Thank you for your interest in submitting to F(r)iction!
Categories Accepted
- Short stories: 1,001 – 7,500 words
- Creative nonfiction: up to 6,500 words
- Flash fiction: (up to three pieces in the same document) up to 1,000 words per piece
- Poetry: (up to five poems in the same document) up the three pages per poem
Please visit our guidelines page to properly format your work for submission.
What We Look For in Submissions
Our editors have drafted up this fantastic page on our website to share what we look for in our submissions. We strongly recommend you read this and check out the examples before submitting to get an idea of our general publishing aesthetic.
We also highly recommend checking out a past issue of F(r)iction. We have several pieces available online, but there’s nothing like holding a glossy, full-color issue in your hands. You can check out all of our issues in our shop.
Our Submission Guidelines
We accept work, written in English, from anywhere in the world—regardless of genre, style, or origin—and welcome speculative writing and experimental literature.
We read all submissions anonymously. Please include your name and contact information in your cover letter only and remove any identifying information from both the submitted manuscript and the file name as well.
We accept, and encourage, simultaneous submissions and only ask that you withdraw your piece(s) using Submittable upon acceptance elsewhere.
There is a small reading fee for general F(r)iction submissions ($2.50), but authors accepted will be awarded payment for their work. Our staff is almost entirely comprised of volunteers, so this fee goes toward paying all the contributors who are printed in our beautiful pages. F(r)iction pays contributors $10 per final printed page, plus two contributor copies.
We edit every piece accepted for publication; for this collaborative process we will pair you with one of our Senior Editors. All our editors have been trained to help guide the development of each piece to reach its fullest potential in keeping with the author’s vision. This does not mean we will take on a wild jumble of words and half-formed musings. But it does mean that we value your work and want to help each piece to be as unforgettable as possible.
We respond to every submission as quickly as possible, usually within one or two months.
Covering 71 percent of the Earth’s surface, the ocean directly and constantly impacts our lives in ways we see and ways we don’t. From epic sea squalls and hurricanes and floods, to quiet currents that maintain the weather and house thousands of creatures, large and small, the seas wield immense power over climate and the lives of humankind. Yet, there’s so much we don’t know about the vast, abyssal territories of darkness, high pressure, and incredible cold and heat that surround us, impenetrable (or extremely dangerous) to landlubbers. In F(r)iction’s Ocean issue, we seek stories, poetry, and nonfiction about underwater cities, rising seas, harrowing travels, creation, destruction, thirst, and whales. Give us space whales! Tell us about a galaxy of oceans contained in a holographic fishtank, preach the gospel of Poseidon, or win millions with the help of a chance-taking cephalopod. The opportunities for observant and original writing are as boundless as expansive as the briny deep.
Form:
- Short stories: 1,001 – 7,500 words
- Creative nonfiction: up to 6,500 words
- Flash fiction: (up to three pieces in the same document) up to 1,000 words per piece
- Poetry: (up to five poems in the same document) up the three pages per poem
For this issue, F(r)iction seeks to uncover the redacted with Censored! Let’s investigate the burning of books, witches, and bridges as we delve into all things sanitized. What are the secrets a family withholds about their past? What histories do we bury, whitewash, or blackout? What voices are lost to time, imprisoned, and expunged? Bring us stories, poetry and creative nonfiction that wants to hide truths, or protect others from them. Join us as we contemplate blacklists, consider authoritarianism, and debate the trade off between freedom and safety. Imagine an microchip in a person’s brain that keeps them from talking about certain things… and how it might go wrong. Ponder a dress code that erases identity completely. Or maybe the part of yourself you obscure to fit in. Question a person scouring their socials to delete their younger self for a job. Send us your writing that interrogates obfuscation, from without, and within.
Form:
- Short stories: 1,001 – 7,500 words
- Creative nonfiction: up to 6,500 words
- Flash fiction: (up to three pieces in the same document) up to 1,000 words per piece
- Poetry: (up to five poems in the same document) up the three pages per poem
Join us on the Red Carpet for a notable (and maybe notorious) issue of F(r)iction! The Fame issue will explore all the fabulous, fascinating, and sometimes Faustian facets of rising in reputation and renown. Let’s questions the costs of social media stardom, relish the heights of heroism, and contemplate the most infamous of individuals and events. Fame might take the shape of a recognized discovery in science, or in a string of high-profile crimes. It might be a potion that brings glory into a person’s life, or a pursuit that ultimately brings their downfall. It might even be the short-lived legacy of a high school embarrassment, or a testament to peaking during youth. Maybe an AI gains an audience and begins to question itself? Or a person’s worst moment is captured on video and broadcast to the world? We’re seeking your short stories, poetry, flash fiction, and CNF that ponders the impacts of celebrity, whether practical or fantastical.
Form:
- Short stories: 1,001 – 7,500 words
- Creative nonfiction: up to 6,500 words
- Flash fiction: (up to three pieces in the same document) up to 1,000 words per piece
- Poetry: (up to five poems in the same document) up the three pages per poem
Please only submit using this category if you have been explicitly invited to by a member of our staff. This category allows select authors the chance to resubmit a redrafted version of a piece we originally declined free of charge.
Please include your original title (in the case you changed that) and date of your first submission in your cover letter; this will help us keep track of its progress.
Note: Submitting a revision does not guarantee acceptance; it is read, vetted, and discussed using the same process.
If you use this category and were not invited to re-submit, your submission will be declined.
We love our F(r)iction family (seriously, why don't you call us more?) and all we want is to shout from the social media rooftops about all your accomplishments like the proud relatives we are.
So here's your chance to help us brag about you! If you've been previously published in F(r)iction (either in print or online), we would LOVE to hear about what's been happening in your writing career. Let us share the news with all our followers on social media. Please. We miss you.
Love,
Your F(r)iction Family