Call for Submissions: Spank the Carp

Spank the Carp 

Submissions Guidelines

We publish fiction, poetry, and creative non-fiction, from any author including as yet unpublished writers or writers with only a few publications under their belt. See below, but also check out the editor's interview on Six Questions For and on Duotrope.

PREFERRED CONTENT
Trite but true, the best way to see if your work will be a good fit for SPANK the CARP is to read what's on the site.

Here's a link to Past Ponds, most recent first.
​Here's a link to the Editor's work published on StC.

Any genre, including hard science fiction, though PLEASE no fantasy, erotica, or sappy romance. Humor is good.

Flash Fiction (around 800 words or less).

Short stories (around 5000 words or less).

Poetry that is lyrical, where you've paid as much attention to the sound of the words as to their meaning.

​Free verse is okay as long as it doesn't read the same with or without line breaks. Same goes with poetry submissions in general.
​
Concrete or Shape poetry definitely encouraged.

Please no excerpts from larger works, for example a chapter from a memoir, and no chapbooks in full or in part.

NEW: Creative non-fiction: Same word limit as short stories. All types except biography, and Content Notes below apply.

Regardless, we prefer works that cut to the chase, that are pithy, and have a sense of importance (without overdoing it). And by that we mean, you wrote something you feel needed to be written and put out there in the world.

CONTENT NOTES
Please DO NOT SUBMIT anything erotic, sexual, pornographic, or portraying gratuitous violence. Think PG-13, maybe PG-18. Also do not submit political or religious screeds disguised as fiction or poetry. Sensitive thought-provoking actual fiction that makes a general religious or political point, like something utopian or dystopian is okay, just no preaching. It won't even be considered. Same goes with anything erotic, sexual, pornographic, or violent.

Anything you submit must be your own original creation. It must never have been published on any website or print publication that you do not personally own. If it has appeared only on your own blog or website or your own self-published printed material it is considered self-published. In this case, as long as you are the sole copyright owner, we will accept your work for consideration for reprint.

NOTE REGARDING AI: Please do not submit any work where you used AI in any fashion (other than say 'smart' type ahead/grammar checking) If you're not sure, please add a note to your cover email regarding your use.

Carpwork Gallery ARTWORK and PHOTOS
I'm looking for images and photos that depict Carp and Koi in artistic and natural settings and have a strong artistic element. See the Carpwork Gallery for examples. A one sentence credit will appear with your image or photo and a caption that you should provide. Submission process, compensation, and terms are the same as for written work.

NOTE: When submitting images, please include a creative caption.

SUBMISSION PROCESS - PLEASE NOTE
All stories must be submitted via email by the original poet/author - no third party submissions please. We will respond as quickly as possible. Turnaround time is approximately 60 days.
NOTE: By submitting your work you agree to the Terms and Agreements below as well as the note above regarding AI.

Please submit one short story, one flash, or up to three poems at a time. Simultaneous submissions are fine but please inform us if your submission is accepted for publication elsewhere.

​Please no resubmissions.

Please include:
- In the subject please include the type of piece you are submitting, for example: Submission - Poetry
​- In the body of your email: Your full name,
- A two sentence max description of your work,
- How you heard of SPANK the CARP (optional).
- Attach a docx, doc, or rtf formatted document (no PDFs please). For visual poetry, png or jpg only.
- Do not send a formal bio. If your work is accepted we will contact you for a formal bio. DO however tell us whether you have been published before.

Email to:

the_carp (at) spankthecarp.com

with the word Submission as the subject.

Voluntary TIP JAR Submissions: For $4 you will be guaranteed a response within 2 weeks, with feedback. This is totally voluntary and does not affect the editor's decision. Details and signup are here.

Compensation
No compensation can be offered at this time. If accepted, your work will appear prominently on the home page, with a link to its own page. This can easily be linked to from a personal or other website. Also, since we seek quality over quantity, in the issue in which your work appears, you will appear with only a few other authors and not buried in a sea of screen clutter.

Writing Competition: The Lost Kite Editions Chapbook Prize

LOST KITE CHAPBOOK PRIZE

The Lost Kite Editions Chapbook Prize is awarded annually to a chapbook of any genre (fiction, poetry, creative nonfiction, etc.). Collaborative, hybrid, and multi-genre submissions are also welcome. The winning author will receive a $1,500 award and 20 contributor copies. The winning chapbook will be published in spring, 2027.

The contest will be open until May 15th, 2026. We accept submissions from all writers, but make a concerted effort to welcome submissions from incarcerated writers. To that end, incarcerated writers will be welcome to submit until August 31st, 2026.

The winning manuscript will be selected by Hanif Abdurraqib.​

Guidelines

• We accept submissions through Submittable.

• Please do not include your name anywhere within the manuscript itself. Along with your manuscript, please submit a cover letter with a brief biographical note and, if desired, a statement or description that contextualizes your submitted work. While we may consider publishing work under a pseudonym, please include your legal name in your cover letter.

• Chapbooks should be between 20 and 50 pages in length (this does not include title, section break, or acknowledgement pages). We won't turn you away if you are a few pages over or under, but please stay close to that limit.

• Manuscripts containing individual stories, essays, poems, or excerpts that have been previously published online or in print are eligible; please simply note previously published work in your cover letter. If your manuscript has been previously published as a whole (including publication with a press, self-publication, online/digital publication, and publication in a small, limited-edition print run), however, then the manuscript is not eligible.

• The submission fee is $5.

• Simultaneous submissions are accepted. Please withdraw your manuscript(s) from consideration immediately if you plan to publish it elsewhere.

• You are welcome to submit multiple manuscripts. The $5 submission fee will apply to each manuscript submitted.

• We do not accept work generated with artificial intelligence.

Accommodations for incarcerated writers

• Incarcerated writers and those submitting on their behalf are welcome to submit by postal mail:

   P.O. Box 6037
  Minneapolis, MN 55406
   
  or by email:
   submissions@lostkite.org

• Typed submissions are preferred, but we will accept handwritten submissions from incarcerated writers.

• The $5 submission fee is waived for incarcerated writers and those submitting on their behalf.

• Incarcerated writers are welcome to submit until August 31st, 2026.

Writing Competition: Solstice 2026 Annual Literary Contest

Prizes: $1,000 (fiction), $500 (poetry), $500 (nonfiction), $500 (graphic lit)

Entry fee: $20

Deadline: June 1

Soltice Annual Literary Contest  

Rules & Guidelines

Cover sheet required with name, address, telephone number and email. Email and/or phone MUST be included to be considered. Please include the cover sheet in the same file as the actual submission. Do not put your name on the manuscript itself. Final judges will be choosing on the basis of the quality of your work. Please indicate the genre of your piece next to the title.

Each entry:

Fiction or Nonfiction: 25-page maximum, double-spaced, 12-point font, .DOC or .DOCX attachment; free-standing excerpts from books also accepted.

Poetry: 3-poem maximum, 12-point font, .DOC or .DOCX attachment.

Graphic Lit: Original artwork, multiple panels (no single image pieces), 1-6 pages preferred, maximum 8-10 pages, in JPG/PDF format.

You may submit more than once during the contest period but must pay a separate fee for each entry.

You may submit simultaneously elsewhere, but please contact us immediately if accepted by another journal.

We will not accept previously published work. Solstice has first publication rights, but copyright reverts to you upon publication. After the piece is published in our Summer Awards Issue, we will publish the piece in our Archives. All winners, finalists, and editors’ choice will be cited in future advertisements and announcements.

Solstice has a zero tolerance policy for AI generated submissions of any genre. Any individuals found to be submitting AI generated work will have that work rejected. Any reading fees sent to Solstice will not be refunded on the basis of rejection.

If you won last year’s contest, you must skip a year before resubmitting to the contest, but we encourage you to submit work to Solstice for general publication.

We will announce the winners, finalists, and editors’ choice approximately 6-8 weeks after the contest deadline.

After announcing the winners, finalists, and editors’ choice, all contest submissions will be automatically considered for standard publication unless you indicate otherwise.

The $20.00 entry fee must be paid online at the time of entry.

 We accept online submissions only through Submittable. No emails please.

Call for Submissions on Theme of "Oasis": Thin Air Magazine

 

Thin Air Magazine

Submissions for Thin Air 33 (Print) are OPEN 

Deadline: Oct. 18, 2026

Thin Air Online is open year-around!

Theme: Oasis–

Oasis is defined in Merriam Webster as the following: a fertile or green area in an arid region (such as a desert)
something that provides refuge, relief, or pleasant contrast

For Thin Air Magazine’s upcoming issue, we seek to expand upon this notion.

In a turbulent, and at times seemingly desolate world, what is your oasis? Where do you seek shelter, or find comfort? What spaces fill, sustain, and save you? Is your oasis the physical body, spiritual self, home, community, or another source? How does one create sanctuary in the desert of the world?

Alternatively, we consider the conditions that are required to produce the oasis, and subsequently, what surrounds it.

For there to be an oasis, there must first exist a desert. An oasis can only exist when it is surrounded by, or contrasted by, a severe lack of something crucial to survival. What does it mean to be surrounded by a landscape of hostility, scarcity, or exclusion? In other words, what is your desert, and what drives you to find your oasis? Hunger? Thirst? Reprieve? Or is it something else entirely?

With this in mind, we wonder what else the oasis can represent.

What if the oasis can be a form of resistance? We think of the various forms of sanctuaries that are created in the midst of violence, fear, and the ever escalating political tensions: what oases have you noticed forming in the face of danger, desolation, and inaccessibility?

As creatives, we know that writing may even serve as an oasis and constant. In your creative, safe, and bold spaces, we encourage you to write all that you feel, see, and know of these oasis possibilities.

Submitting comes with a $3.00 reading fee. In an effort to minimize barriers and encourage work from marginalized writers, we will wave this fee upon request at our discretion.

Please review our general and genre-specific guidelines below:

• We accept fiction and nonfiction up to 3,000 words.

• We accept up to three poems in one document totaling five or fewer pages.

• We only consider unpublished work. Please do not submit material previously published in anthologies, chapbooks, online, or on personal websites (including FB, Twitter/X, Insta, Flickr, blogs, etc.)

• We accept simultaneous submissions. If any part of your submission is selected for publication elsewhere, please notify us immediately using Submittable.

• In an effort to encourage submissions from both established and emerging writers with diverse voices, we read all submissions blind. Do not include any identifying information within your submission.

• Thin Air Magazine does not accept work from anyone affiliated with Northern Arizona University within the last 7 years.

• Thin Air Magazine aims to respond to your submission within 3-5 months. If you submit April-August, know that we likely won’t be able to respond until September when school is back in session. We appreciate your patience! Our staff is a volunteer-graduate-student-run magazine and we strive to read every submission carefully before making a decision.

Formatting Specifications:

• Please use Times New Roman, 12pt., double-spaced, 1 inch margins for all submissions except poetry, which should remain single-spaced.

• INCLUDE page numbers and a word count at the top of your manuscript.

• DO NOT INCLUDE your name/identifiers in your manuscript.

• If the unique format of your submission is critical to the piece, please feel free to keep your unique formatting.

• Note that we may have to alter format for printing due to physical restraints and requirements.

Copyright: We ask for first North American serial rights for work published in Thin Air Magazine. Copyright is retained by the author at all times.

Submission Expectations

Thin Air has a responsibility to build a safe, diverse community for contributors and readers alike. We have no tolerance for writing that is racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, ableist, body shaming, Islamophobic, anti-semitic, or in any other way cruel. Your writing may, and in fact is encouraged to, grapple productively with these subjects. Do not send us unchecked bigotry or hate speech.

Acknowledgement

Thin Air is run by NAU graduate students on the Kinłání (occupied Flagstaff, Arizona) campus. We sit at the base of the Dook'o'oosłííd, on homelands sacred to Native Americans throughout the region. We strive to acknowledge and commemorate the indigenous past, present, and future of Kinłání.

Accountability

Thin Air is not and will never be perfect, but that doesn’t mean we won’t try. We strive to be an active voice for universal equity, and we commit to using our position in the literary world to uplift historically underrepresented voices and fight for the decolonization of literary magazines. If you notice we have missed the mark on anything, no matter how small, please reach out to us at:

thinairlitmag@gmail.com 

We thank you for your help on our path to becoming our best selves.

Thin Air Online

Thin Air Online is looking for your poems, art, fiction, hybrid works, tiny films, nonfiction, humor, songs, paintings, collages, interpretative dances, jokes, audio projects, and other precious creations. We especially appreciate submissions that don’t exactly fit into printed mediums.

NAU’s Thin Air literary website is invites its university community to submit their work. Submissions are open to all. Thin Air Online looks particularly for work that is playful but serious, in form, in content, however that might apply to you. Please do not submit seasonal work.

There is no reading fee for TAO, but we carefully select our publications. So submit away! If you want to support our work, please donate.

Please review our general and genre-specific guidelines for TAO below:

• Include a title in the title line.

• Clearly label your submission’s genre (Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Visual Art, Genre-Defying/Hybrid).

• Clearly write your submission's title.

• Written submissions must be 5,000 words or less.

• Submit poems in batches up to 3.

• Video and audio pieces must be shorter than 10 minutes.

• We only consider unpublished work. Please do not submit material previously published in anthologies, chapbooks, online, or on personal websites (including FB, Twitter/X, Insta, Flickr, blogs, etc.)

• We accept simultaneous submissions. If any part of your submission is selected for publication elsewhere, please notify us immediately using Submittable.

• In an effort to encourage submissions from both established and emerging writers with diverse voices, Thin Air Online reads all submissions blind. Do not include any identifying information within your submission.

• Thin Air Online aims to respond to your submission within 3-5 months. If you submit April-August, know that we likely won’t be able to respond until September when school is back in session. We appreciate your patience! Our staff is a volunteer-graduate-student-run magazine and we strive to read every submission carefully before making a decision.

Copyright: We ask for first North American online serial rights. If your work is selected for Thin Air Online, we ask for exclusive online rights for 60 days from the date of publication. Copyright is retained by the author at all times.

Thank you for submitting!

Submit your work here. 

Call for Submissions on Theme of "Kurdistan": The Markaz Review

 

The Markaz Review will accept simultaneous submissions, provided you inform us upon submitting your completed ms. If your work is accepted elsewhere, please contact us immediately. We use DUOSUMA for submissions.

TMR 60 • KURDISH ISSUE • July 2026

Kurdistan is an enigma, sometimes even to its own people, who are all too often forced to suppress their language and heritage, as a result of laws imposed from without, by colonial states determined to extinguish any Kurdish revolution, or through migration to the diaspora. In any event, the consequence is often the same: Kurdistan fading into a distant memory until it’s reduced to the second hyphenation of their identity. Through our Kurdish-themed issue, TMR is looking to embrace this dissonance, and in so doing, reject historical portrayals of Kurdistan.

The prevailing narrative has long been that having a common enemy should be the connective tissue that binds Kurds together. But that’s never been true. Inherently, Kurds are a nomadic people. The rough terrains of the mountains have created deep linguistic shifts from one regional dialect to another; dialects so pronounced that Kurds themselves see them as separate languages. So where does that leave identity? What does it mean to be Kurdish when the identity itself fractures the moment you try to define it?

TMR invites your responses to these questions, in whatever form inspires you to create — essays or creative nonfiction, short stories, poetry, interviews, reported pieces, art, photography, film/video, and more. We’re looking for submissions from across the diverse map that is Kurdistan, whether they reflect a vital, shared experience or, conversely, a singularly unique perspective. Our query/submission window opens on April 17, and closes on June 1.

The Markaz Review (TMR) is a nonprofit publication. TMR pays all contributors an honorarium within 30 days of publication. 

Submission link here. 

Call for Submissions: Turn & Work

Turn & Work

Turn & Work is an independent music and literary publication. We believe that a literate, creative subculture is essential for understanding the world we live in. Art is upstream of politics; it shapes people and culture. And somehow, despite all this technology, it’s harder than ever for independent artists to break through.

This site started as a book blog, but it’s evolved to be about more than that: independent music, original short stories, and other great work from around the web.

Because art is work, regardless of medium. It’s hard, it takes time, and it generally doesn’t pay well. It takes guts to share that work with the world and hope that it connects with people.

So, Turn & Work is our way of supporting the people who do that work. It’s a way to show appreciation for the art that’s connected with us and to share it with you.

We hope you find things you love here. If you do, share them widely. If you’ve spent some time here and have something you’d like to share with us, we’d love that too.

It is:

• 3-ish book reviews a week, plus an essentials list of what we think everyone should read

• 4-ish music features a week — reviews, interviews, and Backstory posts, where artists tell their own story in their own words. See some examples, and read the brief

• The Shortlist: curated links to excellent short fiction and creative nonfiction from around the web

• The Setlist: a weekly playlist of new independent music, plus callouts to artists worth your time

• Short Stories: original and reprinted short stories

• Welcome Distractions: the Thursday newsletter. Music, books, links, opinions, and a custom playlist for subscribers who request it

It isn't:

• Pay-for-play. We don’t take money from musicians or writers, directly or indirectly.

• Coverage of artists who already have ten publications writing about them

• “Band X Announces Y.” We don’t republish press releases or repackage announcements as content.

it might be:

Something even better! We’re always looking for people who are serious about something. If you have a beat (a genre, a scene, a love of literature nobody’s covering well) and you want to write about it, we want to hear from you. Guest posts, regular columns, one-offs. No pitching to an anonymous inbos: Email Hugh directly.

Simple rule: we cover things we’d want to find somewhere else. If you think your work belongs here, we want you to reach out. If you want to put someone else’s work on our radar, please do that too.

We don’t take money from artists or authors, directly or indirectly. We’ll happily accept freebies (ARCs, vinyl, or t-shirts have shown up from time to time), but coverage is always at our discretion. We don’t use SubmitHub or any pay-for-play discovery service.

Everything on Turn & Work is written by a human. We only cover work we actually care about.
For publicists and agencies

We work with publicists regularly and we’re always interested in early access to music that we would consider covering. We do reviews, premieres, Backstory posts (artist-written, no interview format), and Q&As. If you’re pitching, email Hugh. If you’re not sure whether it’s a fit, check the New Music features or the Setlist Archive first.

Always open. The only real requirement is that the story is compelling.

What we look for:

What we look for: fiction and creative nonfiction, flash through short story length. No hard minimum or maximum — if it’s over 2,000 words it should have a great hook. Any genre, any style. Reprints are welcome, just be upfront about prior publication. Poetry too, though I lean toward narrative verse that reads like flash fiction.

We don’t accept AI-generated text. If we suspect it’s AI-assisted, it’s a pass.

How to submit:

Send a Word doc with a short bio (one or two sentences). Simultaneous submissions are fine — just let us know if it gets picked up elsewhere. You keep your rights; we ask for first publishing rights only. We aim to respond within a month. No response means no.

Submit your story! 

We cover full albums, EPs, and singles. We lean toward indie rock, post-punk, punk rock, hyperpop, and electronic music with English lyrics — but a compelling song in any genre will get our attention. Check the Setlist Archive or Music Essentials to get a sense of what moves us.

Check the New Music features or the Setlist Archive to see what we dig.

What we look for:

Music that’s a little rough or weird, with a strong emotional core. Extra credit for Canadian and Australian artists.

What to include:

A link to your music (MP3s preferred, streaming is fine), an EPK or basic bio with at minimum your name and where you’re from, lyrics if available. Pre-releases welcome.

How We Cover Music:

Singles from early-stage artists go into Monday Music Posts. EPs and shorter projects get covered in New and Noted. Full features are for albums and EPs with a strong narrative core. Backstory posts are artist-written — no interview format, no Q&A, just the story behind the work in your own words, the more personal the better. We also do interviews and profiles.

Everything we cover during the week lands on the Friday Setlist alongside other new music we’ve found.

Submit your music 

We’re looking for people who are serious about something — a genre, a scene, a corner of literature or music that isn’t getting the coverage it deserves. Guest posts, regular columns, and one-offs all welcome. We don’t pay yet, but I expect that to change in 2026.

Come at US!

Call for Submissions on Theme of "Failure": Ivo Review

Ivo Review 

Open to Submissions for our Fifth Issue on the Theme of FAILURE!

See our Current Calls page for any special submission periods that might be open.

Deadline: July 30, 2026 

What We Look For

We are looking for prose, poetry, fiction, non-fiction, hybrid works, and dramatic works from emerging and established writers from around the world, particularly writers from historically underrepresented communities. We love the concept of narrative - we want to read storytellers telling stories in whatever form that takes for you.

Works should be primarily in English.

We consider simultaneous submissions but if a work is accepted elsewhere please let us know. We will be thrilled for you! We consider reprints but please indicate the original publication so that it can be credited - with a link to the work if possible so that we can also link to that publication.

We love visual art submissions and are always looking for cover art.

We will not consider AI generated work. At this time we are also not considering translations.

How to Submit

For art, please submit one piece that you would like considered for our cover art.

For poetry and flash or micro-fiction, please submit up to five (5) pieces of up to 100 lines for poetry. We consider micro-fiction to be up to 350 words, and flash to be 351 - 1000 words.

For longer works of fiction, non-fiction, or dramatic works please send up to two (2) pieces of up to 3000 words.

For dramatic works, we consider works that would be able to be produced as a 10 minute play or shorter. We love long dramatic monologues, but will also consider ensemble pieces.

Send submissions to:

editorivoreview@gmail.com

The subject line should be the THEME of the issue for which you are submitting work and the CATEGORY of the submission. (Example: LOST - POETRY) Please include a short cover letter with a short 3rd person author's bio in the body of the e-mail and attach submissions in a single .docx attachment.

Submissions that do not follow these simple guidelines will not be read.

Rights and Expectations

You retain all rights to your work. By submitting work to Ivo Review you are granting us the non-exclusive rights to publish your work in our online issues and to continue the display of that work on the online site. You are confirming that you are the author of the submitted work and that you retain the rights to submit it for publication. Works published online in Ivo Review will be considered for future anthologies, and authors will be contacted for permission and with information about payment if we are interested in using your work again in that way. We will promote your work, but we will never attempt to sell your work or to include it in any publication other than the issue in which it was originally published without your permission.

If a piece has not been previously published before Ivo Review, please credit us in any future publications.

At this time, we are not a paying market - though we do hope to be able to correct that soon. We do have every intention of nominating for Pushcart and other prizes including Best Small Fictions, Best Microfiction, and Best of the Net.

We anticipate that we will respond to submissions two to four weeks after the end of the reading period for that issue, but we are a very small operation and so cannot promise that it will not take us a bit longer. If you have not heard from us after six weeks from the end of the reading period for the issue you submitted for, please feel free to contact us for an update. We will not take it personally!