Events

Deadline: April 30th 2013 Payment: $35 flat free Firbolg Publishing has decided to add one more stunning Gothic story to our latest anthology! We are seeking authors interested in a truly challenging writing project. The latest Enter At Your Own Risk collection is a radical look at differing points of view. Every story has a protagonist. However, every story also has a cast of secondary characters to round out the narrative and themes. Below you will see a list of the stories we are offering and the fascinating look into the perspectives of some of those secondary characters. Interested in a challenge? We are adding one more Gothic master to our list! Edgar Allan Poe is one of the most famous Gothic dark fiction writers of all time. In his infamous story “The Black Cat,” we descend into a madman’s fears and paranoia. But what of the other two characters in the tale? The cat and the narrator’s wife play very significant roles in this story, but we never hear directly from them. We want the stories from the cat and the wife. How did they see these horrific events? How did they feel as they watched the protagonist slip into madness? Choose one of Poe’s other characters and re-tell his terrible tale! Submission guidelines: Deadline: 30 April word count: 2000-7000K Payment: $35 flat fee We want the tone, atmosphere, and feel of the Gothic masters. Less gore/ blood and more fear/ suspense. send submissions to: [email protected]

Deadline: April 30th 2013 Payment: 5 cents per word Penumbra is looking for original, unpublished stories of 3500 words or less. We prefer that writers use Standard Manuscript Format for submissions. (You can read this article by Chuck Rothman on the SFWA site on preparing a manuscript for submission if you are unfamiliar with SMF.) Please send your stories as file attachments in .rtf or .doc formats only. Please include a cover letter in the body of your email, with the manuscript title, you pen name if applicable, the exact word count of the story not including title and byline, and a publication history if applicable. Penumbra is a professional rates paying publisher, paying 5 cents per word. We will evaluate poetry submissions for each issue. We will also consider previously published stories with rights reverted to the author. Penumbra has multiple issue calls open at the same time, therefore it is imperative that you include the issue theme in the subject line of your email. Submissions that do not include this information risk getting lost in our queue and not read before the deadline. Penumbra uses Musa Publishing's house style guide, which relies upon the Chicago Manual of Style. All accepted stories will be edited to reflect Musa house style. If you have never been published before, please tell us. Penumbra likes publishing new authors as much as we like publishing experienced authors. Every month, we select one of the best stories from an author with little or no publishing experience and feature that story and author as our Rising Talent recipient for the month. The Rising Talent author's story, biography, and a non-fiction essay will be featured on our website for a full year, as well as spotlighted in the Penumbra issue for that month. We absolutely do...

Deadline: May 1st, 2013 Payment: Exposure Only Yeah, we spent two months thinking about it, but still couldn’t come up with a better title than that. We know you’re busy setting pen to paper crafting devious, speculative (possibly metrical) verse for our recently unveiled Poetry Issue, but we also wanted to give you the what-for’s and how-to’s on the second of three special editions JDP will be publishing in 2013. Simply put, we’ve always wanted to do a Lovecraft issue. But not just the standard collection of pastiches, because there are lots of other people around doing that and doing it well. So…inspired by Gaiman stories like “A Study in Emerald” and “I Cthulhu,” we’re looking for something special…a mash-up of one literary style or theme with ol’ Howard Phillips to create something new, ideally something dark and ferocious, very possibly with a healthy dose of humor. In short, write Lovecraft like Neil Gaiman! Guidelines 1. No copyright infringement. We’d love to see Batman fist-fight Nyarlahotep as much as the next quirky lit mag, but we can’t publish characters that belong to someone else. So whatever you’re going to mash-up with Lovecraft, make sure that either a) you created it or b) it’s in the public space. Related: since Neil already went to town with Sherlock Holmes and won a Hugo for his troubles, you might want to scratch that character off your list. 2. No trunk stories. Look, we love Innsmouth Free Press and things like the Cthulhurotica anthologies by Dagan Books, but if they’ve already rejected you, we’re probably not interested. (Unless they said, “Wow, this is something like Neil Gaiman would write!” But they probably would’ve accepted it if that was the case.) Bottom line: conjure something fresh from depths of outer space for us. We want...

Deadline: May 1st 2013 Payment: $20 USD and a copy of the anthology Love writing short stories? We’ll be releasing three anthologies this year under our series line entitled, Three Little Words. Yep, you guessed it, each story in the respective collection must use the three little words in the title. Cute, huh? Witches, Stitches, and Bitches – What if you had the power to sew up the mouth of the evil bitch who called you fat in 10th grade? How would you deal with a curse that caused you to be infertile because you stole the heart of someone else’s love? Would you choose love or the ability to have children? We are looking for 13 stories involving a witch, a stitch, and a bitch. The stories will revolve around the witches’ calendar which begins with October. We would like five stories in the book to involve holidays (Samhain-we will take two- one to open the book and the other to close it, Yule, Beltane, and Mabon). If you plan to write a holiday story please identify this in your submission letter. Deadline May 1, 2013. Please use the form at the right to submit your story for consideration. One submission per anthology will be accepted. Payment for anthology stories is $20 USD and a copy of the anthology. In return, you give us exclusive rights for one year from the date of publication, after that you are free to submit the story to other publications as long as you acknowledge us as first publisher. We only ask that for five years after date of publication that you do not self-publish the story on Smashwords, Barnes and Noble, Amazon, or any other self-pub medium.

Deadline: May 1st, 2013 Payment: 2 contributors copies At last it can be told! An anthology of all-new stories about Carnacki, the Ghost-Finder is NOW OPEN FOR SUBMISSIONS! Later this year, to coincide with the first issue of SARGASSO (The Journal of Hodgson Studies), I will be publishing an all new collection of Carnacki stories and I am currently looking for submissions! Carnacki remains one of Hodgson’s most popular creations with not only new stories about the character appearing but he has been included in comic books as well as novels from other writers. I’m looking for a fresh crop of writers to tackle the stories of this intrepid Ghost-Hunter! So here’s the details: stories should be between 3,000-6,000 words (anything longer, please query first); stories should feature Carnacki in some aspect; no explicit gore, violence or sex, please; payment will be in 2 contributors copies; DEADLINE for submissions is May 1, 2013 so, yes, this will be closing quickly. CARNACKI: THE NEW ADVENTURES is planned for an August, 2013, release at the Necronomicon convention in Providence, RI. Send your submissions (or questions) to me at: [email protected] with the tag CARNACKI SUBMISSION in the subject line. I look forward to reading all of these great new Carnacki stories and presenting to everyone an exciting new collection of tales about this timeless character. Get your submissions in early! William Meikle already did!

Deadline: May 5th 2013 Payment: 1 Contributor's Copy We are open to submissions for Shifters, a themed charity anthology, for POD paperback and eBook publication. It will benefit the American Humane Association’s Red Star Rescue Team, which provides disaster response services for pets and domestic animals. The release will coincide with the World Horror Convention in June. We are looking for shapeshifter and were-creature stories of any type, for an adult audience. Horror stories with werewolves, shapeshifter erotica, weird western, science fiction, reimagined fairy tales… as long as it features a shapeshifter or were-beast. Word Count: 2,000 to 10,000 words preferred, but flexible. We also need a small number of very short flash pieces, 250 words or less. In addition to being in the book, these may be printed on postcards as promotional pieces. We are also looking for submissions for cover art and art for the promo pieces. Payment for stories, and for artwork: 1 print contributor’s copy of the anthology. All proceeds from sales of the anthology will be going to the charity. Rights: We will be asking for First Electronic and First Print Rights (unless it’s a reprint). Please remember that you can only sell your various ”First” rights once, and that you will only be able to market your accepted story later as a reprint, once we have published it, which may limit where you can submit it to in the future, and how much you may be paid for it. Only you can make this business decision for yourself. Deadline: May 5th, 2013. Submit the full story to us at [email protected], with “Shifters” in the subject line. Include a little information about yourself as well. Multiple submissions: Ok Simultaneous submissions: Ok, just let us know. Reprints: We prefer original stories for this anthology, but will...

Deadline: May 5th 2013 Payment: $100 flat rate per each manuscript accepted into the collection ‘Ominous Realities’ focuses on the dark side of the speculative street. For this collection of short stories, we’re looking for work that fits comfortably into the Dark Science Fiction and Dark Fantasy genres, but that is a ‘cut above.’ If you’re an author whose subject matter is complex, disturbing, visceral, or brooding and thought provoking, then you’ll want it included in ‘Ominous Visions.’ If you make your home in dark horror science fiction or dark horror fantasy or anywhere in between, as long as you dwell near the center of all that is horrible, you need to have your work included in this upcoming anthology. DEADLINE – May 5, 2013. We are looking for your Speculative Horror Fiction. As long as it is dark and dreadful. For our upcoming anthology ‘Ominous Realities,’ we’re looking for the darkest voices working in the areas of Science Fiction, Science Fantasy and Speculative Horror Fiction. Whether your vision includes alien intervention, biblical apocalypse, dystopian existences or simply fantastical and frightening concepts of life current or past, we want to see what you’ve got up your sleeve. We do not want to limit the creativity or our authors, preferring instead to let each writer’s words speak to them from the place that is most comfortable. We’re looking to include the best and brightest new voices writing in Speculative Fiction today, and ‘Ominous Realities’ is intended to celebrate that creativity, without limitations. Please review our Submissions Guidelines below, and feel free to contact us here on the site with any questions. or send a message to [email protected]. But, keep in mind we have a VERY short deadline! *’Ominous Realities’ is a working title. Grey Matter Press reserves the right to change...

Deadline: May 15th 2013 Payment: $20 Dark Bits will be a collection of 52 horror flash fiction stories. We have no restrictions or subject or taste, only on the length. The anthology will be book and ebook formats. Reprints are welcome. Maximum of 500 words. We are asking for non-exclusive print and digital rights Payment is $20 per story. Deadline for submission is 15 May, 2013 There are two ways to submit to Dark Bits. We take submissions through Submittable.com. http://apokrupha.submittable.com/submit/07d27c0e-f6e2-40db-b341-bc54b8616daa Please remember, Submittable is a third party site. Please read the Terms of Service before you sign up. Submissions can also be emailed with the subject line: DARK BITS, your name, story name as a DOC file attachment to: [email protected] Dark Bits will be the first in a series of anthologies, entitled QuickLII

Deadline: May 19th 2013 Payment: Exposure Only What we’re looking for is previously unpublished old-style pulp stories in the genres of science fiction, fantasy and horror. Word length 6000. Please follow, as far as possible, the Lester Dent Pulp Fiction Formula. The content, as long as it’s sci fi/fantasy/horror, is up to the individual author, but try to make it pulpy and retro. Weird tales, superheroes, Flash Gordon-style space opera, even noir or spy-fi, as long as it has a supernatural or SF twist, will all be accepted. Deadline: 19th May. Payment: exposure plus discounted copies. Send all submissions to [email protected]

Deadline: May 20th 2013 Payment: An eBook copy will be sent to all contributors and up to 5 paperback copies per author will be available to purchase at cost plus shipping. 50% of the royalties will be distributed between all contributors. Not afraid of the water, are you? Maybe you haven't thought about what might be down there... Write us something original; tell us what is so terrifying about two Hydrogen atoms bonded to one Oxygen atom forming a single molecule. Should we be afraid of the water itself, or what it might be hiding below its surface? Shallow murky depths, clear hot springs that are deceptively deep, or underground caverns holding secrets yet to be discovered. Think about it. Don't just spin an average yarn - we want the reader to wonder if the next time they dip their toes into the water, it be their last. The series is called FEAR, that should fairly well define the parameters, and remember - we publish fictional tales, not scientific journals. Accepting Submissions: April 1, 2013 - May 20, 2013 Word Count minimum: 4,000 words - nothing less will be reviewed; no reprints considered. Submission guidelines: Accepting Submissions - April 1, 2013 - May 20, 2013. Word Count: 4,000 - 10,000 words. Please submit your manuscript as a *.doc or *.docx file (all other formats will automatically be rejected. Contact us prior to submitting if this presents an issue for you.) Font and formatting: Please submit in Times New Roman, 12 point font; single line spacing with a 0 point definition above and below each line. Please format the document to 1st line indentation of .5" (1.27cm), do not space or tab to indent the line. The page margin should be set to .5" (1.27cm) on all sides. Graphic gore must...