Author: Stuart Conover

Events / Flash / Online / Pro

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Taking Submissions: Anomaly May 2025 Window

Submission Window: May 1st – 7th, 2025
Payment: 8 cents per word
Theme: Science fiction stories under 300 words

We open from the 1st-7th of each month, beginning April 2025.

What we want: Anomaly is interested in science fiction stories under 300 words in length, for publication on their Patreon, with the right to collect stories into a future anthology. We’re looking for dark and disruptive stories that have strong emotional resonance. We like stories that stick with us after reading, that get us thinking about the twisted use of technologies, the way the world may be, or how characters might react to an evolving technological future.

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Events / Flash / Online

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Taking Submissions: Short Story Substack May 2025 Window

Submission Window: May 1st – 31st, 2025
Payment: $100 for the chosen story + 50% of subscription revenue
Theme: Any genre, short story

Mission = Revive the art of the short story, support artists, and produce something wonderful.

Payout = Base Pay of $100 for the chosen story + 50% of subscription revenue to be sent by Paypal, Zelle, or check.

Wait, you mean if this substack gets thousands of subscribers, the winner would get thousands of dollars?

Yes! The New Yorker pays roughly $7,500 per story and I sincerely hope to go way past that.

What does the timeline look like?

Submit stories by the end of the month, winner to be announced on the 15th. There is ONE story that wins and receives the full payout.

Where do I send submissions?
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Artwork / Events / Flash / Flat Amount / Magazine / Poetry / Reprints Allowed / Semipro

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Taking Submissions: NonBinary Review #41

Deadline: August 1st, 2025
Payment: 1 cent per word for fiction, $10 for poetry, $25 for artwork or $50 for cover artwork
Theme: Solarpunk
Note: Reprints Welcome

NonBinary Review is currently open for submissions on the theme of SOLARPUNK.

We want your rusting Teslas still chugging along for a hundred years. Your wooden bicycles pulling hitches rigged with wind turbines. Your crumbling brutalist towers, softened by time, now home to moss, mushrooms, and grizzly bears.

Solarpunk is not just about sustainability, it is about adaptation, resilience, and the beauty of a world where humanity and nature thrive together. If you are looking for inspiration, think Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers; Studio Ghibli’s Princess Mononoke and Castle in the Sky; or the quiet satisfaction of making coffee with a Chemex, dumping the used grounds in your compost, and watching the worms enjoy their breakfast too.

We are NOT looking for “climate change is a myth, stop worrying!” stories, sexual coming-of-age narratives, or anything that does not fit within the speculative genre.

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Events

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Taking Submissions: Spook Hollow: Tales of Ozark Horror

Deadline: July 31st, 2025
Payment: $50 and a contributor’s copy.
Theme: Horror stories set in the Ozark mountains

Calling all Ozark writers, storytellers, folklorists, and tale collectors!

Parlor Ghost Press, an imprint of Watertower Hill Publishing (publishers of 𝘏𝘰𝘶𝘴𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘏𝘢𝘶𝘯𝘵𝘴, 𝘏𝘰𝘴𝘱𝘪𝘵𝘢𝘭 𝘰𝘧 𝘏𝘢𝘶𝘯𝘵𝘴, and 𝘏𝘰𝘵𝘦𝘭 𝘰𝘧 𝘏𝘢𝘶𝘯𝘵𝘴), is taking submissions for our upcoming anthology, 𝘚𝘱𝘰𝘰𝘬 𝘏𝘰𝘭𝘭𝘰𝘸: 𝘛𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘴 𝘰𝘧 𝘖𝘻𝘢𝘳𝘬 𝘏𝘰𝘳𝘳𝘰𝘳, edited by Heather Daughrity, to be released February 2026.

What we are looking for: horror stories set in the Ozark mountains–either your own take on a story from Ozark folklore or an original tale featuring Ozark locations/atmosphere/beliefs/etc.
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Artwork / Events / Other / Pay / Reviews

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Taking Submissions: Lizzie Borden Anthology

Deadline: June 1st, 2025
Payment: $10 and a contributors copy
Theme: New and unique takes on the legends and realities of the Lizzie Borden story

Everyone knows the legend of Lizzie Borden, especially the dark nursery rhyme…

 

Lizzie Borden took an axe

Gave her mother 40 whacks.

When she saw what she had done,

Gave her father 41

Riverdale Avenue Books has teamed up with the Historical Lizzie Borden house to put together an anthology of stories, under the direction of award-winning horror author Sèphera Girón, who has visited the house multiple times over the past few decades.

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Contributor's Copy / Flat Amount / Novel / Royalties

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Lefthand Path Press Is Open To Novel Submissions

Payment: $1000.00 to $2000.00 cash Royalty Advances, industry standard or better royalty rates and  a big box-o-books (22 free author copies)
Theme: Strong elements of Horror and/or Dark Fiction as well as strong characters and character driven storylines

Lefthand Path Press is a new horror and dark fiction publisher with big plans. We will be launching our publishing house along with our awesome upcoming website later this year, probably close to Halloween.

While we are gearing up for the launch, we ate still looking for one or two incredible new novels.

 

We are currently open to submissions for NOVELS only.

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Anthology / Events / Flat Amount / Royalties

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Taking Submissions: Search for the Any Key

Submission Window: May 1st – August 29th, 2025
Payment: $15.00 plus equal share of 50% of the anthology’s royalties.
Theme: Action/adventure mixed with any drama, can’t use a physical key, the why of the search should be the most important part

This will be mostly action/adventure, but can be placed in any time period, on other planets or any type of setting. All genres accepted and may contain humor, drama, romance, etc. Diverse characters welcome, human or otherwise.

The catch – no traditional keys accepted. If the characters don’t find the key, that’s okay.

Example – on a certain TV show, characters were searching for forgiveness and the key to enter was tears of regret. Another film had a key as part of a puzzle box which opened several artifacts.

Please think outside the box when writing these stories. The Why of the search is the most important point.

ALL writers are encouraged to submit. Doesn’t matter if you’re a pro with years of credits, a beginner just starting out, or a teenager – please feel free to send the editor a story. In your cover email, please tell the editor a bit about yourself and a quick one-line synopsis of the story. Include genre. If experimental, please explain the type or how so the editor doesn’t edit out the form or reject it out of hand.

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Articles

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Eye Health in Horror Stories

In horror, few images unsettle quite like those involving the eyes. Whether it’s the act of seeing something terrible or losing the ability to see at all, eye-related imagery has long been a staple in the genre. As museum specialist Aubrey Minshew noted in an American Academy of Ophthalmology article, “having something strange or violent happen to someone’s eyes is the quickest way to make an audience feel frightened or uneasy.”

 

Filmmakers and horror writers have long understood this instinctive reaction. Consider the notorious scene in Stanley Kubrick’s adaptation of the novel A Clockwork Orange, where the protagonist’s eyelids are forcibly held open with a lid specula while he undergoes aversion therapy. Or the 2008 horror film The Eye, where a young woman’s corneal transplant causes her to see terrifying visions inherited from her deceased donor’s psychic premonitions. In this article, we’ll explore why eye health is such a compelling theme in horror fiction—and look at some chilling examples where eye health (or the lack of it) takes center stage.

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