Events

Deadline: June 1st, 2018 Payment: $0.03 per word Note: I almost didn't share this just so I'd have less competition for submitting in case I can write something in time. That's how much I love this call! You're all welcome that I'm not actually that selfish! We know we have a tendency to say, “Attention writers! Some new hotness!” but this is literally some new burn-the-roof-of-your-mouth hotness. Inspired mostly by David James Keaton’s struggle to find good pizza in California and pitching ideas to Max Booth when he’s hungry after working a 12-hour shift at the Overlook, get ready for… TALES FROM THE CRUST: An Anthology of Pizza Horror edited by Keaton and Booth and published by Perpetual Motion Machine Publishing. Originally Keaton was thinking of calling it PIZZA MY SKULL because there’s a pizza place around San Jose called Pizza My Heart, meaning “piece of my heart,” and so he thought a “piece of my skull” joke would be hilarious. Turns out that’s a lot of assumptions to make about a gag. Also their pizza is gross. Luckily, George Cotronis brainstormed a much better title (though it might make people wonder if there’s a “Crustkeeper/Cryptkeeper” hosting the show). Speaking of Mr. Cotronis! Holy lord look at the cover art he’s come up with. WE WANT TO LIVE IN THIS WORLD… This is exactly the vibe we’re going for here. Not so much the goofy Goosebumps thing you might imagine with a pizza horror story, but we’re taking it kind of seriously. Like we take our pizza seriously. The humor is inherent in the pizza theme already, so we’re playing this kind of straight. And if you think you’ve got what it takes, like a healthy love of the cheesy cuisine, send us your best work. Now, you may be...

Deadline: June 1st, 2018 Payment: $25 if Kickstarter fails, $100-$500 if it succeeds. Attention Authors! We are soliciting short stories by new and established authors in the fantasy genre, between 3,500 and 7,000 words in length. (Shorter or longer works will be considered in cases of exceptional merit.) The goal is to select at least ten entries for publication* in a short-story anthology, to be funded with a Kickstarter project. At least two entries will be selected from among those received before the Kickstarter goes live. Payment to the selected authors will depend on the success of the Kickstarter. If it funds, authors will receive a minimum of $100 each (max $500). If it fails, authors will receive $25 each, paid out of my pocket. (Sign up here if you want to know when the Kickstarter goes live, as well as other project milestones.) (Our first Call for Submissions, in the military-fiction genre, can be viewed here. The associated Kickstarter met its goal, resulting in the authors being paid $100 each; ultimately, the anthology was placed under contract by an independent publisher. While we can’t promise similar results this time, we are hopeful.) Submission Rules How to submit: Email your manuscript (acceptable document formats: Word, PDF, Pages, TXT, RTF) to the following address: submissions at orenlitwin dot com. Begin the subject line with “”, and make sure to list your contact information in the email itself. (Also, please mention how you heard of this anthology!) SUBMISSION DEADLINE: JUNE 1, 2018. Genre: Fantasy, broadly defined. This includes traditional high fantasy, urban fantasy, or any other flavor that includes a magical or fantastical element. (If you are interested in other genres, please suggest them for our next project!) Theme: “Ye Olde Magick Shoppe.” This need not be taken literally; however, your story must include as a significant plot element the selling of magic, either as a good or service, by someone whose profession this...

Deadline: June 1st, 2018 Payment: $250 for stories and essays and $75 for poems SUBMITTING TO SLICE SLICE magazine welcomes submissions for short fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. We’re looking for anyone with a fresh voice and a compelling story to share, and we are particularly enthusiastic about championing emerging voices. The best way to get a sense of Slice’s content is to read the magazine. You can subscribe here. At the core, Slice aims to bridge the gap between emerging and established authors by offering a space where both are published side-by-side. In each issue, a specific cultural theme becomes the catalyst for articles, interviews, stories, and poetry from renowned writers and lesser known voices alike. We offer all contributors of Slice a monetary award for their work ($250 for stories and essays and $75 for poems). GUIDELINES Our reading period is currently open. The reading period runs from April 1 – June 1, 2018. The theme is “Time.” All submissions during that time will be considered for Issue 24, which will be released spring 2019. Click here to submit via Submittable, an online submissions manager. Please note, we are unable to accept any submissions sent to us via email or post. The maximum word count for submissions is 5,000 words. Simultaneous submissions are acceptable as long as we’re notified immediately if the work is selected for publication elsewhere. All work should be previously unpublished. Please allow up to three months for us to reply to your submission. VISUAL ART SUBMISSIONS If you’d like to contribute art to Slice, please drop us a line at art at slicemagazine dot org and include either a link to your online portfolio or a PDF of recent work. Via: Slice Magazine.

Deadline: June 1st, 2018 Payment: $0.02 per word Deadline: June 1, 2018 Theme: Flash Fiction horror that feels real while containing anthropomorphic animals as characters Word Count: up to 1000 words Payment: $0.02 per word Editor: Weasel Dread is an online horror furry magazine that focuses on flash fiction (1000 words or less). We are seeking short scenes of dreadfully frightening stuff containing anthropomorphic animals (humanized animals). We’re trying to create something along the lines of a furry No Sleep (see Reddit No Sleep for example stories). Suspension of disbelief is key. The story will have to feel real. Although this is a horror magazine project, there are limits as to what we can actually take. Rule of thumb: If you can get away with it in an R-rated film, you’ll most likely be fine. Blood and gore, nudity, light sex are fine. Reprints are fine with us as long as you own the rights to your story. Simultaneous submissions are fine! If your story is accepted elsewhere, it is your responsibility to let us know. Weasel Press asks for Non-Exclusive rights to your story in perpetuity. Submissions are taken through Submittable. Use one submittable form to upload your story(stories if more). The form will take up to 3 DOC or DOCX documents. That means you’ll have to have all of your submission ready when you send it off. As this is an online only magazine, there will not be a print version of it. We will display a free PDF document of the project once completed. If you would like a kindle version, we will have one available for $0.99. Dread: A Furry Horror Mag Submit Via: Weasel Press. (Have to click through to submit.)

Deadline: June 1st, 2018 Payment: £3.50 (UK) / $5.00 (US) At Three Drops Press, we’ve always enjoyed when a bit of pixie fiction or a gnome poem lands in the submissions inbox, so a themed anthology in honour of the Good Folk was inevitable. And the time has come to throw open the doors to Fairyland and ask for your best work on nature spirits and elemental creatures of all kinds – and there really is no shortage of these beings in myth, folklore, and literature around the world and down the centuries. Submissions will close on 1 June 2018, and the tiny-sized anthology will be published as near to the Summer Solstice (northern hemisphere – 21 June 2018) as possible. Please read the guidelines carefully, as this is a very special anthology: Poems should fit nicely on a page measuring 10.795 cm x 17.463cm with 1.25 cm margins all around. Yes that’s right: this one is a pocket-book. (We know some elves and fairies are human-sized, or bigger, but the editor has a weakness for tiny, cute things. It’s probably why she had so many babies.) Please submit 1-5 poems of 40 lines or under, or 1-3 micro-to-flash fictions of 500 words or less. Send the poems / stories in the body of the email or in a Word document – please NO PDFs – to [email protected] with the subject line ‘Fairy Rings – Genre – Your name’ e.g. mine would be ‘Fairy Rings – Poetry – Kate Garrett’ Previously published work is ok, but you must own the rights and let us know where it first appeared. Please NO simultaneous submissions. This call is open for 6 weeks and we will take no longer than 6 weeks at the absolute longest to respond (usually much faster). Thank you...

Deadline: June 5th, 2018 Payment: 6 cents per word. Hello, I am FearBot3000. I was programmed to notice breathless confusion across social media. Confusion often follows the infallible decrees of Lord Commander Patagonia. Albeit infallible, sometimes his decrees require an algorithm to reach a state of clarity. The title of Cockroach Conservatory Vol. 1 is: The Working Zealot's Guide to Gaining Capital in Pre-Apocalyptic America What are we looking for? Weird stories about cults, capitalism, working stiffs, and weirdos. We like bizarro. We like horror. We like our sci-fi and fantasy on the weirder side. We like humor. Think Joe R. Lansdale. Think Victor Pelevin. Think Brian Keene. Think Jessica McHugh. Really. This is a loosey-goosey guideline. The title obfuscates as much as it reveals. We know. It was done on purpose. Cults! Murder! Capitalism! Take it and run. Word count: no more than 3000 words. Payment: 6 cents per word. Is that weird Soviet era sci-fi illustration of a robot the cover? No, it's just a public domain placeholder for this website. We have commissioned a local Austin, TX artist for the cover. Poetry Send no more than 3 poems. If accepted, we'll pay a flat rate of $10 per poem. SUBMISSIONS ARE OPEN UNTIL JUNE 5, 2018. Anything submitted after that will go unread unless we announce an extension. Send your stuff as a doc or docx file to [email protected]. rtf file format will not be opened. Subject line should read: SUBMISSION - - Include a short bio in your email. Try to follow this format. We don't need your physical mailing address. We want first North American rights to your story on acceptance. Payment will be on publication. We'll send contracts out and exchange payment information on acceptance. FearBot3000 returns to Sleep Mode. Via: The Cockroach Conservatory.

Deadline: June 15th, 2018 Payment: $10-20 and a contributor's copy DEADLINE: 15 JUNE 2018 AIR surrounds us. Invisible but everywhere, AIR can be gentle and playful spirit, or an aggressive and destructive force. Winds lift and move water, driving the storms and waves that irrigate crops and shape shorelines. The breeze can transport seeds, fertilizing the earth and spreading life in its wake. AIR feeds fire, gives life to its burning creativity. Our words and music vibrate within AIR; its gusts allow our species to communicate and sing with one and other. AIR fills the spaces within our lives, it is the element that whispers dreams and lets the world dance. TRANSMUNDANE PRESS is searching for stories centered on and about AIR for the next anthology in our series focusing on the classic alchemic elements, EARTH, AIR, FIRE, and WATER. We enjoy reading well-crafted fantasy, horror, erotic, and science fiction tales, and we're looking for authors with clean, heavily-edited writing to showcase alongside our established contributors. Let your imagination squall and launch you IN THE AIR. We’re only accepting 30-40 stories for this anthology. SUBMISSION GUIDELINES: Send stories that are heavily edited and ready for us to read. These must be original pieces for first-time publication. Limit of two submissions per person, if you have more, make a note of it in your email, and we’ll ask if we’re interested. WORD COUNT:  between 3,000 and 7,000 words. FORMATTING: Your submissions must be in 12 point, Times New Roman font, double-spaced with page numbers. We like headers in the top right corner with your last name and page numbers so that your work can't get jumbled up. A title page with author information: address, e-mail, phone number, word count, a brief author bio, and your platform links. SUBMITTING THE FILE: word...

Deadline: June 15th, 2018 Payment: $60 USD for fiction and $30 USD for poetry Our reading periods are as follows: February 1–March 15 for our Spring (April) issue; May 1–June 15 for our Summer (July) issue; August 1–September 15 for our Autumn (October) issue; and November 1–December 15 for our Winter (January) issue. Feel free to record your submissions at Duotrope and/or the Submissions Grinder. We are also listed on Ralan. Fiction and Poetry Guidelines Arsenika is looking for previously unpublished original fiction and poetry up to 1,000 words long. Payment is $60 USD for fiction and $30 USD for poetry for first world electronic rights and non-exclusive audio rights. We hope to raise the poetry rate to $60 as well in the future—please support us on Patreon if you’d like to help us reach our goal. Submit no more than two flash fiction pieces and five poems at a time, and please make sure you fill out the form again for each piece you send, unless the pieces are meant to be read together (e.g. a triptych of poems). All work should be in Standard Manuscript Format (fiction format/poetry format). Format poetry exactly as you would like to see it online—use italics for italics, underlines for underlines, boldface for boldface, etc. Send only TXT, RTF, DOC, and DOCX files. Please do not send simultaneous submissions (pieces that are submitted to Arsenika and another market at the same time). Multiple submissions are accepted, but please have no more than two flash fiction pieces and five poems in the submissions queue at a time. We try to respond to all submissions within 14 days. If you haven’t heard from us in 30 days, please send us a query at [email protected]. Remember: Don’t self-reject. Submissions are currently CLOSED. We will reopen for...

Deadline: June 15, 2018 Payment: $5 Canadian Time-travelling bank heists! Prison breakouts from the fortresses of immortal wizards! Train robberies by steam-powered automatons! Intergalactic spies! Battles of wits between cyborg hackers and AI detectives! Swashbuckling! Fisticuffs! Ridiculously complicated schemes! People gathered around a diorama of a bank vault making wisecracks! Things not going according to plan! We're looking for fast-paced, dramatic stories up to 7,000 words, with protagonists we can admire for their intricate planning, improvisation, and general adroitness (whether they succeed or fail in the end). Think "Topkapi", "Inside Man", that episode of Firefly where they rob the train, that sort of thing. We want to see elaborate heists and impressive schemes, in a science-fictional or fantasy setting (any subgenre). We welcome and encourage submissions from authors of traditionally underrepresented backgrounds, and we'd love to see stories that subvert or play with genre tropes. We will be open to submissions from May 1 to June 15, 2018. As stated, the word limit is 7,000 words; if you have a longer story that you think would be a particularly good fit for our theme, please query us before sending. Please send your submissions as either a .doc or .rtf (no .docx) to [email protected]. What we don't want: Stories with no speculative fiction element. This isn't a market for true crime stories or modern-day thrillers. Horror stories, or stories with gratuitous or unnecessary violence or gore. We enjoy a good fight scene and we're not averse to violence that's necessary to the story, but we don't want a straight-up murder spree. We much prefer protagonists who get out of a jam with quick thinking, fancy footwork, clever dialogue and razzle-dazzle. If your story is further along the horror spectrum than "creepily atmospheric," we're probably the wrong place for it. Likewise, we're fine...

Deadline: June 15th, 2018 Payment: 10,000 words – $100 / 7,500 words – $75 / 5,000 words – $50 / 2,500 words – $25 / 1,500 words – $15 Note: Writers must be from Texas and the story must take place in Texas. Hello, E.R. Bills here. I am the editor of Vol 3 of the upcoming horror title, Road Kill: Texas Horror by Texas Writers, from Hellbound Books Publishing. Due to the popularity of the Road Kill anthology, I’m “scaring” up stories from Texas writers again. I’m looking for original horror stories, 1,500–10,000 words, give or take. If I receive a 14,000-word story that really blows my hair back, I will consider it. And the same for an 800-word tale. I prefer not to receive stories that have already appeared elsewhere. Submissions should be sent to [email protected] The primary objective of Road Kill is to promote new and up-and-coming horror writers in Texas, but the collection will include some works from established writers (previous contributors to Road Kill are invited to submit as well). The stories must be written and submitted by Texas writers and they must take place in Texas—hence the title. No one will be making a fortune, but we will be paying one-time fees (based on word count) and if the anthology sells over 5,000 copies, royalty percentages—1% per writer—will kick in. Every writer will receive two free copies and enjoy discounted wholesale pricing on any copies of the book that he or she purchases to carry and sell on their own. The scale for writer stipends is as follows: 10,000 words – $100 / 7,500 words – $75 / 5,000 words – $50 / 2,500 words – $25 / 1,500 words – $15 All payments will be made upon official acceptance and when acceptance is communicated,...