Abandoned Novel

The abandoned novel. Every author or aspiring writer has one. In your mind you've created a brilliant and compelling story that begs to be committed to the page. Two or three chapters into it, fate intervenes. Maybe it's writer's block. Maybe your computer crashes. Maybe you've just lost your motivation. For what ever reason that great story never gets told in its entirety. But just because its unfinished doesn't mean it's not a great story- it's just a great story still waiting to be told.

At AbandonedNovel.com, we're seeking the greatest stories never finished. We want the best beginnings to your unfinished novels to publish in a new book with other stories that never found their conclusion.

We are currently accepting submissions for inclusion in a new paperback release: Beginnings - A Novel. Beginnings will feature ten selections of the best opening chapters of abandoned novels. Almost every genre is eligible for inclusion (please no erotic fiction, romance novels or children's books). Selected authors will be notified and will receive a royalty contract. The deadline for submission is November 30, 2008 and the scheduled publication of Beginnings - A Novel is slated for June 1, 2009. For our submission guidelines and instructions on how to upload your own abandoned novel, please click the "submit" button. All authors submitting original work retain their original copyright of the material submitted.

Mother Goose Is Dead

MOTHER GOOSE IS DEAD
Modern Stories of Myths, Fables and Fairy Tales

Michele Acker & Kirk Dougal, Editors

E-subs & Info No web site as yet

Submission Guidelines

Think back to the days when legends walked the earth and tales of wonder entertained all that listened. Now take those stories and twist them, stretch them, or toss them aside and create your own.

“Mother Goose is Dead: Modern Stories of Myths, Fables and Fairy Tales” is looking for up-to-date versions of tales that have delighted and scared us down through time. Tell the familiar from a different view or warp the story until it stands on its head. Are you tired of the standard legends? Invent your own myths to describe the making of the world, the end of time, or anything in between. Make us suspend our belief and get caught up in your world whether it be a slightly skewed version of our own, the familiar wound around like a pretzel, or a place entirely your own.

Accepted stories will be fantasy tales revolving around myths, fables and fairy tales. Submissions need to be between 3,000 and 6,000 words although variations may be made for exceptional pieces but do not press your luck. No poetry.

The intended audience is adult with the idea in mind that Victorian-age fairy tales were meant to frighten children to teach lessons. Adult themes are acceptable but sex, violence and profanity should be included only as necessary support to the story and not present for gratuitous or shock purposes. X-rated material will not be accepted.

Submissions must be received by August 31, 2008, though that may be extended if not enough submissions are received.

The anthology will be comprised of between 15-20 stories. Authors will be notified by email within six weeks of their submission being received whether or not their story has been accepted. If by the end of the submission period a sufficient number of accepted stories have not been received (based upon anthology size), the submission process will be extended and opened up to the general public. In that instance, authors of accepted stories will be notified by email and will be given the option of withdrawing their story. Authors should note that once accepted, a short write up (50-75 words) of the history of your fable will be needed. Later, bios and head shots will be required as well.

Submissions must be made by email (It is 2008 people). Submissions should be sent to the above e-mail address. Please embed all stories in the body of the email. All attachments will be deleted unread. Once accepted, the editors will inform authors where and how to send formatted manuscripts. Please include “Anthology Submission” and the title of your work in the subject line. Submissions will be acknowledged by email within 72 hours. If you do not receive an acknowledgement, please feel free to resubmit.

All submissions must include the author’s real name, street address, email address, and pen name if desired. Please send polished work only. Stories with spelling or grammatical errors will generally be unacceptable. However, if your story is exceptional we may ask for a rewrite to fix minor issues. By submitting your story for this anthology, you warrant that it is your own original work and that it has not been published anywhere, in any format, including any website. Sharing with a small critique group for peer review is acceptable. Exclusive submissions only. Multiple submissions are fine, but no more than two per author. The anthology will only accept a maximum of one story per author for publication.

Payment will be by royalties, with each contributor receiving an equal share. Editorial work will also receive a share.

Michele Acker and Kirk Dougal are the editors of “A Firestorm of Dragons,” a new anthology released by Dragon Moon Press. Acceptance into the anthology does not guarantee publication or payment of royalties. Dragon Moon Press has expressed an interest in this project but a final decision will not be made until the final selection of stories is presented. Any questions about this anthology should be sent to the above e-mail address.

25Jun08

MALPRACTICE: AN ANTHOLOGY OF BEDSIDE TERROR.

NECROTIC TISSUE will be accepting submissions for MALPRACTICE: AN ANTHOLOGY OF BEDSIDE TERROR. To many of us, a hospital may be one of the most frightening scenarios there are. It can leave you completely vulnerable and places your livelihood in the hands of complete strangers. It’s the perfect formula for horrific tales. All that’s missing is YOU; the ideal catalyst. We are seeking stories from 2000 to 4000 words in length. The pay rate will be 1 cent a word and one contributor’s copy. Stories must have some connection with Bloom Memorial Hospital. The Hospital can be located anywhere for your tale. Indeed, Bloom Memorial exists as a complete hospital in many towns, but you can also get to it through any hospital or clinic in the world. All genres will be considered as long as the finished product scares the surgical scrubs right off of us. Think Dr. Mengele meets Bedlam hospital and make it that much worse. All necrotic Tissues content guidelines apply with exception of word count. The word count is limited to stories between 2,000 and 4,000 words. We will also take a select few 100-word stories for a flat fee of $10 and one contributor copy. Our reading time will be July 1st until September 30th, or until filled. The anticipated publication date will be late 2008 or early 2009. Please provide a cover letter with name, address, email and published credits (if any). If this information is missing, your submission will be unread and deleted. Send all submissions to: anthology@necrotictissue.com. All submissions should be in proper manuscript format and pasted into the body of your email.

Evil Nerd Empire

Accepting Submissions

We’re an experimental press with strong preferences for anything on the disturbing side: escapades into surrealistic labyrinths of hate. lounging with crotch goblins in dungeons of hell, tortured memoirs by lapsed addicts, horrific and monstrous tales, psychoerotic romance with something dead, etc.

Currently seeking authors for the following genres:

* Cyberpunk/Hacker Noir
* Bizzaro
* Pre/Post Apocalypse Mythology
* Surrealism Fusion
* Hallucinatory Horror
* Post Adolescent Angst
* Anything else that I find to be clever and original

submissions@evilnerdempire.com

UPDATED SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
[brought to you by the benevolent & mercifiul Minister Of PR....so PAY ATTENTION!!!]

Here is how it goes. First write a bio describing anything significant about you, along with your submission and submit them in either .DOC or .RTF format (you have plenty of time as I allot an extra 9 seconds so that gives you 10 seconds). Then being the masochist that I am, I will actually try to translate your babble into English and determine if it is worthy. If I find what you have submitted to be worthy, then congratulations, you had human genes somewhere in your ancestry, welcome to the empire! However; if I find my eyes and brains in pain from viewing your crap, then I will verbally abuse you and hopefully you will have the decency to aid the empire by abstaining from sex (can't have you polluting our gene pool further) and joining the military (I will recommend you for the rank of bullet catcher), as we do have a shortage of cannon fodder. Being the magnanimous man that I am (or maybe a little bit of a sadist too), I will make one concession and even have the rejects (no, not talking about you...yet...I mean the rejected submissions) posted in a separate area of our empire for all to ridicule (after I do so first). Then again, you are used to that. So is that understood?

Chicago Overcoat

Submission Deadline: August 1st, 2008

Fill in the Blank:

“Hard-boiled detective” meets ________.

Now write it. But remember: You're not selling ideas, you're selling stories. So no matter how good of an idea "hard-boiled detective" meets "vegan zombie lesbians from Mars" may be, if you don't flesh out a great story, we'll pass.

We like slipstream, cross-genre, surreal, humor, SF/Fantasy, and experimental. Elements of horror are fine, but we like "odd" a lot more than we like "shocking."

More than anything, however, your story should focus on noir. Since the term Chicago Overcoat is taken straight from The Big Sleep, the stories of this anthology will be as new and adventurous as its inspiration material was back in the day. Also, we don't only want stories with surprise, twist, or fabricated/contrived/intricately labored endings. (In fact, we'll probably only take one or two of these, and we'll take them early.) Just make sure the feel is right. That's the most important thing.

Honestly, this will be a difficult anthology to get into. So two tips:

1. It really helps your chances if you know both genres that you're writing in. We can tell if you're just dabbling. It's good to branch out, but you've gotta put in the time before it pays off. You have to hit every genre cliché before you know to look out for it next time.

2. Make your characters real people. Real people have dentist appointments next month, talk on the phone, have pets, and they go out for lunch with friends. They have bad habits; they burn popcorn. And there's an entire range of emotions for them to experience. When they die, they leave all sorts of loose ends untied. But most importantly: They all have motivations for everything they do.

Fiction from 100 to 6,000 words, and we may publish one novella of 10,000 to 15,000 words.

No reprints.

Simultaneous subs okay.

Because you may not get a response until after the deadline, we accept multiple subs, up to four stories or 6,000 words, whichever comes first, OR, one novella length submission. Anything above this will be deleted unread. You should receive an automatic response letting you know that we received your e-mail, if you don't get this, please query.

Submissions go to James Maddox and Brian Worley, editors. Subject line like this (or our spam filters may eat it): COsub/Title/name (or COquery for questions).

Submit work in the body of the email, or attached as a rtf or doc to:

susurrusantho@yahoo.com

If your work is selected, we will purchase FNASR at the following rates:

$5 for flash (>1000 words)
$10 for short stories (1000 + words),
and $25 for a novella of <10,000.>

Recommended Reading:

Raymond Chandler
Dashiell Hammett
Haruki Murakami
Steve Niles's Cal McDonald Mysteries
Paul Auster's New York Trilogy
Richard Stark
James M. Cain
Slylock Fox*
Frank Miller
Many Stephen King novellas (Shawshank, The Colorado Kid, ect.)
Nicholas Blincoe
Batman, man. Batman.
And many other Lone Wolf types.

*I was totally kidding about Slylock Fox**
**unless you can make it work.

Terms and dates subject to change.

Tesseracts Thirteen

Tesseracts Thirteen


GUIDELINES

The anthology is open to Canadians, landed immigrants, long-time residents, and expatriates.

Open to submissions in either English or French. (French-language stories must be translated into English for publication before they can be accepted, but they can be submitted in French for a preliminary evaluation). Translation into English is the sole responsibility of the author. Canadian authors who write in languages other than French or English are welcome to submit an English translation of their work, provided it otherwise falls within the parameters of this anthology. Please supply details of original publication for any submission that originally appeared in a language other than English.

Genres: Dark Fantasy and Horror.

Length: all submissions must be under 5 000 words. Stories outside of this will not be considered.

Open to short fiction and poetry (no plays).

Deadline: Post-Marked October 31 2008

Do not query before submitting.

When submitting, you must send both email attachment and a hard copy.

Mail submissions:

Attention: Series Editors
c/o Tesseracts Twelve Submissions
P.O. Box 1714 Calgary Alberta, T2P 2L7 CANADA

Email submissions: tesseracts13@edgewebsite.com.

Emails MUST contain the word "submission" in the subject line, or they will be deleted automatically by the server. Please also include the story title in the subject line.

Submissions MUST come in an attachment: WordPerfect, RTF, or Word are the only acceptable formats.

Emails MUST contain a cover letter in the body of the email; for security reasons, email attachments with no cover letter will be deleted unread and unanswered.

Cover letter: include your name, the title of your story, your full contact information (address, phone, email), and a brief bio. Do not describe or summarize the story.

Manuscripts must be typed double-spaced, 12-point type (preferably Times New Roman or Courier font) on quarto (8 1/2 x 11) OR A4 (8 1/4 x 11 3/4) paper, minimum weight 16 lbs; near-letter-quality dot matrix printing is acceptable, provided the ribbon is sufficiently dark and computer printouts are seperated and paperclipped.

Submission format: no strange formatting, colour fonts, changing fonts, borders, backgrounds, etc. Leave italics in italics, NOT underlined. DO NOT leave a blank line between paragraphs. Indent paragraphs. ALWAYS put a # to indicate scene breaks (a blank line is NOT enough).

Spelling: please use Canadian spelling, as per the Canadian Oxford Dictionary.

ALWAYS include your full contact information (name/address/email/phone number) on the first page of the attached submission.

If your address is not within Canada, please indicate in the cover letter your status vis-à-vis Canada.

Reprints (stories having previously appeared in English in ANY format, print or electronic, including but not limited to any form of web publication) can be considered but will be a hard sell; reprints must come from a source not easily available in Canada. If your submission is a reprint, please supply full publication history of the story. If your story appeared previously, including but not limited to anywhere on the web, and you do not disclose this information to the editor upon submission, you will be disqualified from consideration.

Authors' fees will reflect a payout of all author royalties.

Payment is $20.00 for poetry, $50.00 for stories under 1,500 words, rising to a maximum of $100.00 for stories over 5,000 words (longer stories are paid a slightly higher fee, but in order to exceed the word length limit of 7,500 words, editors must judge a story to be of surpassing excellence). EDGE buys non-exclusive world rights; that is, EDGE is free to market the Tesseract Thirteen anthology as a whole anywhere in any language, but contributors retain the right to market their individual entries outside the anthology.

Publication details: Autumn 2009, in trade paperback.

Nancy Kilpatrick
Award-winning author Nancy Kilpatrick has published 18 novels, over 190 short stories, 5 collections of stories, and has edited 8 anthologies. Much of her body of work involves vampires.

Nancy writes dark fantasy, horror, mysteries and erotic horror, under her own name, her nom de plume Amarantha Knight, and her newest pen name Desirée Knight (Amarantha's younger sister!) Besides writing novels and short stories, and editing anthologies, she has scripted 4 issues of VampErotic comics. As well, she's penned a couple of radio scripts, a stage play, and much non-fiction, including the book The goth Bible: A Compendium for the Darkly Inclined (St. Martin's Press — October 2004).

Nancy won the Arthur Ellis Award for best mystery story, has been a Bram Stoker finalist three times and a finalist for the Aurora Award five times.

David Morrell

David Morrell is the award-winning author of First Blood, the novel in which Rambo was created. He was born in 1943 in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada. In 1960, at the age of seventeen, he became a fan of the classic television series, Route 66, about two young men in a Corvette traveling the United States in search of America and themselves. The scripts by Stirling Silliphant so impressed Morrell that he decided to become a writer.

Morrell is the co-president of the International Thriller Writers Organization. Noted for his research, he is a graduate of the National Outdoor Leadership School for wilderness survival as well as the G. Gordon Liddy Academy of Corporate Security. He is also an honorary lifetime member of the Special Operations Association and the Association of Former Intelligence Officers. He has been trained in firearms, hostage negotiation, assuming identities, executive protection, and anti-terrorist driving, among numerous other action skills that he describes in his novels. With eighteen million copies in print, his work has been translated into twenty-six languages.

Chicken Soup for the Soul: Power Moms

Subtitle: 101 Stories Celebrating the Power of Choice
for Stay at Home and Work from Home Moms

Raising children, managing homes, and maybe even keeping a hand in the working world can place incredible demands on mothers. These multi-tasking, high-performing women have become today’s power moms.

Moms – share your stories about being a mom and doing it all. Dads – share your feelings about your stay at home wife. And children of moms who stayed at home – tell us about your mom. Stories should be written in the first person and should not exceed 1200 words. Any stories are welcomed, including those on the following topics:

• Celebrating the choice to be at home: Share your most treasured moments
• Making the choice to stay home or scale back work to raise kids
• Managing the new demands of raising healthy, accomplished and
well-balanced children
• Meeting the challenges of running a household in an increasingly busy
world
• Clever ways of multi-tasking: getting it all done every day
• Dad at work, Mom at home: Surviving the division of labor in your marriage
• Facing Baby Brain Drain: Making quality time for yourself
• Reclaiming the joys of work through charity and community service
• Creative ways to work from home
• Mompreneurs: Making your own family-friendly job
• Reinventing yourself when the kids are all in school
• The power of female friendship: How women rely on each other to get through the day
• The buck stops with you: Feeling the pressure of being everyone’s go-to person
• Life in the minivan: Making the most of the driving black hole
• Giving up the Guilt: When doing it all is impossible

If your story is chosen, you will be a published author and your bio will be printed in the book. You will also receive a check for $200 and ten free copies of the book, worth more than $100. Your story will be copyrighted in your name and you will retain your rights to resell the story to another publication after it is published by Chicken Soup.

DEADLINE IS SEPTEMBER 1, 2008. SUBMISSIONS GO TO http://chickensoupf orthesoul. com/form. asp?cid=submit_ story

Submissions to our web site receive faster attention and are more likely to be published, but if you do not have Internet access, please submit your story by mail or by facsimile.

Chicken Soup for the Soul
P.O. Box 700
Cos Cob, CT 06807-0700
Fax 203-861-7194

The Crossroads Theater

Editor: Rodney J. Smith

Dead Jester Press is seeking high-quality works of dark fiction for inclusion in its debut anthology.
The Crossroads Theater will feature stories from varied time periods and settings -- from the urban to the fantastic, and all the weird places between.
Theater won't be your ordinary anthology; it will present its collected stories in a new and unique way.

General guidelines
Stories should be dark and/or weird; they need not be full-blown 'horror', but they must contain creepy/unsettling narratives. Stories focusing on evil deeds in disturbing places are especially sought.
Open to all settings/periods (and hope to see a wide variety of time periods), however please note that no story should date later than the 1980s-90s. This could mean turn of the century; the middle ages; the 1960s; alternate histories; even other worlds. The only place they can't be is anywhere futuristic.
Characters and settings can be as weird and fanciful as you please, but they must be 'real' within the story (not merely a character's delusion/hallucination).
Stories must be written in third-person; omniscient narration is preferred. Narrative should lean closer toward immediate, visual story-telling than internal thoughts/flashbacks -- while characterization is important, engaging plots that 'come alive' before the reader are the priority.
Length should be between 500 and 7000 words.
No reprints. No poetry. No multiple or simultaneous submissions, please.
And NO vampires. Seriously.

*Please note: given the volume of inappropriate submissions received thus far, all stories not written in third person and/or grossly over the word count will now be deleted unread.

Rights
Exclusive Worldwide Print rights for 1 year from date of publication, and non-exclusive Print rights thereafter.

Payment
All net profits will be shared with contributors, for as long as the book is commercially available.

Deadline
The reading period closes July 29, 2008. Publication is tentatively expected to be late 2008.

Response Time
All decisions will be made on or by August 11, 2008.

Submitting
Send all submissions as .doc or .rtf attachments to submissions[at]deadjesterpress.com. Stories should be in standard manuscript format. Please don't, however, put two spaces after each sentence.


Questions? Send to: editor[at]deadjesterpress.com

Light at the Edge of Darkeness - Review

Light at the Edge of Darkness
Edited by Cynthia MacKinnon

ISBN: 1-934284-00-1 (Trade Paperback)
Pages: 384
Pub. Date: April 2007
Publisher: The Writer’s Café Press


Looking at the cover of Light at the Edge of Darkness at first glance the reader would have to assume the stories bound between the covers have something in common, something mysterious, even frightful. Yet, in the middle of that cover is the striking shimmering figure of Christ on the Cross, and then the reader would have to ask a second question, tales of hope in a dark place? It stands to reason. Light and Darkness have been clashing since before the Fall of Man, going back to the greatest Fall of all, Lucifer’s rebellion and casting out.

This is a collection of Biblical speculative fiction written by members of the Lost Genre Guild. This collection of tales contains stories ranging from fantasy, sci-fi, all the way to cyberpunk–all written from a Christian world view. The groups main focus is to fill a void on Christian bookstore shelves hopefully to spill over into the secular realm. Will the average sci-fi / fantasy / horror reader shy away from such titles as these? Perhaps, but this is definitely the collection to change that perspective.

The authors of these stories are well crafted word-smiths, who have sharpened their pens and powered-up their word processors to brings some nail biting and chill-bumps to raise the hairs on the back of any reader’s neck. Monsters, you bet, they’re here. Aliens, killers, terrorists, all your thugs and symbols of evil abound to trample down the hopes of those trying to make it out. Though some of the stories border on dark, sinister themes, one has to realize that the true Dark that is out there is more evil and more sinister than what even Hollywood can envision. Some readers may draw offense to this collection, it is your choice. But there are some very good writers here and they have written from a place of hope, a place where the Darkness ends and the Light begins. Dare to venture, dare to walk the walk. There is always Light at the Edge of Darkness. — Steven Macon Y-30 Associate Editor
Copyright©1999-2007 by Yellow30 Sci-Fi
& The KitchenSink Entertainment Group
All Rights Reserved

Used with permission.

Call for manuscripts - The Ultimate Series

From HCI Books:

We're looking for "slice-of-life" stories and photos that are inspirational, motivational, humorous or thought-provoking. Here's what's looming, please don't procrastinate - we're already evaluating stories (thank you if you've already sent one!):

submission deadline June 30, 2008(*) The Ultimate Christmas (pub date Nov 2008)
submission deadline July 31, 2008 The Ultimate Teacher (pub date Feb 2009)
submission deadline August 31, 2008 The Ultimate Mom (pub date March 2009)
submission deadline September 30, 2008 The Ultimate Dad (pub date April 2009)

All the details you'll need (e.g. what we pay, our guidelines, book synopses, and a full list of titles in development) can be found at www.ultimatehcibooks.com.

Links on the main menu will provide access to pages of details.

Cruise around and enjoy yourself.

Anthology Builder

The goal of AnthologyBuilder is to become a printable library of sorts, a place where readers can easily find reprints by their favorite authors and have them delivered as a professionally bound book with beautiful cover art.

Submissions: AnthologyBuilder is seeking fiction of up to 50,000 words in a variety of genres including, but not limited to, mainstream, thriller, mystery, romance, science fiction, fantasy, and horror. We regret that we do not accept erotica, nor stories with excessive violence or sexuality.

We buy English-language reprint rights and request that unsolicited submissions be previously published in a paying market.

Authors should be aware that AnthologyBuilder does not have the resources of a large publishing house and does not copy-edit manuscripts. In order to preserve your professional dignity, please proofread submissions carefully.

Payment: We pay a pro rata royalty each time a story is purchased. Specifics can be read in our author contract.

Submission Process: Stories may be submitted through our online submission form. (You will need to create an account before submitting.)

We evaluate submissions partially based on the market in which they originally appeared. If you suspect that we may not be familiar with your story's market, please include some brief information about it and a link to its guidelines in the "comments" field.

Once your story is submitted, it may take up to ten days for us to determine whether your submission is a good fit for AnthologyBuilder and to format it for use in our database. We will send you an email once we have made a decision on your story.

Manuscript Format: Please use standard manuscript format, using italics rather than underlined text to signify emphasis. Scene breaks should be denoted with a single number sign (#) rather than with asterisks.

Bob Burdick Featured at Murder By 4

Hope you're doing well and will have a minute to read a great post in MURDER BY 4 by author R. C. Burdick titled "Tools of the Writer's Trade."

Bob began writing for publication in 1982. He has published dozens of articles and short stories and also counts two mystery novels among his credits: THE MARGARET ELLEN (2004) and TREAD NOT ON ME (2005). Additionally, his short story collection, STORIES ALONG THE WAY, won the 2002 Royal Palm Book Award. As a contributing writer his work has appeared in the Chatsworth Times, The Time Courier, and The St. Petersburg Times. His work in progress includes Death At Bear Creek Summit and Bottom Feeders, a sequel to The Margaret Ellen. Since 2001, Burdick has also been a columnist and contributing writer for Inky Trail News.

Chicken Soup for the Soul: Resolution Stories

Chicken Soup for the Soul: Resolution Stories

Release Date: December 2008

Everyone makes resolutions! We make them all year long - not just for the new year. Some of our resolutions are big and life changing; some of them are small. We resolve to change our behavior, to exercise more, to eat less.

We resolve to be nicer, to not yell, to get more organized. You name it - someone has resolved to do it. What have you resolved?

Chicken Soup for the Soul is looking for stories about resolutions. What did you resolve to do? How did it work out? What did you learn? We would love to hear from you about the resolutions you have made– both your successes and those that didn't work out.

Tentative chapter topics include:

• Trying to lose weight
• Getting fit (The weight loss and getting fit stories could tie into our
self-esteem, accept-who-you- are theme for girls and women)
• Getting more organized
• Making more money/Giving away money
• Restoring a relationship with someone/Making amends
• Changing one’s behavior
• Stopping bad habits such as smoking, biting fingernails
• Going green
• Eating healthy
• Serious stuff such as substance abuse withdrawal, seeking treatment for
mental health issues
• Self acceptance – realizing the resolution wasn’t necessary and you are
great the way you are

Stories must be true (non-fiction) , written in first person, and 1,000 words or less. Stories should make readers laugh, cry or sigh, and be positive, universal and non-controversial. Also, the "point" or "message" should be evident without preaching. No essays, commentaries, tributes, philosophical or biographical pieces will be accepted. Please refer to other Chicken Soup
books to better understand our story-telling style.

You may submit more than one story. For each story selected, a 50-word biography will be included about the contributor and a permission fee of $200 per story will be paid within 30 days upon publication

Please submit stories through our website at www.chickensoup. com. Select the Resolution Stories book title.

The tentative submission deadline is August 31, 2008. Please note that this
deadline could change so the sooner, the better!

The Random Eye - Speculative and Horror Fiction

Submission Guidelines

The Random Eye is seeking speculative and horror fiction that concentrates on the theme of parallel universes. Please keep the anthology theme in mind when submitting your story as those stories that do not fit the theme will not be considered.

Payment is $10 per story, regardless of length. We accept stories at a minimum of 2, 000 words to a maximum of 10, 000 words. Payment is made strictly through Paypal. Stories are to be submitted as a .txt or .rtf format attachment to your email, with the words 'STORY SUBMISSION: Your Title' in the subject line of your email. Please do NOT use standard manuscript format (ie: double spaced, tabbed indents for paragraphs). Stories are to be submitted single-spaced with a double space between paragraphs instead of tabbed indents. Be sure to include your author information along with your preferred email for correspondence.

Send all submissions to: pinkbagels@gmail.com

Dzanc Books - submissions and contest

Do you have a short story collection you hope to publish? Here's a market looking for your book.

SUBMISSIONS to Dzanc Books PLUS a Short Story Collection contest (although they charge a reading fee).

Dzanc Books is looking for literary fiction that takes chances and does so with great writing. We do not mind books that do not fill a marketing niche. We are looking for absolutely fantastic works to fill those slots. It really is all about the writing to us.

If you believe you have a novel that meets what we are looking for, please feel free to submit a portion of your manuscript to us.

1) If submitting a novel, or literary nonfiction, please attach the first 1 or 2 chapters (no more than 35 pages) in MS Word format, and
2) If submitting a story collection, please see the Short Story Collection
contest guidelines.
3) Please note that due to an increased number of incoming manuscripts, it
might take up to five or six months to respond.

Thank you for your interest in publishing with Dzanc Books.We are currently in the process of working on our online submission system. In the meantime, if you would like to submit your manuscript, please email submit@dzancbooks. org with a cover letter and up to 2 chapters of your novel or 2 stories of your collection.

For more information visit: http://www.dzancboo ks.org/submissio ns.html

Tainted: An Anthology of Terror and the Supernatural

Edited by Aaron Polson

Submissions Open from May 15 - July 15, 2008.

All responses will be sent after July 15, 2008.

Submissions Open from May 15 - July 15, 2008.

All responses will be sent after July 15, 2008.

What is Tainted? This anthology is a collection of stories inspired by one the following:

• "The Caterpillars" by E.F. Benson
• "The Boarded Window" by Ambrose Bierce
• "The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar" by Edgar Allan Poe
• "The Empty House" by Algernon Blackwood
• "The Red Room" by H.G. Wells

The editor will select at least one story inspired by each of those listed above to publish in a handsome trade paperback (October 2008). All five original stories will be included in this collection.

You can follow links to the stories above to read them online.

What we want:

A tale inspired by one of the classics, but set in modern times. We want authors to take those orignal stories and have fun with them. Stories may fall in any speculative genre, but should be dark. Be inspired!

Traditional storytelling...beginning, middle, and an end. Protagonists with real conflicts...protagonists that might change, grow, develop because of those conflicts.

Beautiful, haunting images without overdoing it--balance plot with description.

Stories, especially speculative fiction, should speak to the human condition in some way.

2,500 - 10,000 words*

Simultaneous submissions are not accepted. Please send only one story: your best effort.

* optimum length would fall between 3k-7k

What we don't want:

A retelling of the original story. A period piece.

Experimental forms.

Excessive gore, language, sex, and violence. The key word--excessive--and yes, it frequently is excessive in modern fiction. Make sure it works in the story. Short fiction is all about economy of words.

Bigoted attitudes, platforms, and messages.

Anything overtly political.

Flowery prose, grammatical errors, and improper submission format.

Format for Submissions:

Follow standard formatting guidelines. Be professional.

Attach your story to an email as a rich text format file (rtf). Anything else will be discarded unread.

Cover letters are nice, but not necessary. Your work stands on its own merit.

Send one story at a time to: tainted.subs(at)gmail.com, replacing the (at) with @.

The subject should read: Submission (Title of story that inspired yours)

For example: Submission The Red Room

Form rejections will most likely be sent due to the expected volume of submissions.

Compensation/rights:

We ask for one time rights for the story to appear in the anthology. All other rights remain with the author.

Each successful contributor receives one copy of the anthology and a one time payment of $25 (US) through PayPal (this is non-negotiatble; if you do not have an account, it is a quick and easy set up). Payment will be made upon publication.

A simple contract stating these terms will be issued.

All writers and artists retain the full copyrights to their work.

Questions? Email: tainted.subs(at)gmail.com, replacing the (at) with @. Subject line: Question.

Rage of the Behemoth

The RotB Heroic Adventure Anthology will contain 21 stories about the biggest, baddest, boldest behemoths ever to roar across the pages of heroic adventure! 100,000+ words of monstrous mayhem record the ferocious battles that rage between gargantuan creatures of myth and legend and the warriors and wizards who wage war against, beside, and astride them. Behemoths and battles will be presented in four-story sections of five different habitats introduced by the stunning pen of Johnney Perkins: Frozen Wastes, Scalding Sands, Depthless Seas, Mysterious Jungles, and Ageless Mountains.

Guidelines:
Behemoth and terrain must be featured in the story. The behemoth must play an integral role in the story – all else regarding the creatures is free reign. They can be good, bad, indifferent, the protagonist, the antagonist, sidekick, human, animal, golem – whatever falls within the FSP genres.

Word Count: 3,000 – 7,000 . . . . Payment: 1¢ per word (following acceptance)

Submissions:
Please submit your story attached as an .RTF file via email to jasonmwaltz@google.com. Please use the subject line to reflect the habitat and title of your story as in the following: Submission: RotB – Desert – Swan in Heat (For snail mail instructions, please read the FSP Submissions policies).

Open Submissions begins 1 June 2008
Target Submissions close 1 January 2009*
Target Publication 1 June 2009*

*Be advised that every section will have a different creature in each story - so no repeats of behemoths within each habitat. This means that submissions can only close and publication work begin once there is a different behemoth in every terrain and all terrains are filled. The anthology will remain open until such time. Keep track of available story slots here on the FSP RotB site, where a list of up-to-date story acceptances in each terrain will be maintained.

If you're a writer, limber up those fingers and send those earth-shattering, jaw-dropping, neck-craning, fear-inducing critter-tales to FSP now! If you're a reader, prepare to tremble in your easy chairs and thank your gods that the raging wars between man and beast are but words soon-to-be-held between your sweaty palms!

For more information check Flashing Swords Press.

The Thin Threads™ Story Collection Contest

Thin Thread™ - The Moment that Made the Difference.

Kiwi Publishing invites you to contribute a true story, article, or anecdote that will bring hope and happiness to all those who realize the possibility in each moment, and the unseen miracles that arise from overcoming what seem like setbacks. By sharing special moments, from surprising, loving and inspiring to traumatic, these stories will touch people around the world.

Topics will include: Thin Threads™ of: Survival, Romance, Opportunity, Sport Success, Courage, Leadership & Innovation, Forgiveness, Motherhood, Fatherhood, Patriotism, Business Success and any other story that offers hope from a Thin Thread™ moment.

We're looking for inspirational, true stories, 1200 words or less, that will make readers laugh, cry, or sigh. Stories should be positive, universal, and non-controversial. The "point" or "message" should be evident without preaching. No essays, commentaries, tributes, philosophical or biographical pieces will be accepted.

Each story must contain the following elements:

1. Be Real - non fiction

2. Capture the essence of a thin thread event

3. Evoke an emotion from the reader

You may submit more than one story, all original or from a person in your life. Should your story be selected and be included in the "Thin Thread"™ book series, a permission fee of $100 will be paid. The submission deadline is July 1, 2008. Submit a story through this site

Please be aware that should your story be selected for publication, you will be required to sign a submission release form. Kindly click here to review the terms of that form before you submit your story.

Or, you may email submissions to: Thinthreads@kiwipublishing.com.This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

If unable to email, please send a hard copy (and on disk if possible) to: Thin Threads™ c/o of Kiwi PublishingP.O. Box 3852Woodbridge, CT 06525.

Further information is available at FAQ

Sample stories are available here.

Due to the volume of stories we receive, we are unable to respond to each contribution. Finalists, only, will be notified prior to publication.

HAUNTED LEGENDS

Call For Submissions: HAUNTED LEGENDS
Below are the submission guidelines for the forthcoming anthology Haunted Legends. We are releasing them now so that submitters have all of May and June and much of July to write a new story for us. Do not submit immediately. Do not submit trunk stories.

-------

Haunted Legends, to be published by Tor Books, seeks to reinvigorate the genre of "true" regional ghost stories by asking some of today's leading writers to riff on traditional tales from around the world. We don't just want you to retell an old ghost story, but to renovate it so that the story is dark and unsettling all over again.

Classic tales of the Jersey Devil, the spirits of the Tower of London, ghost lights, and phantom hitchhikers continue to capture the imagination. The Haunted Legends difference is that our contributors will tell the stories in ways they've never been told before.

We pay 6 cents a word, up to 8000 words.

The open-reading period will begin on midnight, EDT of July 15, 2008 and end 11:59p.m., July 31, 2008.

All submissions must be emailed as a RTF file to Ellen Datlow and Nick Mamatas at hauntedlegends@gmail.com. Please send no more than one submission. Please send no correspondence, such as queries, to hauntedlegends@gmail.com either before or after the reading period – all mail sent to the address at any time other than the reading period will be automatically deleted unread.

Note that much of the anthology is full and that a large number of ghost stories, especially those with an American or UK origin, are thus already “taken” by authors who have been personally solicited for work. Your best bet for this anthology is to go far afield – we are especially interested in renovations of traditional ghost stories from Africa, Latin America, and Asia, or in other tales that may not be well-known.

We also want to emphasize that we are interested only in traditional ghost stories made new again by the ingenuity of the writer. We do not want “campfire” versions of old stories, or slavish recitations. Think of new forms, new voices, new themes, new ways of considering these classic tales. Do not send us your trunk stories. It should be as though your version was always occulted within the classic rendition, but never before perceived or acknowledged.

And now, a brief AFAQ (anticipated frequently asked questions):

May I query you with an idea for a ghost story to make sure that it has not already been taken?
No, you may not. If you believe that your idea is already taken, you may wish to research another idea. Indeed, even if the idea has not already been claimed by one of the solicited authors, you may well still face competition from a dozen other variations in the slush. Novelty is your best approach.


Well, what if I query you anyway?
I may decide to give you a misleading answer, or no answer at all.


So how about if I query Ellen Datlow instead? She’s the nice one, anyways.
You have misapprehended the situation. Let us put it this way: when was the last time Ellen Datlow had an open-reading period for any of her original anthologies? She doesn’t want your queries either.


Can I just make up a ghost story?
No. You have to find an existing one and renovate it in an utterly brilliant fashion.


How will you will be able to tell the difference?
We are obsessive experts and we are friends with even more obsessive experts.


Is this all some kind of cruel joke?
I’d call it the end result of a large number of compromises, all of which were necessary to guarantee any sort of open-reading period.


This is madness! Why does everything have to be so hard all the time? Why are we pitted against one another in these awful competitions, and for crumbs? Crumbs, I tell you, crumbs! As if we were starving rats. I hate you!
Fools! Your despair only makes me stronger!

Vampire Fiction

In 2002, 23 House Publishing released an anthology of vampire fiction by writers who proved themselves to be masters of the genre. Six years later, the vampires are calling again. A new collection of vampire fiction is being assembled, and a call has gone forth for authors - the best of the best - to be part of this exciting new book.

Submission Guidelines

Deadline for submissions: August 31, 2008

1. EXTREMELY IMPORTANT: First and foremost, please be sure to include as much contact information with your submission as possible. We have literally had to pull stories that were selected for some of the previous anthologies because we only had an email address for an author, and it became unreachable. Give us every way possible to get in touch with you - addr, phone, cell, website, email, secondary email, etc. All contact information will be kept private, but we want to be able to contact you.
2. To be considered for publication, a submission should be an unpublished, original work of fiction, submitted directly by the author, taking place in the world of vampires - although there is no constraint as to the time period in which the story occurs. We don't want to be too restrictive about the vampire universe, but keeping your story within the bounds of general vampire lore (harmed by light, no reflection in mirrors, etc.) will increase your chances. For the past anthology we had some stories that were SO far out (Jesus was a vampire, George Washington was a vampire, vampires are on UFOs, etc) that they would have been a detractor from the anthology as a whole. Just send in an entertaining story that you think the average reader will enjoy.
3. Length requirements are somewhat flexible, but ideally stories should be 3000-5000 words. Stories that are too far outside of either boundary won't be read.
4. Please note that this anthology is about vampires. Stories regarding monsters, aliens, angels, ghosts or any other non-vampire entities are not appropriate for this book.
5. Your story can be comedy, romance, horror, or any other theme that you want - we're looking for a good, even mix. Just entertain!
6. The submission should be original fiction - no "fan fiction", including Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the Anne Rice series, Masquerade, or even the new "Moonlight" television series. Not that there's anything wrong with fan fiction, but in an independent published anthology it creates all sorts of copyright problems. We're looking for original characters, stories and ideas.
7. Please be sure to double-check the grammar in your stories. Although we're looking for content, grammar does make an impression on the initial read. Single space your story and give it your best polish before sending it in. We want to consider your best effort.
8. Stories must be submitted by the website www.23house.com/submit.html.
9. The resulting book, tentatively named "Nights of Blood II", will be published in trade paperback format, 8.5" x 5.5" with a gloss cover and heavy 60 lb. stock paper inside - it's going to be a very attractive book, and the working cover price is $18.95.
10. There is NO fee to submit your story manuscript for consideration... and if you ever see a publisher asking you to pay ANYTHING AT ALL for your story to be considered, don't just walk, RUN AWAY!
11. For stories selected for publication, authors will be required to sign a contract, which basically spells out the items contained in these guidelines.
12. Stories selected for publication may be edited as deemed necessary to suit the format of the book. The story's author will be contacted for approval if substantial changes are required. The flip-side of this is that if substantial changes are required, the story probably won't be selected.
13. If selected for publication, the author grants first publication right to the story to the publisher for as long as the book remains in print. To further use the story in print or other media, please contact 23 House for prior approval.
14. There is no limit to the number of stories that an author can submit.
15. Writers selected for this collection of vampire tales will be compensated with a single copy of the book. Authors can purchase additional copies of the books at the wholesale price of 50% off cover, and then re-sell them at full price at book signings, speaking engagements, etc. to generate revenue.

Submissions should be posted at www.23house.com/submit.html.

Please direct any question to: 23 House

INFRADEAD - Guidelines

INFRADEAD is an anthology of original novella-length science fiction stories to be published in trade paperback format in 2009. INFRADEAD is edited by Tyree Campbell, J Alan Erwine, and Scott Virtes. INFRADEAD is looking for tales of human extinction.

Preferred length is 5,000 to 10,000 words, but we will consider longer works. Pay will be 1/2 cent per word. We will not consider reprints.

We will consider poems. However, the theme of this anthology requires that poetry be very well developed--not necessarily long, but well developed. Pay will be a flat $6 per poem. We will not consider reprints.

The successful INFRADEAD story is driven by its plot, the events of which are experienced by fully developed characters. The science in the story is speculative but plausible. In summary, we want to know what happened to bring humanity to this state, and how, exactly, in the words of the last humans, they lived the last lives. If you choose to have small groups of survivors [see add'l note below], tell us how they cope with their circumstances. And remember: the Earth will have changed in some way. This change must be taken into account when you tell us how the survivors cope.

One additional note: it is not necessary that the entire species be wiped out. There might exist very small pockets or remnants of humanity--but in the conditions of the story, the species will for all practical purposes be finished.

Either of these works will offer suggestions regarding the human denouement.

1. A Choice Of Catastrophes, by Isaac Asimov
2. Our Angry Earth, by Isaac Asimov and Frederik Pohl

There is no need to rush your writing. We will close to submissions on 1 December 2008. We expect to "hold" about 10-12 story submissions and about 8 poetry submissions until then, at which time we will make our final cuts. We will advise you of declines or holds within 2 months of the date of your submission. So there is no need to hurry.

HOW TO SUBMIT:

Stories: submit your story as an rtf or Word attachment. Submit only one story at a time, please. At the top of the attachment put your snail mail address and contact information. Double-space. Indent paragraphs five space-bar spaces--do not tab, please. Use italics when necessary. In your cover letter, be sure to include the word count and a brief bio. Send your story to infradeadsdp@yahoo.com . Be sure to put Submission in the subject line.

Poems: submit your poem in the body of the e-mail. Submit one poem at a time. Be sure to include your snail mail address and contact information. Use italics when necessary. Include a brief bio. Send your poem to infradeadsdp@yahoo.com . Be sure to put Submission in the subject line.

And if you have any questions, please query at infradeadsdp@yahoo.com .

VANCOUVER POET LAUREATE WANTS YOUR POEMS

Vancouver’s first Poet Laureate, George McWhirter, invites poetry submissions for an anthology on the features that give Vancouver its identity, such as its streets and place names.

This call for submissions is open to anyone who wishes to help fill the gap in Vancouver’s verse geography. There is no fee to enter. Authors whose work is chosen for the anthology will be paid $25 per page or poem.

Poems should ideally be a two-sonnet length, and cross streets or place names for the poems should be provided. Submissions must be typewritten and sent with a self-addressed, stamped envelope to the publisher at the following address by July 31, 2008...

A Verse Map of Vancouver
c/o Anvil Press Publishers
278 East First Avenue
Vancouver, BC V5T 1A6

The Poet Laureate will also make the selections for and edit the anthology, which will be published in spring 2009.

During his honourary two-year term from 2007-2009, the Vancouver Poet Laureate acts as a champion for poetry, language and the arts and will create a unique artistic legacy through public readings and civic interactions.

For more information:

City of Vancouver, Corporate Communications, 604.871.6336

Jean Kavanagh, Vancouver Public Library, Marketing and Communications, 604.331.3895