Category: Call Type

Events / Flash / Magazine / Pro / Reprints Allowed

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Taking Submissions: Story Unlikely Magazine 2025 Window

Deadline: September 29th, 2025
Payment: 8 cents per word, 2 cents per word for reprints
Theme: Action/adventure, general, fiction/narrative nonfiction, humor/comedy/satire, speculate (fantasy, sci fi, horror, magic realism, cyberpunk), memoir, western, romance, alternate history, suspense/thriller, mystery/crime, literary, and any cross/hybrid genres.
Note: Reprints Welcome

Submissions to our magazine run annually from February 2nd through September 29th

Why submit to us?
– WE PAY WRITERS FAIRLY. It’s hard work writing good stories, and you deserve to get paid. Or maybe you don’t and you’re just duping us? Regardless, we pay 8 cents a word (with a $500 cap), and 2 cents a word for reprints.
– NO SUBMISSION FEES. Nobody’s getting rich off $3 per submission, but paying money just for the privilege of receiving a form letter rejection is the worst. (Costs of running an E-zine aside) We’re going to go ahead and coin a phrase right here and now – ‘Write privilege’, get it? Of course, you do.
– GET YOUR WORK IN FRONT OF A LARGE AND GROWING AUDIENCE. Our aim is fixed on telling good stories, period, and because of that we have built a massive readership from all over the globe. Want to get your stories out to more than just dear old nana? Then you’ve come to the right place.
– REASONABLE TURN-AROUND TIME. If you haven’t heard from us within 90 days, then your story was rejected. Rejections stink – we get it – but its better than forever waiting and wondering.

– WORKABILITY. Is that the right term? Well, we’re going with it. Unlike large publishers who view authors as just a number, we actually work with you to help present the story in its best possible light. We do, however, expect reciprocity; Story Unlikely is comprised of volunteers who are by nature team players. If you’re an inflexible my way or the highway type – or even worse, an unbearable ideologue – then consider this a premature breakup. No really, it’s us, not you.
– GET ILLUSTRATED. We illustrate ALL stories we publish, and we think we’re doing a pretty bang-up job with that. You can learn more about our artists at Design Unlikely.
– GET REVIEWED. Although we’re not genre specific, since we’re a professional paying magazine, Tangent Online reviews any SF&F (loosely defined) stories we publish. Your story might even make their Annual Recommended Reading List.
– Still NOT CONVINCED? Then listen to a word from our CFO – who The Office fans may recognize – to our editor-in-chief on every writer’s bane: rejection. Yes, that’s a watchable video below, and you’ll find more of them (with other cheeky celebrities) littered throughout our site.

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Anthology / Contributor's Copy / Events / Flat Amount

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Taking Submissions: Sherlock Holmes: A Year of Mystery 1889 & 1890

Deadline: Deadline for proposals is April 30th, 2025. Submission deadline for stories is June 30th, 2025.
Payment: $125 dollars and a contributor’s copy
Theme: Sherlock Holmes stories that are canonical in nature and fit the timeline below.

“When I glance over my notes and records of the Sherlock Holmes cases between the years ’82 and ’90, I am faced by so many which present strange and interesting features that it is no easy matter to know which to choose and which to leave.” – Dr. Watson

Synopsis: The year 1889 was a particularly busy one for Holmes with a number of cases including The Hound (Sept. 25-Oct. 20); “The Beryl Coronet” (Feb. 19-20); “The Man with the Twisted Lip” (June 18-19);  “The Naval Treaty” (Aug. 1); “Cardboard Box” (Aug. 31- Sept. 2); “The Engineer’s Thumb.” (Sept. 7-8);  “Crooked Man” (Sept. 11-12);  and “Blue Carbuncle) (Dec. 27). Although things slowed a bit in 1890, prominent cases included “Copper Beeches” (April 5-20); “Silver Blaze” (Sept. 25-30) and “The Red-Headed League” (Oct. 9-11). But what other cases did our heroes encounter in these years? Find out in  Sherlock Holmes: A Year of Mysteries – 1889 &  Sherlock Holmes: A Year of Mysteries – 1890.

Submission Guidelines: The stories must be Canonical in nature and fit with the timeline. Holmes and Watson should act like they do in the original stories. As you can see above, a number of the original cases from this period are specifically dated, so please bear that in mind when you are writing your story.

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Events / Flash / Magazine / Semipro

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Taking Submissions: Mythaxis April 2025 Submission Period (Early Listing)

Submission Window: April 23rd-30th, 2025
Payment: €0.01 per word, with a €20 minimum.
Theme: Diverse sci-fi and fantasy fiction.

We are open to submissions within the following periods:

  • January 23rd-30th
  • April 23rd-30th
  • July 23rd-30th
  • October 23rd-30th

Submissions received outside of these dates will unfortunately be lost and therefore not responded to. When open, we seek and offer the following:

  • Length: 1,000-5,000 words. These are firm limits. Shorter or longer works will be considered, but the further a story goes outside these bounds the more it will need to impress.
  • Compensation: €0.01 per word, with a €20 minimum. Please be aware that payment is via PayPal only.

If you do not receive an acknowledgment within 24 hours of submission, please get in touch. We aim to accept or reject within 14 days of acknowledgment, but rl (real life) and rl (reading load) can get in the way. If you do not hear from us after 30 days, feel free to query.

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Artwork / Events / Flash / Flat Amount / Magazine / Non-fiction / Poetry / Reprints Allowed / Semipro

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Taking Submissions: Trollbreath Magazine April 2025 Window

Submission Window: April 1st- 30th, 2025
Payment: Fiction: 4 cents per word for original works, and 1/2 cent per word for reprints. Poetry: $25 flat fee for any poem. Non-Fiction: $40. $150 for cover artwork.
Theme: Speculative fiction, poetry, and non-fiction of all kinds with a particular fondness for slipstream and fabulism in all their delightful forms

Trollbreath Magazine is a journal of speculative fiction, poetry, and non-fiction, publishing electronic issues on a quarterly schedule. Our interests are as varied as the endless amount of genres, from dark fantasy to hope punk to surrealism, and everything in between. We have a particular fondness for slipstream and fabulism in all their delightful forms, but what motivates us most are great stories by wonderful authors eager to share their visions of the past, the future, the in between, and everything that lies outside the margins. Coloring beyond the lines encouraged. Feel free to review our already published stories and poetry to get an idea of what we like.

Stories, poems and articles will be available at the beginning of the quarter to paying members. Web Memberships give the subscriber the opportunity to read the issue on our website; eBook Memberships provide the additional right to download the issue in PDF or epub file format(s). Over the course of the quarter, a new story will be released from the paywall every Friday to the those without subscriptions, until all stories are available to the public.

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Anthology / Contributor's Copy / Events / Flash / Semipro

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Taking Submissions: Untitled Creature Feature Anthology

Deadline: April 30th, 2025
Payment: 1 cent per word and a contributors copy
Theme: Creature Feature with the premise of situations where something is being sought out by a person/group.

My first foray into horror was creature features. Growing up, I loved movies that involved monsters: Them!, Godzilla, The Birds, Swamp Thing, Creature from the Black Lagoon, The Fly, and many more. Pair that with my background in anthropology and biology, and it’s a Petri dish of ingredients bound to spawn new terrors. What better way to celebrate the second year of Inky Bones Press than to publish an anthology based on the subjects that inspired me to both love and write horror. I can’t wait to read your twists and interpretations of the requirements lurking below.

What horrors will you unleash?

Theme:

Situations where something is being sought out by a person/group. They could be grave robbers, treasure hunters, archaeologists, cryptozoologists, entomologists, biologists, hide-and-seek fanatics, anything you choose—as long as their plans go awry. Get weird and creative!

Must Include:

  • Bones: you can mention the word itself or be more specific. Ex: spine, skull, vertebrae, ribs, skeleton
  • A creature of your choice: tiny, monstrous, an alien—just make sure it’s scary!

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Anthology / Contributor's Copy / Events / Flash / Flat Amount / Reprints Allowed

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Taking Submissions: Strange Legacy: 2025

Deadline: April 30th, 2025
Payment: $20 and a contributor copy for US authors or $35 for non-US authors
Theme: “Classic” monsters creature feature story (think all of the old Universal Monsters for inspiration.)
Note: Reprints welcome

Strange Legacy: 2025 (Creature Feature) is actually a continuation of the Strange Aeon anthology series. We are going in a slightly different direction this year thematically with a bit of a break from purely cosmic horror and focusing instead on the creatures, both traditional and original. The editorial style will remain the same. As usual, these style preferences apply to gore and sex as well: think early Weird Tales, no excessive language or explicit sexual references. (You do not have to remove all profanity from your submission—I can read around it—but, if your story is accepted, you will be required to remove it from the final version.)

The theme of this year’s anthology is the “classic” monster story—from old favorites like vampires and werewolves to Lovecraftian creatures [1] to the byproducts of insane science experiments. That being said, please send anything you consider a good story. Feel free to query for any questions. If you are planning to write a story especially for this anthology, by all means query the idea first.

I am especially interested in stories of mad science, monster-based horror, weird western, and stories that “peel the onion.” Indeed, I cannot emphasize strongly enough the need for these categories. Victoriana and Lovecraft era period pieces will have a much harder time finding acceptance.

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Flat Amount / Ongoing Submissions / Online

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Ongoing Submissions: Horrific Scribes

Payment: $25
Theme: Dark short fiction (and some poetry) for all horror subgenres and other genres if it ends up being dark that will be printed online

We are currently accepting submissions ONLY for Horrific Scribes. We are NOT yet accepting submissions for standalone publications such as novellas and novels (please see our plan for such things).

That said, Horrific Scribes is open for submissions! Horrific Scribes will soon be an expanding archive of dark short fiction (and some poetry) by various authors who share the Horrific Scribblings imprint’s dedication to the provocative, scary, and strange. We’re looking for dark fiction, mostly horror (all subgenres, bloodless to extreme, nothing off limits as long as there really is a good story and it’s not driven by hate, e.g. racism, homophobia, etc.) but also the horror-adjacent, e.g. dark fantasy and dark sci-fi but also surreal and experimental work with dark edges. However you’d classify it, it should be unconventional, challenging, and worth thinking about.

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Artwork / Events / Flash / Flat Amount / Magazine / Poetry

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Taking Submissions: Thema: I Wish I’d Said That

Deadline: July 1st, 2025
Payment: short story, $25; nonfiction/essay, $25, short-short piece under 1000 words, $10; poem, $10; artwork/photography, $25 for cover, $10 for interior page display.
Theme: I Wish I’d Said That

Upcoming premises (target themes) and deadlines for submission [postmarked]:

The Lost Sock (March 1, 2025)

ALL SHORT STORIES, ESSAYS, POEMS, PHOTOGRAPHS and ART MUST RELATE TO ONE OF THE PREMISES SPECIFIED ABOVE.

NOTE: Previously published pieces are welcome, provided that the submission fits the theme and that the author owns the copyright.

The premise (target theme) must be an integral part of the story, not necessarily the central theme but not merely incidental. NOTE: Stories longer than 20 double-spaced typewritten pages will not be considered. Indicate premise (target theme) on title page. Be sure to Indicate target theme in cover letter or on first page of manuscript. Include self-addressed, stamped envelope (SASE) with each submission. Rejected manuscripts unaccompanied by an SASE will not be returned. Response time: 3 months after premise deadline. NO READER’S FEE.

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