Category: Flash

Anthology / Events / Flash / Flat Amount

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Taking Submissions: Stories to Take To Your Grave, Mortuary Edition

Deadline: April 30th, 2024
Payment: $20
Theme: Horror stories that center around undertakers, funeral homes, mortuaries, cremations, and other aspects of the funeral trade

We are looking for 10 short stories that center around undertakers, funeral homes, mortuaries, cremations, and other aspects of the funeral trade for “Stories to Take To Your Grave”. We are open to all subgenres of horror, from suspense to splatterpunk!

WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR

-Complete stories with a beginning, middle, and end.

-Stories that leave us feeling satisfied yet also wanting more.

-Stories that make our reformed undertaker feel like he’s back in the business.

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Anthology / Events / Flash / Flat Amount

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Taking Submissions: Children of the Blind Owl

Deadline: August 31st, 2024
Payment: $150 – $250
Theme: Original weird tales and essays set in the Middle East that explore the human (and inhuman) experience through the lens of weird fiction and horror

Sentinel Creatives has opened up for submissions for our anthology of Middle Eastern Horror: “Children of the Blind Owl”.

Deadline for Submissions: 31 August 2024
Wordcount: 3,000 – 6,000
Remuneration: $150 – $250
Simultaneous Submissions: Yes

WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR

We’re looking for original weird tales and essays set in the Middle East that explore the human (and inhuman) experience through the lens of weird fiction and horror.

We are looking to secure 11-13 tales of weird fiction and 1-3 essays (any length). Submissions should delve into the history, folklore, ideas, experiences, identities, religion, and philosophies of the region in some way.

Time Period: We are looking for stories in both historical and contemporary settings.

As the title of this anthology suggests, one of the inspirations behind this project is Sadegh Hedayat’s “The Blind Owl,” a surrealist, horror, weird fiction, novella completed in the 1930s. Though we hope the stories in this anthology take inspiration from Hedayat’s work, we are not looking for stories set in or derived from his novella or other works. Rather, we are hoping writers will take cues from the themes Hedayat grappled with: alienation, futility, despair, rage, transgression, to name a few.

Ahmed Saadawi’s “Frankenstein in Baghdad” is another work that serves as a good example of what we’d like to see from the stories in this anthology. Saadawi uses, to great effect, some of the vocabulary and motifs from horror to illustrate the problems facing modern-day Iraq, with the corpse itself representing, in some ways, the various ethnic and religious groups and ideologies sewn together as Iraqi pluralism.

Give us your tales of the uncanny, of the monstrous and surreal!

Contributing editors, voice artists, and artists will be announced for this project at a later date.

While this is by no means an exclusive call, we hope to attract writers who are either from the region or have some relationship with it.

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Flash / Magazine / Ongoing Submissions / Semipro

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Ongoing Submissions: Frontier Tales

Payment: 1 cent per word
Theme: Stories of action and conflict. Open to some mixed genres, so it can include horror, etc, if it captures the theme and time period of a Western.

Short stories up to 10,000 words in length. Finished and edited.

Our top priority stories are what we like to call “strait shooters”. These are stories of action and conflict. We want gunslingers dueling in saloons, cowboys taking on bandits, Lawmen bringing order to the chaos of the West, bounty hunters going to the ends of the continent to catch their man, a Comanche warrior making his last stand on the open plains, Settlers defending their home from raiders, etc.

While these sorts of yarns are our preference we are still open to other varieties. Romantic western tales of love triumphing or dying on the frontier, ghost stories of the lost souls doomed to wander the among western winds, or weird westerns featuring deep ancient horrors revealing themselves to unsuspecting victims.

What are we not looking for

Smut/pornographic stories

Space/science fiction with western themes

Neo-westerns taking place in a contemporary setting

Stories set outside of America, in the future we may open up this to include other locales but for now it will be exclusively stories set in the US

Serialized stories, we may open this up in the future but for the time being we strictly want stand alone tales

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Events / Flash / Flat Amount / Magazine / Non-fiction / Poetry / Semipro

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Taking Submissions: Last Girls Club Summer Issue 2024 (Early)

Submission Window: April 1st -May 1st, 2024
Payment: Short Story-2,500 words or less. $0.015 USD per word/$37.50 USD max, Poems-less than 200 words $10, Flash Fiction-less than a 1,000 words $0.015 USD per word/$15 USD max
Theme: Fire!

Last Girls Club Summer Issue Theme is Fire Season. The world is on fire, environmentally and politically. On the US West coast we have rains of ash in the fall from all the forest fires. The Canadian border was plagued with smoke pollution from raging fires. It’s a thing now. Your characters can be fleeing a fire, starting one, or surviving one. Take it where you want. Acceptances will be notified on May 15.

  • No more than two fiction or flash fiction stories per author per submission period.
  • Fiction is limited to 2,500 words or less. Authors are paid $0.015 USD per word upon acceptance ($37.50 USD max).
  • Flash fiction is limited to under 1,000 words. Authors are paid $0.015 USD per word upon acceptance ($15 USD max).
  • No more than three poems per poet.
  • Poems are limited to 200 words or less for each poem. Poets are paid $10 USD upon acceptance.
  • I prefer to use PayPal to pay authors, but will work with authors where PayPal is not available.
  • Nonfiction columns will must be pitched to editor in chief before submission. Email your idea to [email protected]

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Anthology / Events / Flash / Flat Amount

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Taking Submissions: Hentai Ectoplasm (April 2024 Window)

Submission Window: April 1st – 30th, 2024
Payment: $100
Theme: Telling the cannibus-positive tales of the last survivors of a specific neighborhood. Details found below

Opens: April 1, 2024, midnight est 

Closes: April 30, 2024, midnight IDLW

Compensation: $100 USD

Theme: Adult horror, including genre-chimeras

Submissions must be between 3,000 and 6,000 words

Expected release April 2024

Submit to hentai.ectoplasm@bookslayerpress.com

On the night of April 19, 2021, something happened in the suburban town of Brookhaven that changed the course of humanity. In the fancy Southtown gated community, The Sanctuary at Lemongrass Lake, a cosmic event occurs, destroying most of it in the impact. Over on the North end, middle-aged, overweight, cannabis grower, Pam Goodall, determined to save her holy holiday—4/20, bands with unlikely neighbors to not just survive the night, but save humankind.

HENTAI ECTOPLASM is not your average anthology. Twelve – fifteen authors will tell a story of survival as their neighborhood is cut off by the destruction, each delivering the perspective of their respective home.

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Anthology / Events / Flash / Semipro

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Taking Submissions: Cursed Cooking: A Horror Community Cookbook and Food Horror Anthology

Deadline: April 30th, 2024 and May 10th for writers of color, members of the LGBTQ+ community, and other underrepresented groups
Payment: 5 cents per word for original fiction works and 1 cent per word for reprints. Accepted recipe submissions will receive $5
Theme: Real-world recipes and food horror fiction
Note: Not looking for cannibalism stories
Note: Reprints Welcome

Cursed Cooking: A Horror Community Cookbook and Food Horror Anthology

Open call submission window: March 15 – April 30, 2024.

Extended submission window exclusively for writers of color, members of the LGBTQ+ community, and other underrepresented groups: May 1 -May 10, 2024

Cursed Cooking is a horror community cookbook and food horror anthology, featuring both real-world recipes and food horror fiction. This hybrid publication aims to feed not only your body with frighteningly good food, but also your imagination with cleverly crafted horror stories.

So, send us your tales of haunted hamburgers, killer chocolate chip cookies, monstrous manicotti, world-ending wontons, and everything in between. Cook up a story filled with genetically modified grossness, fast-food freakiness, or homemade horrors. Get creative. Get hungry. Think outside the pizza box. But also, send us the recipes that you love, recipes that make your mouth water and have people screaming for seconds (and thirds and fourths). We want it all!

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Events / Flash / Flat Amount / Magazine / Poetry / Reprints Allowed

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Taking Submissions: The Lorelei Signal 2024 Oct – Dec Issue

Submission Window: April 15th – May 15th, 2024
Payment: $15.00 for short stories, $5.00 for poems and flash (<1000 wds) fiction pieces., $5.00 for reprints
Theme: SF/Fantasy (ideally fantasy) with strong and complex female characters
Note: Reprints Welcome

 

The Lorelei Signal is a quarterly SF/Fantasy electronic magazine – one that will feature strong / complex female characters. This does not mean your female character has to be the main hero or villain in the story. What it does mean is no shrinking violets, or women who serve only to get into trouble so the male hero can rescue them.


Each issue I hope to publish:
7 short stories, 1 flash fiction piece and 2 poems
that meet the following guidelines:

My primary guideline is simple:
Write a good fantasy story with strong/complex characters.



What I am NOT looking for – erotica / slash / or other such stories.
Although well written love scenes that are IMPORTANT to the story will be considered on a story-by-story basis.

1) Stories should be no longer than 10,000 words.
However, tell the story – if it takes more than 10,000 words to tell the story properly so be it.
Just try to cut it down if possible – but remember the story is the important part.

2) Stories must feature 3 dimensional / complex characters.

3) I will accept reprints as long as it has been at least 1 year since the story was previously published,
rights have reverted back and you tell me where it previously appeared.
These will be limited to 2 per issue.

4) Please keep the graphic gore down to a minimum
(only what’s needed for the story).

5) Please keep the obscene language to a bare minimum
(again, only what’s needed for the story).

6) Simultaneous Submissions will be considered IF:
a) You tell me up front
b) You inform me immediately if the story has been accepted elsewhere
If I have too many occurrences of finding out a story was accepted somewhere else when I contact an author to tell them I would like to accept their story for The Lorelei Signal – I will no longer accept simultaneous submissions. (more…)

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

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Taking Submissions: Haven Speculative 2024 General Submissions Call #2 (Early)

Submission Window: April 1st – 30th, 2024
Payment: 8 cent per word for fiction, $20 for poetry, 8 cent per word for non-fiction, $125 for cover art
Theme: Speculative fiction

It’s our goal to publish diverse voices from around the world, and to do that, we are actively seeking stories, poems, and non-fiction pieces by authors from backgrounds that have been historically underrepresented in the science fiction and fantasy canon. Our submission cycle is therefore split into two categories, where every other month is explicitly reserved for submissions by authors of color, members of the LGBTQIA+ community, and other underrepresented groups. The interposing six months remain open to everyone.

As writers ourselves, we do our best to handle each submission with the care and attention it deserves. Every submission is an act of bravery, and we know that putting yourself out there as a writer can be tough. Just know that any submission we receive, unless it contains something illegal, will be kept in confidence.

When in doubt, don’t self reject! Submit submit submit!

Guidelines for Fiction

We like stories that are subtle in their telling and stick with us long after we’ve finished, and we’re more likely to buy stories that balance a sense of wonder with a bold plot and emotional depth. For our two issues focused on the climate crisis, we’re particularly interested in publishing stories from people displaced by or threatened by the climate emergency (see our themes below). For our other four issues, we’re open to a wide variety of stories across the SFF and weird spectra.

  • Pay: 8¢ per word for original fiction
  • Word limit: 6000 words
  • Language: English
  • Rights: We buy first serial print and electronic rights for publication of the story in the English language and throughout the world. We also buy non-exclusive archival rights for our website and non-exclusive anthology rights.

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