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Taking Submissions: Rufo’s Dog Macabre
January 31, 2020
etDeadline: January 31st, 2020
Payment: $25 AU
Theme: Horror shorts
We’re looking for fantastic fantasy, super-duper science fiction, Wonderfulliy Weird, and Macabre.
Think classic outer-worldly. Think swashbuckling adventure. Think stuff that would give Lovecraft the shivers. Mad professors, demons of the dark, heroes, monsters, giant robots… We could could go all day. You get the idea.
New, unpublished writers are welcome!
Think you’ve got the chops? Here are the rules:
Under 18?
No problem.
Just send a note from your teacher or guardian with your submission, telling us it’s ok for you to write for us.
No gratuitous sex or excessive profanity. No nasty sex of any kind unless it’s inherent to the story, and not glorified. Gore is fine if it’s written well. Hate speech, or material we might find offensive is not.
We pay a flat rate of $25 AU per original piece of fiction. That’s low right now, but Rufo’s Dog is still a pup. Hopefully, we’ll be able to pay more soon. The best way for that to happen is for you to you tell all your friends to buy a copy and or subscribe, then we’ll have more moolah to throw at the next issue.
We pay a flat rate of $100AU for any original colour artwork that makes the cover, and $25AU for any other artwork. For commissioned work, payment is subject to negotiation with the individual artists.
For contributors with an Australian bank account, payments made via bank transfer are possible. For international contributors, we prefer to pay via PayPal. We do not pay via Western Union or similar services which charge payment fees. WU charges $15 AU per transaction, and we just can’t afford that.
Rufo’s Dog will also provide a password and login for the full zine, valid for 12 months, for each contributer we publish.
No copyrighted material (eg., Batman).
Writers.
We reserve only first rights for print and electronic publication of fiction, Once your work is published in Rufo’s Dog online, or in print, it’s yours.
We reserve all rights for print and electronic publication of artwork, including the right to republish in future editions.
Preferred word count is 2000-8,000. Maximum word count is 10,000. Longer submissions might be scrapped without examination.
Strictly doc, docx, or rtf files only. Other formats like pdf, odt etc., will be scrapped without examination.
If you’re unsure about formatting, use this template:
(You’ll need to download it, and enable editing.)
All fiction must be edited and complete.
No wips. No reviews. No fan-fic. No reprints.
Yes, we accept simultaneous submissions, but tell us if your work gets accepted elsewhere.
Yes, we accept multiple submissions, but only one per genre.
Serials will be considered up to 20,000 words, and they must have a clear outline of the background if any, and also stories to follow.
All submissions not automatically rejected will usually receive a reply within about a week. Everyone at Rufo’s Dog has a day job, so they tend to read submissions on the weekends. Please be patient.
English only. English UK or US is fine, as long as it’s consistent.
Don’t send your life story. The deets we need are:
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Name, age, etc in a 200 max word bio.
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If you are a school student, where do you go to school and what year are you in?
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Have you won any awards? If so, what, when?
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Social media links & website if any.*
NOTE: If you’re a new writer and don’t have much to tell, don’t worry! We all have to start somewhere.
*We do our research. If we find you have a blog, site, or profile that is particularly offensive, (eg hate speech,), WE WILL NOT PUBLISH YOU. You can be as controversial as you like, but there’s a line, and we all know where it is. The Submissions Spook will put you on the “Naughty” list, and once you’re on it, you will not be considered again.
We have no set themes, though we do have set genres. They are fantasy, science fiction, and Macabre. Aything that doesn’t really fit any of the first three, or has elements of some or all, may be labelled Wonderfulliy Weird.
Also, all writers are reminded Rufo’s Dog is meant to be a fun read, even the spooky stuff. Dark, depressing material will probably earn you a depressing response. Dystopia might be hotter than sparkly vampires right now, but it’s not really that much fun.
Send your submission attached to your email to The Submissions Spook at [email protected] with your bio and other deets mentioned above in the email. MAKE SURE TO MENTION THE GENRE OF YOUR SUBMISSION. If he likes what he sees, he’ll pass it on to The Editor Aliens and one of them will contact you.
Fiction submissions received outside the windows stated below might be scrapped without examination, unless submitted by persons under 18. If you are under 18, you are welcome to submit all year round.
Artists.
Check the Submissions Windows section below for the theme we want for our cover. It will be either, fantasy, Macabre. Wonderfulliy Weird, or science fiction. We will accept artwork outside the themes required for the coming cover issue, however these will only make it into the middle pages.
We reserve all rights for print and electronic publication of artwork, including the right to republish in future editions. Artwork must be contributed by the copyright owner. If you have sold it, or it has been published elsewhere-even online on your own site-it will be considered a reprint and we will not publish it.
We’re big fans of retro pulp. The pulpier the better.
Give us fantasy so cheesy you could put on pizza.
Give us sci-fi that takes us back to the likes of Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Ursula LeGuinn, and Anne McCaffrey.
Give us grisly, ghoulish macabre scenes that would could have come straight out of Michael Jackson’s Thriller.
Give us weird multi-eyed heads in jars, things from swamps, or killer robots-anything really-except copy-and-pasted wolves or lightning. Really.
Portait orientation works best for us.
Send your submission as a jpeg, (max 1 meg.,), attached to your email to The Submissions Spook at [email protected] with your bio and other deets mentioned above in the email.
Artwork submissions received outside the windows stated below might be scrapped without examination, unless submitted by persons under 18. If you are under 18, you are welcome to submit all year round.
Sumbmissions Windows
January 1 – 31, 2020 for April 2020 issue. Cover Theme: Macabre
April 1 – 30, 2020 for July 2020 issue. Cover Theme: science fiction
July 1 – 31, 2020 for October 2020 issue. Cover Theme: Wonderfully Weird
October 1 – 31, 2020 for January 2021 Issue. Cover Theme: Fantasy
January 1 – 31, 2021 for April 2021 Issue. Cover Theme: Macabre
April 1 – 30, 2021 for July 2021 issue. Cover Theme: science fiction
Artists and Writers are encouraged to take a look at our sample contract which can be found on our Legal Stuff page.
What happens next?
If your work is selected for publication:
We will pay you as soon as possible.
You will receive a login id & password valid for 12 months.
You will be invited to share links to any of your other published work. If it appears in other anthologies, it will just be listed in your bio on our contributors page. If it is 100% your own work, we will put it on our author showcase page.
We also invite all writers and artists to let us know about any more successful publications they may have in the future, anthologies included, and or promotions or any other news regarding their work. We’ll try to make sure we spread the news in Scraps’ Blog and on Twitter.
We will also share a DropBox folder with you so you can share more files with us. Note: Just because we’ve accepted you once, does not always mean you’re fast-tracked for further submissions. We do this for every contributor we publish; it’s just our way of making things easier for our contributors.
If your story is not selected for publication:
At Rufo’s Dog, we believe in positive feedback. Writers cannot improve if they don’t know why their work is rejected.
The Thing From The Slush Pile writes the rejection letters in the week following the close of each submissions window.
Scraps will send each letter as a pdf attachment. If you receive such a letter, do not despair. You are always free to re-submit next time we are open for submissions.
If your art is not selected for publication:
If it is hand-drawn or painted, we might crtique it, and you will receive a similar letter.
If it contains copy-and-pasted images, especially anything to do with wolves or lightning, the letter will simply state that the material does not fit Rufo’s Dog’s style.
Via: Rufo’s Dog.
- About the Author
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Stuart Conover is a father, husband, published author, blogger, geek, entrepreneur, horror fanatic, and runs a few websites including Horror Tree!