Deadline: March 1st, 2015
Payment: .02/word (up to 5k words)

Fictionvale Magazine is designed to bring great short fiction to folks on a quarterly basis. But we can’t do that without you, the awesome writers out there! So please read the submission guidelines below to find out how to contribute to Fictionvale.

Fiction

We look for well-written genre fiction to fill our valley with story! Most episodes will pair two genres, sometimes similar ones, sometimes distinctly different ones, so we are open to all types of popular fiction. Because each episode features eight or so stories of two genres, we will put out a call for those genres first, but we will accept other genres as well, for future episodes. Please note that we are an editorial publisher. Check out our Editorial Musings blog post for what that means to us and to you if accepted.

You can find any and all submission calls on our Submittable Page.

Research Where You Submit

It’s important that, as a writer, you know the market you’re submitting to. We really can’t stress this enough. Each publication has its own style and its  own ideas of what makes a great story. We strongly suggest purchasing at least one episode of Fictionvale so that you can familiarize yourself with the types of stories we find worthwhile to publish. It’s often not difficult to tell when an author isn’t familiar with our preferences.

You can go for one of the genre free-for-alls, or, if you write in a particular genre, a genre-specific episode, as they’re published.

Episode Eight – upcoming September 1, 2015 – Horror/Humor

Guidelines

Length & Format: Up to 5000 words, including flash (<1000 words) and micro-fiction (<100 words). Standard manuscript format: 1″ margins, double-spaced, Times New Roman 12pt. You really need to pay attention to this. Lately, we’ve been getting a lot of single-spaced entries. Note that if you single-space your entry, that’s already one strike against you because it shows us you can’t follow direction. And you really only need one strike (in any submission call, anywhere) to get a rejection. So don’t make this mistake. Follow the submission guidelines.

Genres: Fantasy, Science Fiction, Horror, Romance, Mystery, Suspense, Action/Adventure, Western, ____punk (fill in your punk of choice!), and all the crazy mashups of these genres.

Age: Fictionvale is meant for adult and mature young adult readers. While we do not publish sex and violence for the sake of sex and violence, stories which deal with adult themes are welcome. We expect our readers to be mature enough to handle them.

Payment: We are currently paying semi-pro rates of .02/word (up to 5k words) upon publication. Our goal is to pay pro rates by the end of 2014 so that authors can use Fictionvale as a qualifying market for SFWA, HWA, etc.

Rights: When we make an offer for your story, we are requesting First World Electronic Rights, and non-exclusive Electronic Reprint Rights, as well as option for one-time Print Anthology Rights (for which authors will be paid pro-rata royalties, separate from payment for the magazine), in the event your story is chosen for our year-end anthology.

Multiple Submissions: Please only submit one short story to us at a time.

Simultaneous Submissions: This refers to authors submitting stories to multiple places at the same time. Your stories are yours and we don’t feel it’s our place to tell you what to do with them. If you choose to submit your story elsewhere at the same time it is in our submission queue, that is fine with us. If you accept an offer for publication elsewhere, please be professional and withdraw your submission from us and let us know.

During our open calls, we get a lot of horror submissions. Horror folks have been asking for their own episode and here it is! In Episode Eight, we’re going to be featuring Horror paired with Humor! Can you sprinkle funny into your scary? Here’s your chance to showcase that particular talent! As always, authors can write straight to either horror or humor, or authors can mash them up. We’re really looking forward to seeing what you’ve got!

Please note that horror isn’t just about blood and guts — it’s about fear and that feeling in the pit of your stomach when you know something is Horrible Horribly Wrong. We’re looking for horror that speaks to our fears.

• Submissions open: 1 February 2015
• Submissions closed: 1 March 2015
• Final story decisions: 1 May 2015
• Editing period ends: 10 August 2015
• Publication: 1 September 2015

During the open submission period for Episode Eight, you can upload your story and info through our Submittable page.

Please note: While you can submit a story of any genre during submission calls, our suggestion is to submit stories of the appropriate genre(s) for each episode. Other genres will be read and considered, but a story would have to seriously blow us away in order for us to accept it during a call for a different genre.

What we look for in submissions

We have a very high standard for quality of writing. Send us your best stuff. The competition will be strong (Episode One garnered 247 submissions for 10 slots!). We look for entertaining and interesting stories with believable, robust characters, with lots of conflict and high tension. But it all has to make sense within the scope of the story.

Fictionvale is intended for adult and mature young adult audiences. As such, adult themes are welcome in your stories, but we prefer not to publish gratuitous sex and violence. So you must make the sex and violence non-gratuitous!

Via: Fictionvale.