This is the final Author Toolbox post for 2020 because we take November and December off (HOLIDAYS!). But don’t worry, you haven’t missed us. You can always sign up on Raimey Gallant’s website and catch us when we start posting again in January, 2021.
For the last Author Toolbox post of 2020 I’d like to share with you three years of my experience in submitting. I love writing short stories. I also love submitting them to magazines, anthologies, and websites and getting accepted. Ahhh, that feeling when you get the email and see ‘we would love to feature your story in our issue’. It doesn’t happen often, so I absolutely treasure each and every acceptance. You probably have your own method to track submissions, but I use spreadsheets. (SO MANY spreadsheets.) My columns are titled:
- Submitted To (the name of the publication/website, so I don’t forget and try to submit the same story a year later, haha, goodness no, of course I’m not speaking from personal experience and have never done such a thing)
- Date Submitted
- Response Time (a lot of places state when they should reply by and it’s helpful to have that date written down so I can remember to send a probing email)
- Rejection (this column fills up fast, let me just say)
- Accepted!
- Payment? (if the publication offers payment which plenty do not)
- Notes (this is almost always a link to the publication’s submission page, it’s just helpful to have it right there and easy to click on.)
Below will follow a bewildering list of places to submit to, a note on when they take submissions, plus what they pay. Most of these publish Fantasy, SciFi, Horror, or a mashup of those three. A few are more Literary Fiction or just kind of general fiction? Read the submission guidelines, is what I’m saying. I admit freely that I would always rather submit to the presses with more fun names (Zombies Need Brains! Pseudopod!) before the boring generic ones, but that could just be me.
I’d recommend highlighting everything, copying, and then pasting it straight into your own spreadsheet or document so you don’t have to track down this page every single time you want to submit a story. Please feel free to do this, this is my written consent for you to copy and paste any content from this post. Consider it an online digital present for your holidays, and for the members of the wonderful Author Toolbox community, and I’ll see you all next year.
- Clarkesworld submit here, pays 8-10 cents/word
- Apex Magazine (no simultaneous submissions) submit here, 6 cents/word
- Strange Horizons (no simultaneous) submit here, 8 cents/word
- Boulevard (Nov-May only) submit here, 100-300$
- Beneath Ceaseless Skies submit here, 6 cents/word
- Deep Magic (clean SciFi only) submit here, 6 cents/word
- Diabolical Plots (JULY only) submit here, 8 cents/word
- Cloaked Press (Fall Fantasy, Spring SciFi) submit here, 10$ or author discount on book.
- Grimdark Magazine (closed currently) submit here, 7 cents (AUD)/word
- Lamplight Magazine (Mar-May, Sept-Nov.) submit here, 3 cents/word
- Independent Legions submit here, 100$
- Stinging Fly (Nov. Dec. only) submit here, €30/magazine page
- Third Flatiron (quarterly) submit here, 8 cents/word
- Haunted Waters Press (ongoing themed anthologies) submit here, up to 8 cents/word
- New Myths (Jan-Feb, June-July) submit here, 30$ minimum
- Cosmic Roots and Eldtritch Shores submit here, 6 cents/word
- Pseudopod submit here, 8 cents/word
- Fablecroft (ongoing anthology calls) submit here, 100$ AUD/story
- Thuggish Itch through Gypsum Sound Tales publishing submit here, 5$-10$ AUD/story
- Zombies Need Brains (themed anthologies through Patreon) submit here, 8 cents/word and then 25% of royalties from anthology
- One Story (Jan-May, Sept-Nov.) submit here, 500$/story
- The Dark Magazine 1 week response time (!) submit here, 6 cents/word
- Electric Spec (flash fiction, quarterly) submit here, 20$/story
- Hypnos Magazine submit here, 1-3 cents/word
- Tales From the Moonlit Path submit here, 10$/story
- The Arcanist (flash fiction) submit here, 50$/story
- Black Warrior (Dec-March, Jun-Sept.) submit here, unsure if pays?
- East of the Web submit here, unsure if they pay?
- Havok (flash fiction) submit here, no payment
- Cemetery Dance (currently closed) submit here, unsure if they pay?
- Coffin Bell submit here, no payment
Thank you for this list! I have (sadly) never submitted any of my work anywhere. How do you get past that initial fear the first time?
It helps a lot, I think, that my short stories are all stress-busters, something I did for fun, quickly written and unrelated to any of my books. There’s almost no pressure attached to them and so it’s easier to shrug off any rejections and keep trying for that acceptance.
I’m glad I’m not the only one who tracks submission places with spreadsheets! I tend to update it once a month with the help of the SFWA’s Market Reports & The Submission Grinder (https://thegrinder.diabolicalplots.com/)
Oooh, another thing to add to my spreadsheets. The Submission Grinder sounds delightfully scary and slightly deadly. Perfect. Thank you so much!
Thank you for this list of places to submit! I’ve got some sci-fi stuff, so these will definitely be relevant for me. Tracking those submissions, as you say, is super important. In mine I’ve also got a column for submission fees, which I kind of cringe looking at when I add them up, but I guess it’s good to keep track of. Something else I’ve included is some kind of “tier” or ranking of markets based on readership, which helps me get some idea about their selectivity. Thanks for sharing these!
The fees! How could I forget the fees. It might have been my subconscious effort at self-protection. I’m also spoiled by Submittable, they organize everything for me and always clearly include the fees.
This is fantastic, thank you for sharing!
You’re welcome!
Good luck as you continue to submit to short stories. I’ve never done that. I took part in my first anthology this year for a charity thing. It went okay. On the fence if I’ll do more. Enjoy the break!
I hope you enjoy the break as well, and the holidays! Thanks for stopping by 🙂
Interesting collection! Thanks for sharing 🙂
Ronel visiting on Author Toolbox day Writing Story: A Case Study
Oh good. Interesting is my favorite type of collection, so this works out.
For a while, Cemetery Dance was a SFWA qualifying market. It would be a shame, if they’ve dropped all the way to non-paying.
Thank you for the list… and for the organization tips. I need those.
I hope the list is helpful for you! And yes, I’m not really sure what’s going on with Cemetery Dance right now. But I can wholeheartedly recommend Cloaked Press, they are wonderful to work with.