Taking Submissions: NonBinary Review #37

Deadline: August 1st, 2024
Payment: $10 for poetry, $25 for artwork, 1 cent per word for fiction
Theme: False Memories
Note: Reprints Welcome

NonBinary Review is currently open for submissions on the theme of FALSE MEMORIES.

False memories first came to public consciousness in the 1980s when a group of pre-schoolers at a California preschool were coached by well-meaning social workers and police investigators into “remembering” Satanic abuse that never happened. The fallout from that episode wasn’t just the persecution of an innocent family, but a nationwide mass delusion now known as “the Satanic Panic,” where authorities were warning the public about supposed widespread satanic cults committing heinous acts of abuse. Not a single one of these warnings were founded in fact, and it is now known that a large number of them were propaganda.

But false memories aren’t always bad. There is a common phenomenon wherein people hear stories of their early childhoods so often that those stories turn into “memories.” It is common in dreams to have “memories” of things that happened to the dream self, but not to the real self. Or a person might believe that they took their regular medication, brought in the garbage bins, or picked up the mail when they haven’t.

We’re looking for weird and wonderful stories of not just the memories themselves, but of their production, their repercussions, their wider meanings. We’re looking for false memories that might have changed history, that led to remarkable discoveries, that impacted lives.

We’re NOT looking stories of recovered memories. Recovered memories are memories of real events that have been suppressed because they’re traumatic, and are a widely disputed phenomenon. We would also like to avoid stories centering abuse, trauma, and violence.

Zoetic Press publishes the best in speculative lit – experimental, interstitial, luminous. We welcome submissions from EVERYONE. The only requirement is that they be in English, or translated into English (we love a translation). If your writing is outstanding, no matter who you are, we have a place for it.

NonBinary Review, our award-winning themed lit journal is published quarterly. Each issue revolves around a specific theme, but we’re asking contributors to go beyond the old familiar media tropes – we want speculative work that looks at our theme from unexpected angles.

We’re looking for work we can read with our whole body – work that gives us goosebumps, makes us see the world differently, has the tang of authenticity, makes us sit up and listen, and smells like….something. This analogy got out of hand. What we’re saying is that we’re not looking for re-hashes of images or stories we’ve read before. We want contributors to explore every facet of our themes, really getting in between the cracks, in the corners, all the forgotten places that no one ever thinks to explore. We want to read work that makes us think “I never would have thought of this, and yet, it’s so fitting!”

What we’re NOT looking for is work that centers violence, rape, misogyny, racism, ableism, or degrading stereotypes of any kind. We know you’re not that kind of writer, but we thought it should be said.

NonBinary Review accepts reprints, but we do ask for previous publication details so they can be credited.

Prose submissions (for which we pay 1¢ per word) should be 3000 words or fewer in length, double-spaced in 12pt Times New Roman font or similar.

Poetry submissions (for which we pay a $10 flat fee) should include no more than 3 poems, each of which may be up to 3 pages in length. Please include each poem as a separate file.

Art submissions (for which we pay a $25 flat fee) should include no more than 5 pieces. Each piece should be at least 300dpi, and at least 600 pixels on its smallest side. Any piece chosen for cover art will pay $50. We do not accept any submission that consists of links to an artist’s website.

Please ensure that you are submitting to the correct category, as we have different editing teams for each. Submissions sent to the wrong category (e.g., poetry submissions sent to the prose category) will be declined.

Dear Horace Greeley invites writers to ask questions about writing, submitting, publication, and any other aspect of the literary life that baffle them, and we’ll answer them online. We don’t promise that we have all the answers, but we do promise that we’re here for you!

Feedback for Poets of Color is just what it sounds like. People of color may submit ONE poem, up to 50 lines, for consideration. Two poets per month will be accepted, and the Poetry Editors will work with those two poets to edit, improve, and strengthen their work. Acceptances are done on the first of the month, although submissions are open year-round.

Heartbeats: Visual Verse invites poets to push the boundaries of poetry. We’re looking for poetry that combines narration, music, and visuals to create a complete experience. We’re not looking for a static reading or words scrolling down a screen – we want interplay between visuals and audio that create something more than the sum of its parts. Poets may submit work of up to 140 seconds in length. We pay a flat fee of $25 per accepted video.

Only those categories below are currently open for submissions.

While there is a published close date for submissions, we have an acceptance cap for each issue, and submissions will be closed once we reach that cap, so don’t wait until the last minute.

Via: Non-Binary Review’s Submittable.