The Horror Tree

Category: Pro

Pro Rates

Events / Magazine / Pro

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Taking Submissions: Cosmic Roots And Eldritch Shores June 2021- EARLY

Deadline: June 3rd, 2021
Payment: 6 cents per word for original, 2 cents for reprints
Theme: Well written original work in science fiction, fantasy, myth, legend, fairy tales, and eldritch, in written, podcast, video, and/or graphic story form, and from around the world.
Note: Reprints welcome

 

 

Submissions Schedule

We have a new submissions schedule as of June 1, 2020:
The first and second day of every month, 12 am of the 1st to 12 am of the 3rd, E.S.T.
Only one submission per person.

For reading impaired individuals, our submissions manager and ‘forget password’ have a captcha compatible with screen readers.

We pay 6¢ per word for new fiction, 2¢ per word for fiction reprints, 2 – 6¢ per word for new fact-based work, 1- 4¢ per word for reprinted fact articles.
For new poetry, we pay $1 a line, reprints would be 50¢ a line, up to 40 lines. We’ll look at longer poems but that would be a hard sell, and words over 40 lines would be paid at 6¢ per word.

We began The Kepler Award to recognize and encourage writers of excellent science fiction and fantasy stories that creatively extrapolate on known science in constructive and exciting ways. You can learn about The Kepler Award here.

You can read a copy of our standard contract here.   It can be varied as needed to include the rights of translators, voice actors, etc.

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Events / Magazine / Pro

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Taking Submissions: Inclusive Future Magazine Issue 1

Deadline: July 15th, 2021
Payment: 8¢ a word for original work, 4¢ a word for reprints
Theme: Visions from a Gender-Inclusive Future
Note: Trans, nonbinary, and genderqueer artists and writers
Note: Reprints Welcome

About Issue 1: Visions from a Gender-Inclusive Future

Inclusive Future Magazine is an anthology of speculative prose, poetry, and art in the guise of a pop culture  magazine from the future.

IMAGINE: It’s the year 2068, and we’ve achieved gender equality in the broadest sense. Not only are  genders outside the binary widely acknowledged and accepted, but people of all genders are paid equally for equal work, have equal opportunity, are included in scientific studies, and are marketed to equally. You are writing and making art from this future, roughly fifty years from now, and you are submitting a piece of work to an international culture magazine whose target audience includes English-speaking adults of all genders living anywhere in the world. 

 

What does this gender-inclusive future look like? What language do we use around gender? In what ways have

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Magazine / Ongoing Submissions / Pro

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Ongoing Submissions: Blood Knife

Payment: 9 cents per word for fiction, $60 for articles
Theme: Sci-fi, cyberpunk, fantasy, the future, and/or (preferably and!) radical politics

GET PAID TO WRITE FOR BLOOD KNIFE.

Do you have good takes on sci-fi, cyberpunk, fantasy, the future, and/or (preferably and!) radical politics? We want you to write for Blood Knife and we want to pay you for your good takes (and good fiction!).

WHAT IS BLOOD KNIFE?

Blood Knife is an online magazine about imagined futures, alternate histories, blood, cyborgs, and radical left politics. We want to explore the collision of the soon-to-be, the never-was, and the now.

Is cyberpunk still relevant? Why do some laser guns shoot green and others red? Are robots comrades? We want to explore all this stuff, and also we want to pay writers fairly without any bullshit.

HOW MUCH DOES BLOOD KNIFE PAY?

We currently pay $60 for an 800 word article, with rates prorated beyond that. Most features (curated playlists, etc.) are also paid at a $60 rate. Illustrations and multimedia are paid on an individual basis, but generally in the $60 to $100 range. Our #1 priority is always towards fairly paying our contributors, and we are continuing to raise rates when possible.

In terms of publishing rights, we ask for exclusivity for 90 days from the date of publication and license to keep it on the website in its original form in perpetuity. If you choose to resell it or publish it elsewhere after that window, we just ask for a note that it originally appeared on Blood Knife and a link back to the site, where applicable.
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Magazine / Ongoing Submissions / Pro

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Ongoing Submissions: Orion’s Belt

Payment: 8 cents per word
Theme: All stories must have significant speculative elements

The Basics

Stories should be submitted to [email protected] All stories must be under 1200 words (not including the title and byline). All stories over 1200 words will sadly be rejected automatically. All stories must contain significant speculative elements. This does not mean all sci-fi stories must have lasers and rockets. It just means a non-speculative story doesn’t become speculative if you include a single line clarifying the story takes place on Mars.

Submission Details

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Anthology / Events / Pro

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Taking Submissions: Darkness Blooms

Deadline: May 31st, 2021
Payment: $0.08 per word and contributors copies
Theme: Identity, security, and community are inexorably entwined

DARKNESS BLOOMS

Identity, security, and community are inexorably entwined.

For our anthology, Darkness Blooms, we’re looking for stories touching on at least one of these themes. We want you to explore the boundaries of who we are, what makes us feel safe (and at what cost), with whom we choose to surround ourselves, and our darkest secrets.

Let’s explore how they influence us and our perception of reality.
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Events / Magazine / Pro / Reprints Allowed

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Taking Submissions: Cosmic Roots And Eldritch Shores – EARLY

Deadline: April 1st-3rd, 2021
Payment: 6 cents per word for original, 2 cents for reprints
Theme: Well written original work in science fiction, fantasy, myth, legend, fairy tales, and eldritch, in written, podcast, video, and/or graphic story form, and from around the world.
Note: Reprints welcome

 

 

Submissions Schedule

We have a new submissions schedule as of June 1, 2020:
The first and second day of every month, 12 am of the 1st to 12 am of the 3rd, E.S.T.
Only one submission per person.

For reading impaired individuals, our submissions manager and ‘forget password’ have a captcha compatible with screen readers.

We pay 6¢ per word for new fiction, 2¢ per word for fiction reprints, 2 – 6¢ per word for new fact-based work, 1- 4¢ per word for reprinted fact articles.
For new poetry, we pay $1 a line, reprints would be 50¢ a line, up to 40 lines. We’ll look at longer poems but that would be a hard sell, and words over 40 lines would be paid at 6¢ per word.

We began The Kepler Award to recognize and encourage writers of excellent science fiction and fantasy stories that creatively extrapolate on known science in constructive and exciting ways. You can learn about The Kepler Award here.

You can read a copy of our standard contract here.   It can be varied as needed to include the rights of translators, voice actors, etc.

(more…)

Anthology / Events / Pro

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Taking Submissions: Diabolical Plots (Early Listing)

Deadline: January 31st, 2020
Payment: 10 cents per word
Theme: Science fiction, fantasy, horror (everything must have speculative element, even horror).
Note: This does NOT open until January 1st, do not submit before this time.

Diabolical Plots will be open for submissions for the entire month of January 2021.

David Steffen is the editor, who you may also know from using the Submission Grinder writing tool or reading the Long List Anthology series.  Diabolical Plots is a SFWA-qualifying market, so if you have a personal goal to join SFWA, making a sale here would help you toward that goal.

This year Ziv Wities will be in the role of assistant editor.  He will be handling much of the first round of the submission process, as well as helping to write personal rejections when we provide personal rejections.

For the most part we expect the process will generally be the same–but the biggest difference is that in past years David read at least part of every submitted story, which is not expected to be true this year because of time constraints–thankfully Ziv is willing to step in and lend a hand!

FICTION

OVERVIEW

Genres: science fiction, fantasy, horror (everything must have speculative element, even horror).

Word count: 3500 words or less. This is a firm limit.  If you submit a longer story, it will be rejected unread and that will count as a submission. Do not query to ask permission to submit something longer–the answer will be no.

Pay rate: 10 cents per word (more than the minimum professional rate as deemed by SFWA)
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Events / Magazine / Pro

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Taking Submissions: Fantasy Magazine (Early Listing)

Deadline: December 1st-7th
Payment: 8 cents per word
Theme: Original fantasy and dark fantasy stories. All types of fantasy and dark fantasy are welcome.

Instructions for submitting to Fantasy Magazine follow. Please read everything on this page and read the magazine before submitting.

SUBMISSION PROCEDURES

Submission Periods: Fantasy is open to submissions the first week of every month (1st-7th). Please do not query about submitting outside our open submission periods.

Anonymous Submissions: Fantasy only accepts anonymous submissions. Do not include your name, address, phone number, or other similar identifiers on the manuscript. All original short fiction, flash fiction, and poetry submissions will be read anonymously on first read: moving out of slush depends on the merits of the story alone. Please make sure the title is on the manuscript.

Simultaneous and Multiple Submissions: We do not accept simultaneous submissions or multiple submissions. Please do not submit more than one set of poems at a time, more than one piece of flash fiction at a time, or more than one story at a time. You may, however, submit a single entry in each category at the same time: you can submit one batch of poems, one flash fiction piece, and one short story all at the same (or overlapping) time, and each category will be considered a separate submission. If we are already considering work in any given category, please wait until you have received an acceptance or rejection before submitting again in that same category.

Instructions: All fiction must be submitted through our Moksha online submission system. Please do not email your submissions. If one of the Submission Type options is grayed out, that means we are currently closed to that Submission Type.

Questions/Problems: Email [email protected] for all submission-related inquiries, or if you have any trouble using our online submission system. Please do not email your submissions to this address. All submissions must be submitted via our Moksha online submission system.

Rejections/Response Times: Be aware that we expect to receive several hundred submissions during our submissions periods. As such, we cannot offer personalized feedback on each story. If we say “send more” it means we really do hope to see something else from you. Most rejections will be sent out within a few weeks to a month, while stories being seriously considered may be held for up a month or more. Please do not respond to rejection letters, even just to say “Thanks for the quick turnaround” etc. We appreciate the thought, but it is unnecessary and will just clutter up our editorial inbox.

Cover Letters: Your cover letter may include your name and other identifying elements. It should contain the length of your story, your publishing history, and any other relevant information (e.g, if you send us a fantasy story about the Byzantine empire and your doctoral dissertation was on Byzantine empire politics, mention that). If you don’t have credentials to cite, don’t worry! We care about your story, not your resume. If you’re not sure what should go in your cover letter, this article on cover letters might help.

Diversity Statement: We encourage people of color, Black people, Indigenous people, Native people, women, people with disabilities, older people, LGBTQIA+, and anyone from typically marginalized or underrepresented communities to submit their work.

 

FICTION

Fantasy is seeking original fantasy and dark fantasy stories. All types of fantasy and dark fantasy are welcome. No subject should be considered off-limits, and we encourage writers to take chances with their fiction and push the envelope. If you’re not sure whether your story is fantasy (vs. horror or science fiction) go ahead and submit and let the editors decide. We do not accept simultaneous submissions or multiple submissions. Do not submit more than one short story at a time.

Format: Please submit your manuscript in double-spaced Times New Roman or Courier font. Please remember to NOT include any identifying information on your manuscript apart from the story title. Your manuscript must be in either .RTF, .DOC, or .DOCX format.

Word Counts: We are open to short fiction up to 7500 words. When you make your fiction submission, you can submit in one of the two categories described below.

  • Short Story: 1500-7500 words. (Stories of 5000 words or less are preferred.)
  • Flash Fiction: Up to 1500 words.

Work previously rejected by Lightspeed or Nightmare: We welcome submissions that were previously rejected by our sister-publications.

Pay Rate: Fantasy pays 8 cents per word for original short stories and flash fiction.

Rights: To see which rights we’re seeking, please review our contract template for original fiction/poetry.

 

POETRY

Fantasy is seeking original fantasy and dark fantasy poems. All types of fantasy and dark fantasy are welcome. If you’re not sure whether your poem is fantasy (vs. horror or science fiction) go ahead and submit and let the editors decide.

We prefer shorter form poems with literary sensibilities which are evocative, emotionally resonant, and/or visually vibrant—in other words, poems which are viscerally impactful, and/or meaningful in some way. At the same time, we will not limit submissions to these parameters.

Please ensure that the title of the poems are in the manuscript.

Submission Quantity: You may submit up to six poems in the same document. (Our submission system will not allow multiple attachments.) We do not accept simultaneous submissions or multiple submissions. Do not submit more than one batch of six poems at a time.

Pay Rate: Fantasy pays $40 per poem.

Rights: To see which rights we’re seeking, please review our contract template for original fiction/poetry.

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