Poetry
Deadline: June 7th, 2025
Payment: Fiction and nonfiction run in the $10-30 range; poetry in the $5-15 range.
Theme: The Uncanny
Our summer edition theme is the uncanny, however you interpret that. What happens when settings look fine — happy, even — on the surface, only for a distortion to be lurking just out of sight? What can the uncanny help us understand about ourselves, our relationships, our communities?
Deadline: August 1st, 2025
Payment: $25.00 – $50.00 for fiction, $5.00 – $10.00 for poetry
Theme: Story must begin with: Her truck took the sharp turns of the mountain road with ease.
Fall:
Her truck took the sharp turns of the mountain road with ease.
Due date: August 1, 2025
We love that writers around the world are inspired by our first lines, and we know that not every story will be sent to us. However, we ask that you do not submit stories starting with our first lines to other journals (or post them online on public sites) until we’ve notified you as to our decision (usually four weeks after the deadline). When the entire premise of the publication revolves around one sentence, we don’t want it to look as if we stole that sentence from another writer. If you have questions, feel free to drop us a line.
Also, we understand that writers may add our first line to a story they are currently working on or have already completed, and that’s cool. But please do not add our first line to a previously published story and submit it to us. We do not accept previously published stories, even if they have been repurposed for our first lines. And, just to be clear, we do not accept simultaneous submissions.
One more thing while I’ve got you here: Writers compete against one another for magazine space, so, technically, every literary magazine is running a contest. There are, however, literary magazines that run traditional contests, where they charge entry fees and rank the winners. We do not – nor will we ever – charge a submission fee, nor do we rank our stories in order of importance. Occasionally, we run contests to help come up with new first lines, or we run fun, gimmicky competitions for free stuff, but the actual journal is not a contest in the traditional sense.
Submission Window: May 1st – August 31st
Payment: Fiction: 2¢ per word for original, 1¢ per word for reprints. Poetry: $20 per original poem and $10 for reprints. Artwork: $100 for issue cover art, $30 for back cover art, and $20 for art used on our site
Theme: Stories and poetry containing elements of science fiction, anarchism, transhumanism, or dystopia.
Note: Reprints Welcome
Radon welcomes short stories and poetry containing elements of science fiction, anarchism, transhumanism, or dystopia.
We publish quality literature the first of every February, June, and October.
Submissions are accepted year-round.
Simultaneous submissions are welcome.
Reprints no longer accepted as of 2025.
AI submissions are not allowed at Radon.
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Deadline: May 31st, 2025
Payment: 8 cents per word and $25-$50 on poetry depending on length
Theme: Cryptids
Call for Submissions: Cryptid Horror – Summer Issue
This summer, we’re hunting monsters—and we want you to join the chase.
Our upcoming issue is diving deep into cryptid horror, where folklore meets fear and the shadows are never empty. From the fog-drenched hollows of Appalachia to the eerie stillness of primeval forests, we’re looking for stories that stir that ancient dread—the kind that makes you glance over your shoulder… just in case.
Whether it’s beasts from local legend or psychological horrors born from the depths of your own personal wilderness, we want your weirdest, wildest, and most chilling creations.
Think: backwoods folklore, eerie encounters, survival nightmares, and twisted myths.
Unleash your inner cryptozoologist and show us what’s hiding just out of sight.
Deadline: July 31st, 2025
Payment: $150
Theme: works of literature that intersect with Taco Bell
My kids make books all the time for fun. Both of them want to be writers and artists when they grow up. I feel like this is my fault. I’ve made it look too fun. They bring me their stacks of pages, begging for the stapler, as if the stapler contains magical powers, as if the act of binding together the book is what makes it real. I staple three neat clicks and I’ve made it look real. Something more real to pretend with, at least.
We are back, pretending to make our literary magazine again. We are the Taco Bell Quarterly, a Prestigious Literary Magazine that is opening for submissions on 4/20/25.
We are looking for prose, poetry, art, and beyond for our eighth issue, which will be available to read for free online, and to buy in print in the late fall. We will pay $150.
What are we looking for: works of literature that intersect with Taco Bell
Deadline: June 1st, 2025
Payment: $5 for poetry sets (up to 5 pages), $10 for flash fiction (up to 1000 words), $25 for fiction stories up to 5000 words, +$2/1000 words for over 5000 for fictions stories up to 10,000 words
Theme: Canadian authors telling stories about community: finding it, building it, maintaining it, being expelled from it. SF and F are called out as acceptable, no word on H so probably a hard sell
This anthology’s theme is “It Takes a Village” – I’m looking for stories about community: finding it, building it, maintaining it, being expelled from it. How do we build our villages as adults? How do we grow connections with those around us? What do we do when we’ve lost them? We’ve heard the phrase “It takes a village to raise a child” but also “The child who is not embraced by the village will burn it down to feel its warmth.” How do we tackle these emotions as adults?
As this is a bit trickier of an anthology theme than the last one, the reading period is going to be much longer, and the final evolution of the anthology’s theme will come from what the overarching theme and tone from the submitted and accepted pieces create.
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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.
Payment: $5 per work
Theme: Fiction, poetry, artwork that deals with the Esoteric, Absurd, and Sublime (definitions below.)
THE ESOTERIC – Hidden. Occult. Secret. Mystical. Unknown.
THE ABSURD – Meaningless. Chaos. Nonsense. Ridiculous. Paradox. Existential.
THE SUBLIME – Awe. Vastness. Beauty. Terror. Overwhelming. Grandeur.
We accept all genres—fiction, nonfiction, poetry, philosophical monologues, etc. However, nothing over 2,000 words.
I’d like to take this time to give special thanks to our Patreon Sponsors who are at the Level 3 reward level and above!
– Ryan Benson.
– Jane Nightshade.
– Rebecca Rowland.
– James Aitchison.
– Robin Ginther-Venneri.
– Burial Books.
– Craig of Write my paper.
– Celltrackingapps.
