individual pieces should be removed from consideration.

We try to respond to all submissions within eight weeks, though response times can be longer—particularly in the spring. We receive many thousands of submissions each year; reading and responding to them all is sometimes slower than we would like. Please do not query about your submission until at least three months have passed.

And: we shouldn’t have to say this, but please be kind and professional in your correspondence with us.

Also, please note that when you submit your work to Copper Nickel you’re adding yourself to our contact list and, thus, consenting to receiving infrequent emails about our book prize, subscriptions drives, etc. We’ll send no more than 2-3 of these emails per year.

Finally, our Submittable account can receive only 1800 discrete submissions in a given month—after which the account will close until the new month. Please submit early each month to avoid being shut out.

Copper Nickel pays $30 per printed page + two copies of the issue in which the author’s work appears + a one-year subscription. (Per-page payment could vary slightly from year to year based on funding. And international writers please note: all payments sent overseas are subject to a 30% tax, which is withheld on the front end. This is beyond our control.)

We also award two $500 prizes per issue—the Editors’ Prizes in Poetry and Prose—for what we consider to be the most exciting work in each issue, as determined by a vote of our in-house editorial staff.

For information about the Jake Adam York Prize for a first or second book of poetry, visit here.

Call for Submissions: The Dawn Review

Deadline: Oct. 31, 2023

We accept all written work, so long as it is literary in nature! We also publish visual work. There are no restrictions on who can submit, and our issues are not themed. We want you to send us something new– a new form, a new combination of words, a new perspective. We love work that is striking and honest– that creates the truth by refracting it. Send us your best!

We welcome pieces that deal with difficult subjects, but please make sure that your message is not hurtful.

Please submit up to 10 pages of written work and up to 10 pieces of visual work per reading period. We have no spacing or formatting requirements.

​If you have previously been published in the Dawn Review, we ask that you wait for two full reading periods before sending us your work again.

We provide free feedback (~300 words) to all submissions upon request.

We accept simultaneous submissions, but we would prefer if your pieces have not been previously published. Please let us know if your piece is accepted elsewhere before we have a chance to get back to you.

The Dawn Review receives first electronic serial rights to your piece upon publication. After publication, all rights revert back to the author. If your work appears elsewhere later, please acknowledge The Dawn Review as the first place of publication. We nominate published pieces for The Pushcart Prizes and Best of the Net. 

More information and submission portal here.

Writing Competition: Willow Springs Magazine's Surrealist Poetry Prize

What We Are Looking For

We are looking for poems in the surrealist tradition and its many iterations. One of the basic tenants of surrealism is a revolt of the imagination against reason, rationalism, and empiricism. The first surrealist movement is marked by the publication of Andre Breton’s Surrealist Manifesto. It is, as Robert Bly describes in discussion of Spanish surrealist poets, the poetry of “wild association” and “leaping.”

Melissa Kwasny writes the following useful definition of surrealism from her book Earth Recitals: Essasy on Image and Vision:

“Surrealism, with its emphasis on images drawn from dreams, the wildness of chance, and unconscious desire, extended our definition of the real by opening the conscious mind to realms of perceptions hitherto unknown or agreed upon . . . Breton states in his Second Manifesto [that surrealism is] “a total recovery of our psychic force.” . . . The images that washed up on the shores of the surrealist poem were recognizably different, strange and incoherent . . . Offshoots of French surrealism include the Latin American surrealism of Pablo Neruda a precursor of magic realism; the post-colonial surrealism of the Caribbean poets like Aime Cesaire; Lorca’s dark Andalusian rendition of the Deep Song; the American Deep image poets, influenced by Neruda, as well by Robert Bly's translations of Transtromer and Rilke . . . and later, poets of the Beat era, collage poets, poets exploring the arrangement of images in non-narrative, disjunctive and, to borrow a word from the surrealists, convulsive ways all influenced by the freedom to go beyond the boundaries of the concrete for images. The image, as fragment, or rather, as discontinuous accumulation of fragments, bound by chance encounters in dreams and waking life, gave us a glimpse into an entirely different way of envisioning our world.”

We seek any contemporary poem born of these traditions in an attempt to identify and keep alive the many changing faces of the movement.

Prize

$1,000 for a single poem to be published in the Spring issue of the Willow Springs magazine.
 

Deadline:September 1, 2023

 

Judge: Christopher Howell

 

Entry Fee: $15

 

Guidelines

• Submit a packet of up to three poems in one file.

• Please do not include identifying information in your submission document. We will use your Submittable information to contact you, so please make sure your contact information is accurate and up to date.

• Multiple submissions are welcome, as are simultaneous submissions. Please notify us immediately if your submission is accepted elsewhere.

• We accept only previously unpublished work for publication.

• We may consider any submission for general publication, unless the author states otherwise.

• Runners up may receive acknowledgment in the print issue, and online publication (if desired).

Eligibility

Students, faculty, staff, and administrators currently affiliated with Eastern Washington University or graduated from our creative writing program within the last four years are ineligible for consideration or publication. Previous winners should wait three years after their winning entry is published before entering again. Willow Springs adheres to the CLMP Contest Code of Ethics.

 

Submissions

Send your poem(s) to our Submittable page.

Writing Competition: Cloudbank's Vern Rutsala Book Contest for 2024

Cloudbank’s Vern Rutsala Book Contest for 2024 will be open for submissions August 1, 2023, through October 31, 2023.

A prize of $1,000 is awarded, plus publication of the manuscript and 50 free books.

• Submit 60 to 90 pages of poetry and/or flash fiction, including a Table of Contents and Acknowledgments page.
• Reading fee is $25. Electronic and postal submissions are accepted from around the world with no citizenship limitations.
• The first 50 writers submitting to the contest receive a Cloudbank book or journal.
• To submit electronically through our submissions manager click here.

To submit by mail send manuscript to:

Cloudbank Books

P.O. Box 610

Corvallis, OR 97339-0610

Make check for fee out to Cloudbank. Mailed submissions are not returned. A self-addressed, stamped envelope (SASE) can be included for notification of the judge’s decision.

Submissions should include two title pages, one with title only, one with title and author name.

Cloudbank editors appreciate a wide range of styles, approaches, forms, and aesthetics; we welcome prose poems and flash fiction.

Call for Submissions: Magazine1

 

Our submission guidelines can also be found on our Submission Page.

We will be open for submissions on August 4th, 2023 and will remain open until November 3rd, 2023. Our first issue will be published in January of 2024.

If you are local to the Sarasota/St. Pete/Tampa Bay area we encourage you to submit using the Florida West Coast Feature section on our submission page!

Our guidelines for submission are as follows:

• Submissions are 5 dollars per submission, any and all money collected is only used for the operating costs associated with the magazine.

• Please wait until you receive a response for your submission before submitting again. You are free to submit to multiple genres, but only one submission per genre is allowed i.e. one short story of 4500 words and 3 poems totaling 10 pages of poetry.

• Please include the name of the genre to which you are submitting somewhere in your file name.

• Only submit previously unpublished work.

• Include a biography in the appropriate place on Duosuma. 100 words or less, please. While it’s fine to tell us where you’ve been previously published, we’d love it if you told us something about yourself instead.

• We accept simultaneous submissions, but let us know if your piece is accepted elsewhere.

• Submit all written work as a .doc, .docx, or .pdf file.

• Have standard formatting: put your page number somewhere on each page. If the submission is prose, please double-space. Use Times New Roman font, or similar.

• Please limit prose submissions to ~4500 words for a single short story or up to four pieces of flash fiction each with a maximum of 1000 words.

• Please submit a maximum of 10 pages of poetry.

• Hybrid work can bend these limitations, but please do so within reason. We won’t be able to do anything with a full manuscript, even if it’s great.

• We typically respond to submissions within four weeks. Please be patient as we are a very small team

Specifics for Visual Art

• Please submit your piece as either a .png or .jpeg file.

• Please submit your piece with a DPI of 300.

• Please submit your piece with a size of 1024 x 1024 px.

• Please list the materials used in the piece.

Payment

We are a new magazine, and as a result cannot offer monetary compensation to our contributors. However, since we are operated by a Bookstore, we will give a $40 gift card to anyone we publish, which can be used in our physical store or in our online shop.

Call for Submissions: Woodcrest Magazine

Submissions of creative writing and mediums of art are welcomed. Submissions will be reviewed and selected by our editorial staff, who will decide which pieces best fit the most current version of our digital magazine. Please send us only unpublished work. Pieces that have previously appeared online or in print are considered published.

We aim for a response time of 3-8 months. Please submit only once per reading period. At this time, we do not offer monetary payment for published work.

Woodcrest is published once a year, usually in May, and is the flagship literary journal of Cabrini University. 

Submit your work here.

Call for Submissions from Indigenous Writers: The Yellow Medicine Review: A Journal of Indigenous Literture, Art, and Thought

For the upcoming Fall 2023 issue of Yellow Medicine Review, we want to see stories, poems, and essays that dwell on these concepts:

• Defining Moments

• Bildungsroman / Coming of Age Experiences

• Epiphanies

• Pivot Points in Life

• Etc.

These can apply to the individual, a family, a tribe, a community, an organization, or entity.

Capture the impact of such. The consequences. The resulting character development, resilience, strength, wisdom. Or the opposite--the resulting trauma, the perpetual haunting, the generational reverberations. Or maybe the resulting humor, or confusion, or disillusionment, or awareness, or grief, or joy, or fear, or fulfillment, or desperation....no shortage of emotions to tap.

Might not necessarily be a depiction of something earth shattering. Might be a small, quiet moment or sliver of insight.

Interpret it as you see fit.

We're eager to read work by elders and newbies and everyone in between and from every corner of indigenous experience. Take a risk. We love risky pieces. Push it. Cross imposed boundaries. Shatter expectations. Challenge norms. But do it brilliantly.

Deadline for Submissions: October 15, 2023

Expected Publication Date: Late November 2023

Submit work as a single email attachment to:

editor@yellowmedicinereview.com

 In your email/cover letter, please include the following:Your name and physical mailing address

List of all titles and genres of included work
Short bio
Your tribal affiliation [YMR is a journal of Indigenous writing]

 

Please adhere to the YMR submission format and guidelines:

 

Send work as a Word or RTF attachment. If there is unusual formatting in your piece, please also include a PDF.

 

The subject line of your email should read as follows: YMR Fall 2023 Last Name (ex: YMR Fall 2023 Wilson)

 

Simultaneous submissions are acceptable.

 

Please no previously published work (though we do sometimes make exceptions--so maybe ask before submitting such)

Call for Submissions: The Baltimore Review

General Submission Guidelines

Please review the editors' preferences and tips to writers. We may not be able to completely pin down what we want—and we do want to be taken pleasantly by surprise—but you may find the quotes helpful. And please take a little time to read some of the work in our current and past issues.

When you submit your work, please include a brief bio to introduce yourself.

If your work is accepted for publication, we ask only for the right to publish it for the first time, online and in print. Please do not submit work that has been published elsewhere. All rights revert to the author after publication by The Baltimore Review. All accepted work will be archived on the website.

Submissions in more than one category are permitted, but please do not submit work more than once per reading period in any category.

Simultaneous submissions are absolutely fine. If you need to withdraw your work, or part of your work, from consideration, let us know. Use the Withdraw option if withdrawing the entire submission; send us a message through Submittable if withdrawing part of your submission, .e.g., one poem from a group of three.

Once your work has been accepted by a publication, always withdraw it from any other publications right away.

Our next submission period is August 1 through November 30, 2023. Please do not withdraw and re-submit your work if making revisions. Simply note the minor edit or, if the changes are more extensive, attach the new version in the Submittable message. But it’s always best, of course, to take some time to thoroughly proofread your work before submitting. Thanks!

Response time: You will be notified of our decision within four months. We're aiming for a response time well within that time frame, usually one to three months, but we do receive thousands of submissions in each submission period, and we read each one of them. Thank you for your patience.

Payment for non-contest submissions is $50 via Amazon gift certificate or $50 through PayPal, if preferred. We hope to continue this as long as funding is available. We also nominate our contributors' work for every possible prize. 

More information and submission link here.

Call for Submissions: The Expressionist Literary Magazine

The Expressionist Literary Magazine

We accept Poetry, Short Story, Flash Fiction, Creative Non-Fiction, and Artwork.

We are always opened to submissions!

Please send your submissions to:

theexpressionistlitmag@gmail.com

with your genre and full name as the subject. Please include a brief cover letter and a short, third-person biography with your submission.If accepted, we ask for publishing/archival rights, as well as rights to post your work on our social media. U

Upon publication, all rights will revert to the author. Any questions can be sent to the email address listed above.

Previously published pieces of work are allowed! Please let us know where the piece was published first so that we can give the publication credit.

We ask that writers credit The Expressionist Literary Magazine for pieces that are published here first. We aim to respond to all submissions within a week, and most receive responses in a few days. Submissions may be lightly edited upon acceptance for grammar/to fit the style of the magazine. We unfortunately are not a paying market at this time.

Call for Submissions on Theme of "Desert": little somethings press

 

little somethings press is currently open for submissions.

In each issue, little somethings press publishes 30 pieces of flash fiction, flash memoir, poetry, and up to 10 pieces of visual art. Simultaneous submissions are accepted, but please let lsp know if your work has been accepted elsewhere.

This small independent press makes everything by hand (with love), so responses may take up to six months.

issue six

This project is partially funded by a City of Tempe – Community Arts Grant. Space will be held in issue five for Tempe-based, Tempe-connected, or Arizona-based artists; however, all are encouraged to apply! Below is the call.

What makes a desert? Definitions of ‘desert’ include arid land, lifeless water, desolate areas, wild lands, or home for most of us in the Southwest. In issue six, we want to explore what perceptions shape our climate. Send us your related flash fiction, flash memoir, poetry, and art. Prose should be no more than 300 words, and poetry no more than 12 lines. Submit all writing in a single .doc or .docx file. Visual art must be in a .jpg format.

Send all submissions to:

littlesomethingspress@gmail.com

by October 1, 2023.

Contributors will receive a small honorarium and a contributor copy as payment for their submissions. We work with First North American Serial Rights. However, all rights revert back to the author upon publication.

Writing Competitions: The Iowa Short Fiction Award and the John Simmons Short Fiction Award

The Iowa Short Fiction Award and the John Simmons Short Fiction Award are annual prizes awarded to two collections of stories. Writers who have yet to publish a book-length volume of fiction are eligible to apply, and winning manuscripts are published by The Iowa Press. Submissions will be open until September 30th, 2023.

The Iowa Short Fiction Award has been presented annually since 1969. In 1988 the University of Iowa Press instituted the John Simmons Short Fiction Award—named after the first director of the Press—to complement the ongoing award series. Serious critical consideration is guaranteed by such final judges as Alison Lurie, Raymond Carver, Marilynne Robinson, James Salter, Kevin Brockmeier, and Ethan Canin; this year's judge is Jamil Jan Kochai.

Eligibility

Any writer who has not previously published a book-length volume of prose fiction is eligible to enter the competition. Previously entered manuscripts that have been revised may be resubmitted. Writers are still eligible if they have published a volume of poetry or any work in a language other than English, or if they have self-published a work in a small print run. Writers are still eligible if they are living abroad or are non-US citizens writing in English. Current University of Iowa students are not eligible.

Manuscript

The manuscript must be a collection of short stories in English of at least 150 word-processed, double-spaced pages. The manuscript may include a cover page, contents page, etc., but these are not required; however, please ensure the writer's name can be found somewhere within the manuscript or in the file name. The author's name can be on every page but this is not required.

Stories previously published in periodicals are eligible for inclusion. There is no reading fee; please do not send cash, checks, or money orders. We assume the author retains a copy of the manuscript.

Publication

Award-winning manuscripts will be published by the University of Iowa Press under the Press' standard contract.

 *If you would prefer to send a hard copy of your manuscript, please print it double-spaced and double-sided, and ship to:

Writers' Workshop
Short Fiction Awards
102 Dey House
Iowa City, Iowa 52242-1000

Your shipment must be postmarked by the submission deadline. We do not return manuscripts to applicants. Be sure your full name and email address are included in your shipment.

Submission link here.

Writing Competition on Theme of "Climate Change": Changing Skies

Send us your creative nonfiction writing (prose only; no poetry for this contest) about climate change! How has it affected you? People you know? If it's about climate change, we want to read it.

First Prize: $500

Second Prize: $200

Deadline: Sep. 18, 2023

Written Submissions

• Please remove your name from your submission and file name to ensure an anonymous selection process for all writing submissions.

• Submissions must be in Times New Roman 12 pt. font, double spaced. Indicate space breaks, if any, with a hashtag: #.

• Submissions must be sent as a Word file (.doc or .docx). Do not submit PDFs.

• All citations, if any, must be done in Chicago footnote style.

• All submissions are free.

• ONE piece per submission. Submissions containing collections or multiple titles will not be considered.

• Submissions must be climate change-oriented (broadly construed).

• We consider all work for Print or Online publication, including podcasts. The deadline for annual print issues is each Spring for publication in the Fall. Submissions after that deadline will be considered for the next Print issue, or Online.

• We accept simultaneous submissions, but please notify us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere, through Submittable, and pull the piece. We publish only previously unpublished work and obtain First North American Serial Rights: all rights revert to you as soon as we publish your work first. We may then republish or excerpt your work unless you request that we not do so.

*We reserve the right to not award any prize money if we do not receive a sufficient volume of quality submissions. 

Submit your entry here.

Call for Submissions from Female-Identifying Poets Over 50: The Gyroscope Review

All submissions to Gyroscope Review must be made via our submissions manager, Submittable. We do not accept submissions via post or email.

Our response time is between 1 – 3 months. Please submit no more than four (4) poems, all in the same document with page breaks between poems. If there are more than 4 poems, we will not read past the 4th onemaking the next poems feel bad. Once you have submitted, please do not submit again within the same reading period. Multiple submissions will be rejected after the first one.

READING PERIODS

Winter issue: October 1 – December 1

Spring issue: January 15 – March 1

Summer issue: April 1 – June 1

Fall Crone Power issue: July 1 – September 1

NOTE: All reading periods are subject to closing early if we receive enough outstanding work to fill the upcoming issue.Please follow the instructions on the submissions form in Submittable.

Submit no more than 4 poems. There are no length restrictions on individual poems. Make sure each poem is on its own page. Use page breaks in between poems.

Formats we accept: .doc, .docx, .rtf.

No title underlines, lines separating poems, weird formatting, or non-standard fonts and settings. Please. We beg of you.

Headers and footers are not necessary.

Please use 12 pt Times New Roman, Garamond, or Arial type and 1″ margins.
No pictures or artwork in submissions. All artwork is arranged through the editors.

Note: If all your poem lines start with capital letters and you don’t want them to, here’s how to correct that in Microsoft Word. Word Tips.)

WE DO NOT ACCEPT PREVIOUSLY PUBLISHED MATERIAL. This includes publications in print, on the Internet including on Facebook, poetry sites, and personal blogs. Poetry workshopped behind password protected sites is okay.

We do not accept translations at this time unless the translation is the poet’s own work and both English and translation are sent.

Please do not submit if you are not open to being edited. We will work with you on edits.

No racist, or any other -ist, derogatory, anti-LGBTQIA+, or pornographic material. This is determined by the judgment of the editors. By all means, push the envelope, but do so in a tasteful manner.

By submitting you attest that the work is your own. Anonymous submissions are not allowed; pen names are acceptable.

Simultaneous submissions are allowed, but we ask that you consider our acceptance of your poem(s) as a commitment to be published by Gyroscope Review, and the poem(s) will not be withdrawn after acceptance to go to another publication. That would make us sad. And irritated. If a submission is accepted elsewhere please notify us immediately through Submittable. We’ll be happy for you, we promise! See our FAQ on how to withdraw single poems or the whole submission.

Gyroscope Review submits poems to the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net as well as other awards.

Gyroscope Review is open to poetry in all genres, including science-fiction, fantasy, and horror. Rhyming poetry is a hard sell unless extremely well done. We are open to traditional forms, but again, they must be well done. Poems about writing poems are generally a pass unless it brings something new to the table. We publish quarterly. Note – Gyroscope Review is not a paying market. We don’t offer contributor’s copies at this time, but we do offer a free PDF of the issue to read online. Print editions are available on Amazon and through Book Depository and Biblio.

Call for Submissions: Little Patuxent Review

Little Patuxent Review is a community-based publication focused on writers and artists from the Mid-Atlantic region, but all excellent work originating in the United States will be considered.

We recommend that you look over at least one issue to determine whether your work is appropriate for our publication. You can purchase individual copies online or at various local outlets. You can also view videos of the readings of some of the pieces we’ve published on our YouTube channel.

We also suggest that you read former Poetry Editor Laura Shovan’s Six Questions interview for her views on submissions and former Fiction Editor Jen Grow’s “More Words = More Reasons to Revise” on why submitting that great first draft just won’t work. Desiree Magney, LPR‘s publisher, has some great advice on how to craft a nonfiction narrative or memoir in her essay “Writing From the Heart, Shaping It Into Art.” Lastly, peruse former Online Editor Ilse Munro’s “The Story of a Story” on what it actually takes to get published in a top literary journal. And for a light-hearted look at what we don’t want, check out our fictional advice columnist’s piece “Dear Elvira: Bad Writing and Every Beholder’s Eye.” 

• We do not accept submissions from persons living outside of the United States. 
  

• While our contributing editors may provide pieces at the request of the editor, we do not accept unsolicited material from anyone listed on our masthead.

• While we may reprint previously published work, we do not accept unsolicited submissions that have been previously published, either in print or online. 

•  We do not accept multiple submissions or work submitted before we have notified you of our decision about pieces under review.

• We do accept work that is simultaneously submitted to other journals as long as it is identified as such and you promptly inform us of acceptance elsewhere.

Submission Procedure

We do not accept submissions sent by standard mail or email. Please use Submittable, our electronic submission manager.

Deadlines and Themes

The submission period for our January issue opens August 1 and closes on October 24 every year. The submission period for our June issue opens December 1 and closes on March 1 every year.

Notification and Queries

Expect three to five months for a decision. If you have not heard from us in that time, check your Submittable account. If you still have a question, contact us by email at 

editor@littlepatuxentreview.org

Compensation and Publication Rights

Regrettably, we cannot provide monetary compensation for work published in LPR. If we publish your work, we will give you one copy of the issue in which your work appears and the opportunity to read or discuss your work at the issue’s launch event. When we accept a piece, we obtain first-publication rights only.

Call for Submissions: Cherry Tree

 

Cherry Tree welcomes submissions of poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, and literary shade. We are open to submissions for Issue 10 from August 1 to October 1.

 

Cherry Tree only considers original, unpublished work. For accepted work, we purchase First North American serial rights. Payment is $20 per contributor and two contributor's copies.

The $3 reading fee helps us to pay contributors and defray publication costs. 10% of these fees will be donated to Minary's Dream Alliance, a 501(c)3 non-profit organization which transforms the lives of youth, families, and communities through education, resource development, and community engagement with programs in youth mentorship and support. The editors will personally match the donation (up to $500).

Submissions are only accepted via Submittable (except for currently incarcerated writers). Please familiarize yourself with our mission statement and guidelines before submitting.

Please send no more than 5 poems, 5 flash prose pieces, or 20 total pages of prose uploaded as a single file.

Simultaneous submissions are fine. If any of the submission is accepted elsewhere, please notify us by adding a note to your submission in Submittable. We will happily consider the remaining work in your original submission.

Use the comments section to enter a cover letter, then click submit. Please include contact information, including email address and phone number.

Cherry Tree does not allow any revisions to submissions during the reading period. Rest assured that typos and other minor mistakes will not deter us from accepting otherwise outstanding work. If your work is accepted, you will be allowed to make necessary corrections prior to publication.

You are able to withdraw a part of your submission (a poem or flash piece, for instance) by making a note in Submittable. If you want to withdraw an entire piece, you are welcome to submit again in that genre, though each submission will incur a separate reading fee.

We welcome work in translation that has not yet been published in English. It is the translator’s responsibility to secure all necessary permissions before submitting.

Submissions that make use of an AI tool must also meet the standard of significant imaginative or intellectual transformation as laid out in fair use laws. We require that submissions which use AI be accompanied by a description of the process, include links to source material, delineate clearly human and AI contributions, and be as explicit as possible about the origins of the AI in question. Work entirely generated by AI will not be accepted. We generally will reject on the grounds of plagiarism a work which borrows too heavily from other published authors.

If your work has been published in a previous issue of Cherry Tree, please wait 2 years before submitting again. For example, if you were published in Issue 9, please wait to submit again until we are reading work for Issue 11.

Further queries may be directed to managing editor Amber Taliancich:

 

 aallen5@washcoll.edu 

 

All submissions will receive a response by the end of November.

Writers currently incarcerated may send paper submissions to:

 

James Allen Hall c/o Rose O'Neill Literary House, 

300 Washington Ave., 

Chestertown, MD 21620

 

 or via email to:

lit_house@washcoll.edu

 

Please state this in your letter.

Current Washington College students and those who have graduated in the past 4 years are not eligible to submit to Cherry Tree.

Subscriptions are $15 for 1 issue (1 year) and $26 (2 years). Back issues are available for $10 each, or $25 for a bundle of 3. Cherry Tree can be purchased at our online store, where we also sell letterpress broadsides, chapbooks, and swag items.

Call for Nonfiction Submissions on Theme of: "When the Atoms Reassemble": Interim

When the Atoms Reassemble

 

Ours is a time of atomization and peripheral living. Societal pillars like education, marriage, parenthood, the nuclear family, organized religion, media and political affiliation do not mean what they did even a decade ago. As these institutions disintegrate, distraction stages a glut of possibility and impaired focus. Technology has altered traditional concepts of reality to the point that one must wonder: will genius spring forth, or will beast slouch into the future?

 

Interim seeks creative nonfiction that measures individual experience against these shifting frameworks. How are our communities changing and why? How can we cope with such shifts? Which aspects of contemporary life should we resist or reinvent? Which should we seek to preserve? Where can we find meaning in an ever-shifting world? Is our capacity for hope enough to carry us? Most importantly, how can we reassemble?

 

Your response to our shared condition is welcomed, whether through memoir, personal essay, lyric essay, braided essay, narrative, experimental/hybrid form, or literary journalism. Essays chosen will be published in our Winter 2023 Print Issue.

 

All works must be 2,000-5,000 words and comply with MLA format, including style of crediting sources.

 

Submissions will be accepted May 5 - September 1, 2023. 

 

Submit your work here.

Call for Submissions: The Iowa Review

The Iowa Review looks for the best poetry, fiction, and nonfiction being written today and is often pleased to introduce new writers.

Non-contest fiction and poetry manuscripts are welcome from August 1 to October 1 only. Non-contest nonfiction manuscripts are welcome from August 1 to November 1. Unsolicited work that arrives at any other time will not be read. (We also sponsor The Iowa Review Awards, an annual contest for which entries are accepted January 1 through 31.)

As submissions are read anonymously, please do not include your name on the submission document itself. Your name, email, address, and bio can be included in the cover letter.

During the open submission reading period, we accept online submissions via Submittable and paper submissions at the following address:

[Fiction, Poetry, or Nonfiction] Editor

The Iowa Review

308 EPB

University of Iowa

Iowa City, IA 52242

There is a $4 fee to submit online.* We do not consider e-mail submissions.

Paper submissions without a self-addressed, stamped envelope will not be considered.

Work must be previously unpublished in print or online, and, if accepted, must not be published anywhere else before it is published in The Iowa Review (the lead time between acceptance and publication is about a year). Simultaneous submissions are accepted, provided you contact us immediately to withdraw your work if it is accepted for publication elsewhere. We typically respond in one to six months.

The page limit for prose is 25 pages and for poetry is 8 pages (query by e-mail if you have a longer poem). Prose submissions should be double-spaced.

We recommend reading an issue of The Iowa Review before submitting. Ask for us at your local bookstore or library, or purchase a copy here.

Current University of Iowa students are ineligible to submit.

We pay $1.50 per line for poetry ($100 minimum) and $0.08 per word for prose ($100 minimum).

Translations should be submitted according to the guidelines of the original work's genre and addressed to that genre's editor. Translators should have permission from the copyright holder and should include a copy of the original work with their submission.

*Subscribers can now submit online for free! Please use the "for subscribers only" category on Submittable. We check these submitters' names against our subscription list, so please use this category only if you're a current subscriber.

Call for Submissions: Upbeat Tales

Got an original, unpublished story? We would love to feature your upbeat and/or comedic fantasy, science fiction or horror story.

Our submission window is now open and will close on 31st August!

Submissions may be submitted through this form.

Formatting

We accept documents as .doc, .docx or, if you must, .rtf. Please follow Shunn’s modern manuscript format.

Simultaneous Submissions

Submitting to us and others at the same time is not only accepted, but encouraged! We do ask that you notify us as soon as possible if your submission is accepted elsewhere.

Non-speculative fiction

If there is not an element of fantasy, science fiction or horror then we are not the target market for your story.

Multiple Submissions

Please submit one story at a time. Unless otherwise directed, please wait 7 days to submit in the event that your story isn't a good fit.

Payment and Rights

We pay $0.01 per word for original, unpublished fiction. Payment is via PayPal only. We require First Print and Digital rights with a six-month period of exclusivity from the date of publication. All other rights remain with the author.

Reprints

We accept reprints by request only (Although we do intend to change this in the future)

Word Limit

100-6,000 words. We intend to accept an equal number of flash-fiction and short stories.

Downers

We accept less than upbeat tales if they are comedic, but not if they're downers! This includes overt racism, violence, sex, or negative outlooks on humanity.

We also ask you not to send fan fiction, published stories, or tales we've previously rejected.

Visit our website for more information.

Call for Submissions: Nashville Review

Nashville Review seeks to publish the best work we can get our hands on, period. We hope to provide a venue for both distinguished and emerging artists. Most importantly, thank you for giving us a chance to read your work.

Reading Periods

We consider submissions in Fiction, Poetry, Nonfiction, and Translation two times a year—August and February—and typically respond within 4-5 months. We welcome submissions in Art and Comics year-round. Currently, we are not accepting unsolicited reviews or interviews.

General Guidelines

There is no fee to submit and we are proud to pay our contributors: $25 per poem and $100 for prose and art pieces.

Please do not include any personal or contact information on your manuscript. Prose pieces must be double-spaced and paginated. If your poems use white space in a nontraditional way, we recommend submitting in .pdf format. Include a brief cover letter with the title(s) of your piece(s) and a short third-person bio.

All submissions must be previously unpublished.

We encourage simultaneous submissions: if your work is accepted elsewhere, wonderful! Just leave a note via Submittable as soon as possible so we know the piece has been taken. Please submit only once per genre, per reading period, and note that we cap the number of submissions to be considered at 750 per section to ensure a reasonable response time. If we reach our submission cap before the end of the month-long reading period, submissions will close early.

Current and former (within 5 years) students and employees of Vanderbilt University are ineligible to submit.

Please visit our online submissions manager to send us your work. Submissions received via email will not be read.

For questions, please contact the Editors: thenashvillereview@gmail.com

Writing Fellowships: Radcliffe Institute Fellowships

Fellowships of $78,000 each, office space at the Radcliffe Institute, and access to the libraries at Harvard University are given annually to poets, fiction writers, and creative nonfiction writers to allow them to pursue creative projects. Fellows, who are expected to reside in Boston during the fellowship period, which lasts from September through May, also receive $5,000 to cover project expenses.  

Poets who have published a full-length collection or at least 20 poems in magazines or anthologies in the last five years and who are in the process of completing a manuscript are eligible. 

Fiction and creative nonfiction writers who have published one or more books, who have a book-length manuscript under contract for publication, or who have published at least three shorter works are eligible. Writers who are graduate students at the time of application are not eligible. 

For 2024–2025 fellowships, submit up to 10 poems of any length or a short story, a recent book chapter, or an essay totaling no more than 30 pages; contact information for three people who will be asked to supply letters of reference; a curriculum vitae; and a project proposal by September 14. 

There is no entry fee.

Visit the website for the required entry form and complete guidelines.

Harvard University, Radcliffe Institute Fellowships, Byerly Hall, 8 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA 02138. (617) 496-1324.

Writing Competition for Poets Aged 60 and Over: Off the Grid Poetry Prize

The Off the Grid Prize recognizes the work of older poets and highlights important contemporary voices in poetry. Winners receive $1000 and publication, promotion, and distribution of their book in print and audio formats. We are looking for work by poets over sixty, ripened in craft and vision, and sufficiently sprightly to promote their work through readings and networks.

2024 Contest Submission Guidelines

1. The competition is open only to poets aged 60 years or older.

2. Submissions will be open from May 1 to August 31, 2023. The winner will be announced in December of 2023.

3. The winner will receive $1,000 and publication, promotion, and distribution in print and audiobook formats. The entry fee is $25.

4. Manuscripts must be typed, paginated, and at least 50 pages in length. Manuscripts must have a table of contents and include a list of acknowledgments for poems previously published. There should be one title page with the book title only.

5. Do not include your name, or any information that identifies authorship, anywhere in the actual manuscript. All contact information (name, address, phone, email) should be included in the cover letter submitted via Submittable.

6. Individual poems from the manuscript may have been previously published in magazines, anthologies, or chapbooks of less than 35 pages, but the collection as a whole must be unpublished. Previously self-published books are not eligible.

7. Former students of the contest judge may not submit to the contest. Students do not include interactions at short-term residencies or fellowships.

8. Please submit online via Submittable.

9. Send inquiries to info@grid-books.org.

Call for Submissions: Apple Valley Review

The Apple Valley Review is an international online literary journal. It is published semiannually, in the spring and fall of the year. Each issue features a collection of beautifully crafted poetry and prose.

We consider short stories, flash fiction, personal essays/creative nonfiction, poetry, and prose poetry. Please submit work that is original, previously unpublished, and in English. Translations are welcome if permission has been granted.

Manuscripts are read year-round, and there are no fees for submissions. Please send your submission via e-mail. Include your cover letter, a short bio, and the text of your writing in the body of a single e-mail message. We do not open unsolicited attachments. 

Submissions are read year-round. The deadline for any individual issue will be listed on our official Facebook and Twitter pages. Generally, the deadline for the spring issue is March 15, and the deadline for the fall issue is September 15.

Any piece of writing that is sent after the deadline for a particular issue will be considered for the next one. We do not keep a backlog. 

Please expect to wait up to two months for a reply. Whenever possible, though, submissions will receive a reply within two to three weeks. (Response times may be longer during holidays or when the volume of submissions is especially high.)

It is rare, but the responses are sometimes caught by spam or bulk mail filters. To make sure you that you receive our response, adding the e-mail address for submissions to your list of approved senders can be helpful. 

We prefer work that has both mainstream and literary appeal. In other words, please send us work that is both accessible and finely written.

Prose submissions may range from approximately 100 to 4,000 words. Shorter pieces stand a better chance of being published, but we are not strict about word counts and will read and consider slightly longer (or shorter) work.   

Please send only one submission at a time. Follow the guidelines for your particular genre, and unless you are sending hybrid work of some kind, please do not mix genres in the same submission.

This is not currently a paying market. However, all work published in the Apple Valley Review during a given calendar year will be considered for the annual Apple Valley Review Editor’s Prize. There is no separate application process for the prize. From 2006 to the 2022, the prize was $100 and a gift of a book of poetry, fiction, or essays.

Please note that we do not publish scripts, book reviews, author interviews, nonfiction articles, or research papers; true genre fiction (though literary pieces with genre elements are welcome); work that is scholarly or critical, inspirational, or intended for children; erotica or work containing explicit language; or anything that is particularly violent or disturbing.

These are purely editorial preferences. Work that is not a fit here may be perfect for another market.      

If your work is accepted for publication, especially if there are any questions about the formatting of your work, we may ask you to send it to us in a Word attachment (.doc or .docx). In the meantime, please do not send any unsolicited attachments.  

Please send your work via email to: 

Leah Browning, Editor, at editor[at]leahbrowning[dot]net (Change [at] to @ and [dot] to. )