Deadline: April 6th, 2025
Payment: Royalties
Theme: Speculative fiction adventure on the frontier of the Old West.

Edited by Nick Nethery

More fantastical adventure on the frontier of the Old West. Stories of cryptid-wrangling cowboys and ancient magic. Witches who ride for the brand. Tell your tales about monsters and magic in the American frontier. We want you to ride off the beaten path with your story submission. If you’ve seen this monster portrayed more than six times in recent media, we don’t want to see it again. Dig up dusty tomes of American folklore and mythology if nothing comes to mind. Stretch your imagination beyond werewolves and skin walkers! Don’t forget to do your homework.

Opens: 02/01/25
Closes: 04/06/25
Contracts: 04/19/25
Publication: 05/16/25

Guidelines for all our anthologies (psst! this is important!):

5,000 to 8,000 words. Length and genre are negotiable, as long as the story fits the concept and is entertaining. Any submission must be in Times New Roman (preferred, but you can use Georgian or other readable font), 12PT, double-spaced, with your name, title of the story, and your email on it. Name the file as [STORYTITLE]-[YOURLASTNAME]—[ANTHOLOGYTITLE]. Send it in a .docx format as an attachment—no links. Refer to the submission guideline graphic below for how to format your story—It has all the information you need! Feel free to download it for reference.

Raconteur Press will hold the rights for one year after publication; after one year, the rights will revert to the author, but we continue to pay you as long as the anthology is selling. Authors receive an equal percentage share of the proceeds from the anthology, along with the Press, our editors, and administration. Yes, you read that right. We don’t take 80% off the top and split the 20% left over between all the authors. We’re all in this together. This is why our anthologies are limited to ten stories.

IMPORTANT: PLEASE do NOT submit stories until the date the call opens. We don’t want to hang on to your piece for longer than necessary. You might find another market for it, or it decides to grow into a novel, or…so go ahead and write it, but tuck it away, and revisit it before submitting.

Raconteur Press uses Pubshare (pubshare.com) to distribute payments and handle tax forms for anthology authors, so authors who contribute must have a free Pubshare account.

IMPORTANT: when you set up your Pubshare account, you MUST choose the method by which you want to receive your royalties. There are currently two choices: PayPal at the beginning of each month, or paper cheque each quarter. BE SURE that you have chosen a method of payment and input the required information. If you don’t, Pubshare will hang onto your royalties until you choose a method of payment and input the required information.

DOUBLE SECRET PROBATION IMPORTANT: One story submission per anthology. And the counting of submissions shall be one submission. The number of submissions shall not be two. Three is right out.

Submit to: racpresssubmissions[at]gmail.com

Questions about our publishing schedules can be addressed to Production[at]raconteurpress.com.

Finally, if you want to ensure your manuscript is read and is seriously considered for publication, read this.

• Printable schedule and open call list of 2025 anthologies can be downloaded here.

Via: Raconteur Press.