Category: Token Payment

Taking Submissions: Jane Nightshade’s Serial Encounters

Deadline: August 30th, 2023
Payment: $5
Theme: Short stories about casual encounters of fictional people with serial killers

Have you ever wondered about the ordinary people who came in contact with famous serial killers before everyone knew them for their depraved, murderous acts?

What did Jeffrey Dahmer’s plumber experience when he unclogged the notorious cannibal’s toilet? Or how about the guy who worked in the music shop where Charles Manson had his guitars strung? The girl who waited on Ted Bundy at his favorite coffee shop? Jack the Ripper’s neighborhood bartender? How about one of the kids who had John Wayne Gacey perform as a clown at their birthday party?

For this anthology, we’re looking for short stories about casual encounters of fictional people with serial killers, that turned creepy or deadly. Stories can be straight crime/thriller stories or ones with a supernatural bent (haunted objects, ghosts, demons, etc.).

Characters and victims, aside from the serial killers, must be fictional—real names of victims or family members can not be used. Also, feel free to use lesser-known killers like Richard Speck or The Boston Strangler, in case the Bundy and Manson stories start piling up like the bodies of their victims…

Note: Stories should not lionize or celebrate the serial killers, or promote racism, bigotry, or depictions of violence against children.

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Taking Submissions: Love Me, Love Me Not Drabbles

Deadline: December 31st, 2022
Payment: $1
Theme: Drabbles Valentine’s Day / Love / Couples. NB: Doesn’t have to be about Valentine’s Day specifically.

  • $1 USD per acceptance.
  • Up to 10 acceptances per pen name.
  • First three to 10 get a $10 Amazon voucher.
  • First to 10 also gets a paperback copy of the final product.
  • One email, one drabble. We won’t look at submissions with more than one drabble, as we don’t have time to extrapolate them into the read process.
  • Blind submissions for the actual manuscript, please.
  • Reprints are OK, but we’ll have no space for “First Published” acknowledgements, so please check your obligations with previous publishers first (if your first publisher is BHP, then you automatically have permission, as long as it wasn’t published in the last 12 months).
  • No simultaneous submissions, please.
  • Include a bio of no more than 15 words, plus one link << this is really important. Don’t include links to retailers (ie Amazon) as the books get rejected when they have retailer links. If you want to include one, we suggest you set up something like linktr.ee (here’s ours: linktr.ee/blackharepress) or bio.site (here’s ours:  bio.site/blackharepress)

Theme: Valentine’s Day / Love / Couples. NB: Doesn’t have to be about Valentine’s Day specifically.
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Taking Submissions: Otoroshi Journal 2023 Spring Issue (Early Listing)

Submission Window: January 1st – 31st, 2023
Payment: $1 per accepted piece
Theme: horrorku, horror themed tanka, haibun, see below for details

The Submission may include any or all of the following:
· Up to seven (7) horrorku or horror tanka [we will rarely publish 5/7/5(7/7)]
· Up to three (3) haibun [title + prose + haiku/tanka — no more than 100 words]
· Up to five (5) pieces of cover art

All submissions must be original, unpublished work that is not under consideration by a print or web-based journal. Posts in closed, critique-oriented groups and social media sites are acceptable for submission, but public posts on forums such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are not. By submitting a piece to us, you are guaranteeing that it is your original work and not under consideration or published anywhere else in the world.

E-mail submission is required. Type poems into the body of the e-mail; no attachments of poetry will be opened. For art submissions, please include all five pieces in a .PDF file or send us a link to a private gallery. If we purchase an art piece for our cover, we will ask that you provide a 300 dpi version of said piece.

E-mail: [email protected]
Subject: Otoroshi Submission

Please include a cover letter noting location in the world. Please include handles for Instagram and Twitter for promotional purposes.

At this time, only one submission per issue will be considered unless the editors directly request a second submission.
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Taking Submissions: Summer of Sci-Fi & Fantasy: Volume Two

Deadline: October 31st, 2022
Payment: $0.005/word up to 7500 words. Minimum of $15
Theme: Sci-Fi and Fantasy
Note: Reprints Welcome

We are currently open to SHORT STORY submissions for Summer of Sci-Fi & Fantasy: Volume Two to be published in the Summer of 2023.

All stories must be submitted before our deadline of October 31st, 2022.

We ask for the following:

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Taking Submissions: The Vampiricon

Deadline: October 31st, 2022
Payment: 1/2 cent per word for non-fiction, $10-$15 for poetry, $10-$15 for interior illustrations, $25 for cover illustration
Theme: Poetry, Illustration, and Non-Fiction related to vampires

SUBMISSIONS OPEN FROM September 1st through END OF DAY on Halloween (10/31/2022)

Must be directly relevant to the subject of THE VAMPIRE.

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Taking Submissions: THE VAMPIRICON: Imaginings & Images of the Vampire (Early Listing)

Deadline: September 1st – October 31st, 2022
Payment: 1/2 cent per word for new, $10 for reprints, $10 for accepted new, not-previously-published poetry of 14 to 50 lines; One Dime/$.10 per line thereafter with a maximum of $15.00., $10-$15 for accepted new OR REPRINTED interior illustration, $25.00 for the Illustration/Art
Theme: Stories containing vampires

Our current Call for Submissions is for THE VAMPIRICON: Imaginings & Images of the Vampire. SUBMISSIONS OPEN FROM 1 SEPTEMBER THROUGH 31 OCTOBER (HALLOWEEN) 2022.

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Trembling With Fear – Summer Special 2022 Deadline Extended

Horror Tree Logo

Deadline: August 31st, 2022
Payment: Trembling With Fear was designed as a way to give back to Horror Tree. Since it’s inception we now offer an optional $5 payment on short stories to be paid by the time our yearly anthology which contains the story will be released. At this time, drabble are still considered donations to the site. Moving forward, as our Patreon levels grow, this will change for the better in both areas.
Theme: Summer-themed horror

Who wants summer to last longer? We do at the Horror Tree! This year, we’ve extended our Summer Specials submission period by an extra month so that we can collect even more hellishly hot and campfire creepy stories. Send us your tales of horror about backpacking, road trips, glamping, beach adventures, summer camp… anything summer-related goes! You may even want to write a drabble as a summer vacation postcard as a “wish you were here” [insert evil grin].

The submission window is open until August 31st to submit drabbles of 100 words and short stories up to 2500 words.

Themed Calls

Please note in your submission if it is for a specific theme and not a standard Trembling With Fear call. As a side note, going forward these will likely be collected in a secondary collection each year.

Summer Holiday Special (to be published in August). Submit from February to end of July. Horror on the beach, at a B&B, on a cruise, backpacking, road trips, glamping, end of the pier. Why not even write a drabble as a holiday postcard: Wish you weren’t here?

For special editions, we also do take longer work and Unholy Trinities.

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Taking Submissions: Step Into The Light

Deadline: October 31st, 2022
Payment: £0.005 per word
Theme: Daytime-themed horror

This daytime-themed horror anthology is going to be absolute FIRE!

We want your original, unpublished, short horror stories set in daylight.

That’s it.

Go wild.

Think Midsommar, The Wicker Man, Benchley’s Jaws, IT, The Silence of the Lambs. All great storylines, all packed with daytime fear proving you don’t have to be in the dark to be afraid. Sleeping with the lights on won’t help you this time.

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