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Deadline: May 31st, 2020 Payment: $10 Theme: Stories must include a key worker and a hopeful ending Flashes of Hope is a Flash Fiction anthology being funded by Theresa Derwin to raise money for foodbanks to support victims of Covid 19. Francois Vaillancourt is donating the cover art. He is a Montreal-Canadian artist who has worked on Stephen King projects. I will be purchasing HWA Adverts and Newsletter space to help promote the book and also seeking advertising in other venues including Crystal Lake Publishing Newsletter and Twitter boost. What we ARE looking for:• Flash Fiction – stories of 500 – 1,000 words. Please see info on payment caps in pay rate section below) that can be characterized as being within the broad category of “horror” fiction and having met the following two criterion; as described above.  A key worker hero of any gender, race, creed, ability, religion, etc. By key worker, we mean those currently working to keep the UK running * nurses, doctors, porters, ambulance drivers, paramedics, shop workers, refuse workers * this list is not exhaustive A hopeful ending to the story * right now we need to encourage hope in light of the challenges we are all facing. Together we are stronger. • Successful submissions will be highly original, well written and cleanly edited.• Stories must hook the reader in opening paragraphs and remain engaging throughout.• Stories that imagine fresh new horrific futures different from anything we’ve seen or read about before.REPRINTS are allowed. What we ARE NOT looking for:• No multiple or simultaneous submissions.• We are not seeking “extreme horror”Explicit language, sexuality and violence is acceptable, however, if handled in a tasteful manner and integral to the story.• We are not seeking abstract mood pieces, vignettes, or highly experimental approaches to literature. We are not accepting poems.• Stories must not include actual individuals or living public figures. No matter how tempting ….•...

Deadline: May 31st, 2020 Payment: $0.03 per word, minimum of $30.00 dollars for short stories. $30 per poem Theme: Redemption Note: This call doesn't officially open until the 15th but is going live early due to the short submission window Apparition Lit is open for poetry and short story submissions four times a year. February 15-28 May 15-31 August 15-31 November 15-30 Submissions received outside of posted open dates will be deleted unread. Our themes for 2020 will be: Experimentation (Submission period November 15-30, 2019 CLOSED, Published January 2020) Transfiguration (Submission period February 15-29, 2020, CLOSED Published April 2020) Redemption (Submission period May 15-31, 2020, CLOSED Publishing July 2020) Satisfaction (Submission period August 15-31, 2020, CLOSED Publishing October 2020) Our previous themes for 2019: Resistance (Published January 2019) – Ambition (Published April 2019) – Retribution (Published July 2019) – Euphoria (Published October 2019) for 2018: Apparition (Published January 2018) – Delusion (Published April 2018) – Vision (Published July 2018) – Diversion (Published October 2018) Apparition Lit also holds monthly flash fiction contests. These stories will follow selected themes and be published online. For more information on themes and submission guidelines, please see the flash fiction drop down below. PAYMENT: Apparition is a semi-pro rate magazine, paying $0.03 per word, minimum of $30.00 dollars for short stories (excluding flash contest. See details in the Flash Fiction dropdown for flash rates) and a flat fee of $30 per poem. If we accept your story, we are purchasing the right to publish the story online and in the quarterly edition. Rights will revert back to the artist after one year. WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR: (Click on the sections to see detailed guidelines for each classification.) SHORT FICTION SHORT FICTION: We will only accept stories between 1000-5000 words. If the story is complete with an extra hundred words, then it will still be considered. Any stories over 5,100 words, or incorrectly formatted, will automatically be rejected. PAYMENT: Apparition is a semi-pro magazine, paying $0.03 per word, minimum of 30.00 dollars (excluding...

Deadline: May 31st, 2020 Payment: $15 for novellas, $3 for flash fiction, $8 for short stories, half that for reprints. Theme: Cutting edge Science Fiction, Slipstream, Classic and Modern Fantasy Note: Reprints Welcome Note: My apologies for the short notice, that should be resolved for the next open window. Submissions Welcome to the Silver Pen Writers Association group of publications. From this web page, you will have an opportunity to submit your work to Silver Blade Magazine. General Guidelines (Updated February 2020) Give us something unexpected and well written.  Technique, voice, characterization, and language will all play a part in our decision to publish.  Amaze us with your writing, use of language, sense of story, and memorable characters.  Give us a story readers will not be able to forget and will eagerly recommend to others. The following are “hard sells” here: Stories possessing several of the cliché elements listed here. Fan Fiction or erotica Anthropomorphism (talking cats, foxes, toasters or whatever) Sloppy work–significant typographical, spelling, or grammatical errors (please proofread before you submit) Publicly available items (seriously, why would we pay to publish something being given away on a blog, forum, social media, etc?) Our editorial policies respect the artistic license of our authors.  However, there are occasions when changes are needed that go beyond basic spelling, grammar, and punctuation corrections. In any case, the author will be given the choice of final approval, prior to publication, over substantial edits made by our staff. We appreciate your willingness to work with us in this regard. Do not submit if you are not open to suggestions. Formatting All submissions should… Have 1 inch margins, 1 1/2 line spacing and double space between paragraphs. NO fancy headers or footers, text effects, background colors or images. Use a standard font (Arial, Calibri, Times Roman, Courier)...

Deadline: May 31st, 2020 Payment: Contributors Copy Theme: Public Domain with a twist (see below.) Note: Reprints welcome Note: My apologies on the short window, just hit my inbox. Demonic Classics: Once Upon A Debacle ​ The Pitch: Demonic Classics is quite the challenge this time around. We are looking for Authors and Writers who want to add a dark humor twist to a fanfiction angle installment. Whether you intend to retell the whole story in a shortened format or dive deep into a famous scene and unravel it from within, we want your story to be inspired by a Public Domain literary work. We expect irony, a laugh, an ‘Oh no’, and some satirical twists to unfold. This year we are looking for stories between 2,000 to 5,000 words. Do not limit yourself to the list below, but feel free to email us if you need a title checked. Gutenberg.org is a great resource for doing so! ​ What stories fall into this category? Here’s a sampling: Pride and Prejudice The Raven Moby Dick Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Adventures of Sherlock Holmes Tale of Two Cities Great Expectations War of Worlds Christmas Carol Ulysses Picture of Dorian Grey Little Women Anne of Green Gables Count of Monte Cristo Wuthering Heights Treasure Island Legend of Sleepy Hollow Scarlet Letter Time Machine Find more here: http://www.gutenberg.org/browse/scores/top ​​ CURRENTLY TAKEN Alice in Wonderland Dracula Nutcracker MacBeth Much to do about nothing - Shakespeare Odyssey Peter Pan Beowulf Adventures of Huckleberry Finn ​ Deadline MAY 31st 2020 at Midnight EST ​ Publications September 2020 ​ Rights, Usage, Compensation? You retain rights to the work. I am simply approving it to be added with your permission to publish it in my collection for both eBook and Paperback. We are perfectly fine if its been published before,...

Deadline: June 1st, 2020 Payment: Royalty Split Theme: Stories of lights in the sky, further explanation below! Note: Reprints Welcome Submission Open: March 1, 2020 Submission Close: June 1, 2020 12:00 a.m. EST Publishing timeline: August 2020 SOON Horror/ Dark Speculative Fiction Rated R ​ Theme: Send me your stories of lights in the sky, a storm that brings with it more than rain, comets that crash, aliens that secretly invade, or a wishing star that is hell-bent on revenge. The stories themselves do not have to take place in the sky, but the evil bad does need to come from it in some way or form. We are requesting the stories take place in "our world". Fantasy and fantastic creatures are welcome, but they should occur within our reality. Word count: 1000 - 10000 (preferably over 2k under 8k but we will read all within these) ​ Compensation: Equal royalty split per story. Digital copy emailed to you. ​ Formatting guidelines: See our Submission Format guide below All fiction manuscripts should be in standard manuscript format. Most important: Pen name, title and email on top, double-spaced, 12 pt standard font (e.g. Times, Arial, Courier), and page numbers. ​ How to submit: Please submit using this FORM when the submission window is open. ​ Multiple Submission: Yes - We will be happy to read up to FOUR stories per author. However, we will publish a max of two stories per author, per book. Please send each story in a separate form. ​ Reprints: Yes we are accepting a small number of reprints. ​ Things that are a hard pass: any animal erotica and all forms of rape Click through for the submission form link: Via: Eerie River Publishing.

Deadline: June 1st, 2020 Payment: $20 Theme: We ask our fiction writers to imagine their readers navigating a story with one finger poised over a mouse button. Can your story stay that finger to the end? “Turning words into art is unnatural. It begins with a contrary attitude. It says, I am unhappy with the way things are and desire to make things different. Rather than represent the world, I will make something wildly and savagely new. I will defy logic. I will invest in new perceptions. I will combine and recombine and fabricate and juggle until something that I have never experienced is experienced. The process is alchemical. The process is violent. It goes to the heart of creativity. It disrupts and shatters. It is splendid with provocation. It is an aggression against banality. It is sharp and loud like a janitor scraping frost from a window. The hectic bounce of steam on a street after a truck roars by. The anarchy of waters, the comedy of the face, dangerous feelings vented from a cage of skin.” ~ John Olson Poetry — We believe poetry is contrary by nature, always defying, always tonguing the tang of novelty. We look especially for plurality of meaning, for dual reverberation of beauty and concern. Contrary’s poetry in particular often mimics the effects of fiction or commentary. We find ourselves enamored of prose poems because they are naturally contrary toward form – they tug on the forces of exposition or narrative – but prose poems remain the minority of all the poetic forms we publish. Please consider that Contrary receives vast amounts of poetry and that we can publish only a small percentage of that work. Please submit no more than three poems per issue. Our poetry editor is Shaindel Beers. Fiction — We ask our fiction writers to imagine...

Deadline: June 1st, 2020 Payment: 2.5¢ per word (maximum of $100 per story.) Theme: We are looking for short story submissions that explore the shape of sex and sexuality in the decades and centuries to come. Must be science fiction themed in nature. What will sex look like in the future? What will change about physical interaction? What new challenges will sexuality face a hundred years down the line? Five hundred? A thousand? Future//Tense: Sex is an anthology of transfuturistic science-fiction. The stories within will explore the way sex, intimacy, and kink may change over time, from the near future to far, on Earth or other planets, in humans or those from the stars. How will society change? How will we? About the anthology Future//Tense: Sex is an anthology of short fiction edited by Madison Scott-Clary. It will comprise several pieces from diverse authors. The anthology will be released in both physical and e-book formats, as well as, depending on interest, audiobook format. Here is what HYBRID will be looking for: Submission content We are looking for short story submissions that explore the shape of sex and sexuality in the decades and centuries to come. There is no restriction on gender of characters or perceived orientation, including anywhere on the asexuality spectrum. Neither is there a restriction on the sexual content of the story. We are particularly keen on featuring #OwnVoices authors. Do keep in mind that Future//Tense: Sex is, at it’s core, an anthology about sex. HYBRID Ink will not, under any circumstances, publish content that portrays any of the following without justification or in a positive light: Racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, or other forms of discrimination Pedophilia or sex with characters under the age of 18 Rape, torture, dubious consent, or forced seduction Gratuitous violence, gore, or death For more information, please see here, and remember that...

Deadline: June 1st, 2020 Payment: $20-$55 according to the category and length of their submission. Theme: Afrofuturism Submissions are OPEN from March 23 – June 1 for Issue 9: Afrofuturism (see below). Every issue of Speculative City is defined by a distinct theme. We are excited to announce our Issue 9 theme will be Afrofuturism. Writer Stefani Cox and writer/visual artist Jacqueline Barnes will act as guest editors for this issue. We are looking for afrofuturist fiction, poetry, and essays written by authors who are specifically of Black and/or African descent. And, as per usual, we seek provocative works that are centered within a cityscape. Writers published will be paid $20-$55 according to the category and length of their submission. We do not accept submissions exceeding 5500 words. All submissions should be the original, unpublished work of the submitter. We will accept simultaneous submissions, but please inform us if the submission has been accepted by another publication. We do not accept multiple submissions for fiction or essays. Please submit word (.doc, .docx) or rich text format (.rtf) files and format your submission according to our format guide. Please send all inquiries to info @ speculativecity .com . We try to respond to all submissions, but as a team of two, we may not always be able to. All submissions should be sent through Green Submissions. Green Submissions requires users to create an account. Please see link to sign up and submit at https://greensubmissions.com/1024/speculative-city/index.php. Before submitting work, please also be familiar with our contract. THEME afrofuturism noun|af·​ro·​fu·tur·​ism​ | \a-frō-fyü-chə-ˌri-zəm\ Definition of AFROFUTURISM noun literary works that use the frame of science fiction and fantasy to explore what Black futures could look like and to reimagine past and present experiences of the African diaspora Via: Speculative City.

Deadline: June 1st, 2020 Payment: $8 Theme: Love gone wrong. Note: Female authors only Deadline: June 1, 2020 Payment: $8 flat fee per story (author must have a valid PayPal address as that will be used for payment) Publisher: Twisted Wing Productions Theme: Love Gone Wrong The theme can explore ANY type of love: romantic or platonic, obsessive, mother/daughter/son relationship, father/daughter/son, bestfriends, siblings, unrequited love, loss of love, falling in love with the wrong person, addiction, love/attachment for a specific place, location or building, student/teacher relationship, etc. The genre is HORROR. Stories MUST have elements of horror in them. Requirements: For this edition of Women in Horror Anthology we’ll be focusing on longer pieces, meaning the word count will be at LEAST 10,000-30,000 words. The author submitting MUST BE FEMALE (or identify as female). The author must retain full rights to the work intended for our consideration and that the work itself is complete and not published anywhere else (including personal websites or social media). Having been previously published isn’t a requirement, if you have a compelling story, send it to us! Format: Word doc, 12 font, double space Times New Roman. Not a reprint. We are asking for exclusive first worldwide electronic and print rights for 18 months and the right to keep the story in print, and nonexclusive right to continue to publish for the life of the anthology. We do not place any limits on what the author does with the story after the exclusivity period. We are not looking for poetry or screenplays. Bonus: Characters in stories are own voices, POC, or LGBTQ Submission method: Please send story as an attachment (.doc or docx. Only) to azzurranoxyahoo.com Please include the following with your submission: Author (Legal Name) Pen name (if applicable) Email Story Title Word Count Third person biography The anthology will be published both...

Deadline: June 1st, 2020 Payment: $750 for fiction, $300 for poetry Theme: Climate Change Note: Looking for work by immigrants, asylum-seekers, and non-immigrant artists who have experienced displacement as a result of climate disaster PLEASE NOTE: The following submission guidelines apply to Volume 4, a special climate-themed issue of The Bare Life Review. They differ slightly from our usual guidelines, so please read carefully before submitting. ​ The Bare Life Review is pleased to accept unsolicited manuscripts in fiction, non-fiction, and poetry. Your cover letter should list the type of submission, a rough word count (or line count, in the case of poetry), and include a short bio. ​ The Bare Life Review does not consider proposals or queries. Please submit completed work only. ​ Please note that our rates have changed: We now offer $750 for accepted full-length prose pieces, and $300 for accepted poems or shorter prose. This small reduction will allow us to publish more authors, and to expand our online presence. ​ Eligibility: Please note that our eligibility criteria have been amended for Volume 4 only. For this special climate-themed issue, we are accepting submissions not only from immigrants and asylum-seekers, but also from non-immigrant artists who have experienced displacement as a result of climate disaster. For more information about these eligibility criteria, and the reasoning behind the temporary change, please read this note from our founders. ​ Translation: The Bare Life Review welcomes work in translation. Any writers not working in English, who have not yet secured translation of their work, may contact TBLR via email. In some cases we may be able to help find a translator. Subject Matter: As always, submissions will be judged on artistic grounds. However, for Volume 4 only, priority will be given to work that explores the issue's theme: Climate. Length: Fiction submissions should be no longer than 8,000 words. Please submit only one story at...