ZINE SCENE
Guernica is looking for submissions of poetry, essays, reportage/journalism, criticism and fiction. Read the guidelines carefully to make sure that the submissions go to the correct section.
Global Spotlights is for excerpts of work, 3,000-7,000 words, ‘published outside the Western corridors of literary taste-making and prestige’. Work is accepted in translation, particularly work which ‘retains inflections of the original.’ In fiction, they’re looking for short stories, novel excerpts, and hybrid texts, ‘fiction that is adventurous, unapologetic, experimental’. For non-fiction, it’s essays, reportage, memoir, criticism, and hybrid forms. Submissions in either genre must have been published within the last year by magazines, zines, and independent publishing houses outside the US and Canada, Western Europe, and Australia.
Check the guidelines for specific details. General fiction submissions should be 2,000-7,000 words. Poetry, 1-5 poems, is always welcome. The journalism/reportage, essays, memoir, criticism, and argument section wants work of 2,500 words or more. If the work is time sensitive say so, and add Reportage to the subject line if the work is journalism or reportage. Response time is
‘at least sixteen weeks’. Payment is $50 for poetry, $100 for original essays, and $150 for original fiction and reportage/journalism, for exclusive print and digital rights for 90 days.
Website: www.guernicamag.com
You have to like a zine which carries this warning: ‘This site is a speculative fiction project. Do not make any of these recipes. They’re impossible, dangerous, and not tasty.’
Deathcap and Hemlock has a weird sense of humour. Do not take them seriously and, as warned, don’t try cooking their recipes but do read them and shudder. Subs opened at the end of September – check their guidelines for the details. The team are ‘Calling all chefs!’ for the nastiest darkest goulash, the most violent sachertorte, or that transformative aperitif.’ They publish ‘a cookbook for a dreadful feast, in the style of a recipe blog.’ Read what’s published at the website and wonder at the writers’ imagination.
Submit fantastical recipes, under 1,000 words, preferably 200-400. Writers who can hint at a story behind the recipe – unfaithful husband, neighbour’s fouling dog, etc – ‘without violating the recipe structure’ are favoured. Format the recipe in cookbook style, ingredients list, steps, measurements etc., and a short introductory paragraph to the recipe is optional. Email the pieces to:
deathcapandhemlock@gmail.com
Response time is ‘reasonable. Payment is $10 for ‘worldwide first-rights for one month and a non-exclusive license to publish thenceforth.’
Website: www.deathcapandhemlock.com
Medusa Tales specialises in speculative stories, 100-5,000 words. The stories, SF, fantasy, and horror, as well as any sub-genre, should be about human transformation and immobilisation. Sex, violence, and profanity are acceptable if they’re integral to the story, but within reason please.
Subs are open to subs at regular periods, 1-15 October and 1-15 February. Check the guidelines for details. Submit docx or doc files through the website: https://medusatales.com
Response time is ‘within four weeks’. Payment is 1¢ per word for original stories with a $5 minimum, for first electronic rights for original, unpublished stories with exclusive rights for three months.
Flash Point Science Fiction needs speculative fiction, 100-1,000 words: ‘science fiction, fantasy, slipstream, and everything in between, so long as it’s short’. Send seasonal flash at least three months in advance. And a special plea for any flash which makes them laugh, cry, think, or smile. Save your file as a doc or docx file. Submit online and the response time is (usually) thirty days. Payment is $15 per story for first worldwide rights and for non-exclusive reprint rights.
Website: https://flashpointsf.com
The Blue Route is an online undergraduate literary journal run by students and faculty at Widener University. They publish short fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction written by undergraduate writers, and seek ‘good, highly imaginative writing about contemporary life as the writer sees it’. Literary fiction please and no ‘clichéd, overly influenced by TV or film, features flat characters,’ no poems ‘which emphasise end rhyme above all else,’ and all work must be ‘sensitive to the beauties and subtleties of language.’
Prose work, fiction or creative non-fiction may be one long or up to three short pieces but the total length must be under 2,500 words. For poetry, submit 1-3 poems.
Submit your work by email with details of the college or university currently attended, to: wutheblueroute@gmail.com
Deadline is 15 November. Response time is ‘about three months.’ Payment is $25 dollars for ‘the usual rights.’
Website: https://widenerblueroute.org
Formerly a daily online journal Atticus Review is switching to being a triannual publication in order to offer more scope to writers. The team is still publishing as an online journal and still need submissions of stories, poems, essays and ‘other forms of creative digital media’. They seek subs of ‘hybrid, unconventional work that pushes boundaries’.
Issues are usually themed but the next deadline 16 November, is not. Read the detailed guidelines and follow them carefully, these editors are picky.
Non-fiction should be challenging, but under 3,000 words. Flash creative non-fiction, up to three pieces, 800 words or fewer, is welcomed. With CNF, the team ‘like seeing the small set against the big picture’. Make it lyrical, maybe full of dark humour. They like ‘pieces which look inward and confront shame’.
Fiction and flash fiction are welcomed, under 4,000 words. Poetry is always wanted. Submit 1-5 poems. The team bias is towards ‘lyrical narrative poetry, and they prefer poems not ‘as sermons and more as snapshots.’ They think poems can be ‘shocking, serene, heartbreaking, elegant, savage, narrative, surreal — or all of the above.’ Just avoid poems ‘that tell instead of show, that substitute shock value for depth or intellect for feeling, or that force a certain limited interpretation or philosophy on the reader rather than allowing the reader to come to their own conclusions.’
The team also seeks ‘all types of electronic/ digital/interactive literature as well as short/ experimental films, book trailers, audio soundscapes and sonic compositions.’ Deadline is 16 November. Response time is ‘slow’. Writers are paid, for first rights.
Website: https://atticusreview.org