The Stinging Fly
This Ireland-based journal will open in November for fiction (short fiction and novel excerpts), creative nonfiction, and poetry for the Spring 2024 issue. They also accept graphic fiction and nonfiction, as well as art. And they have a ‘featured poet’ section, for poets working toward their first collection. Their submission portal will open during the reading period.
Reading period: 13^th – 28^th November 2023
Length: For prose, “just as long (or as short) as it needs to be”; up to 3 poems for general poetry submissions
Pay: €150 for flash fiction/shorter essays (1-2 pages); €45/page for longer prose, minimum/maximum payment of €300/€1,200; €40/page for poetry, minimum payment of €60/poem; €400 for featured poet
Details here.

PodCastle
This is a fantasy podcast and magazine. They have detailed guidelines, including, “We’re open to all the sub-genres of fantasy, from magical realism to urban fantasy to slipstream to high fantasy, and everything in between. Fantastical or non-real content should be meaningful to the story. … Ideally, fiction should have strong pacing, well-defined characters, engaging dialogue, clear action, and still be beautiful. Above all, we’re looking for stories that are fun to listen to. Humor is encouraged. … We’d particularly like to see more stories set outside America, and stories that feature characters who represent a range of backgrounds and ethnicities.” They also accept translations, as well as reprints; writers can send one original story and one reprint at a time.
Deadline: 30 November 2023
Length: Up to 6,000 words (accepts longer for reprints – see guidelines)
Pay: $20 for flash fiction, $0.08/word for short fiction
Details here and here.

(And, Fusion Fragment publishes science fiction and SF-tinged literary fiction. They will open a very short submission window, 3^rd to 5^th November 2023. Send stories of 2,000-15,000 words; pay has increased to CAD0.04/word, up to CAD350. The submission portal will open during the reading period.)

Matter Press: The Journal of Compressed Creative Arts
They publish fiction and creative nonfiction, as well as fiction and creative nonfiction prose poetry, as long as it is compressed in some way.
Deadline: 15 December 2023
Length: Up to 600 words
Pay: $50
Details here and here.

Spooky
This is a new cozy horror magazine, and they are open for submissions for their inaugural issue. “Cozy horror. Fun horror. Classy horror. Dare we say, wholesome horror? … perhaps the easiest way to understand what we mean is to read stories by some of the old masters we love: Ray Bradbury, Charles Beaumont, Richard Matheson, Robert Bloch, Roald Dahl. Watch classic episodes of Thriller, The Twilight Zone, and Night Gallery. Read old horror comics. Listen to radio dramas like Suspense, Quiet, Please, and Inner Sanctum Mysteries. … In short, we’re looking to provide a space for a type of storytelling that has largely gone out of style – dark and scary, but playful and approachable with an emphasis on plot.” They have a detailed list of things they like (including high concept settings and situations reminiscent of the pulps — Androids, ghosts, aliens, old castles, vampires, dinosaurs, deals with the devil, mad scientists, Wild West gunslingers), and what they don’t. They plan to have two submission periods a year, October-December for the spring/summer issue, and May-July for the fall/winter issue.
Deadline: 31 December 2023
Length: Up to 5,000 words
Pay: $0.01/word
Details here.

Iterant
They accept poetry submissions only.
Deadline: Unspecified
Length: 3-8 poems, 10 pages maximum
Pay: $50
Details here.

Bio: S. Kalekar is the pseudonym of a regular contributor to this magazine. She can be reached here.

Lumina returned last year from a two-year hiatus to publish issue 19, which features writing from 19 contributors. Now they’re seeking submissions for their next issue. The deadline to submit is November 21. They have a different deadline listed on their website, which is confusing, but it’s the deadline on Submittable that is correct.

Lumina accepts submissions of poetry, fiction, speculative fiction, and nonfiction. Authors may send one submission per genre during each reading period.

Poets may submit up to four poems. Authors of nonfiction may submit multiple flashes totaling 1,500 words or fewer, or one piece, 6,000 words or fewer (though the preferred limit is 5,000 words). Authors of fiction may submit one story, 3,000 to 5,000 words. Lumina does not accept flash fiction unless it’s speculative. Authors of speculative fiction may submit multiple flashes totaling 5,000 words or fewer, or one story, 7,000 words or fewer (though the preferred limit is 5,000 words). Lumina accepts all speculative genres including fantasy, science fiction, magical fiction, horror, and weird fiction.

Each genre editor has included a note about their preferences in the submission guidelines. It’s a good idea to read this note before submitting.

Lumina accepts submissions online using Submittable, not via email or by post. They accept simultaneous submissions but ask that authors withdraw writing published elsewhere. They do not accept previously published work.

Lumina only accepts submissions that follow the guidelines they’ve posted online. Please read these guidelines in full before submitting.

If you would like to learn more or submit to Lumina, please visit their website here and the correct submission dates are here.

Bio: Ella Peary is the pen name for an author, editor, creative writing mentor, and submission consultant. Over the past five years, she’s written hundreds of articles for Authors Publish, and she’s also served as a copywriter and copy editor for a wide range of organizations and individuals. She is the author of The Quick Start Guide to Flash Fiction. She occasionally teaches a course on flash fiction. You can contact her at ellapeary@gmail.com.

They are distributed by the Two Rivers Press imprint of Ingram, which does a much better job than the general company. Their books are well designed and appealing. To get a feel for what they’ve recently published, go here.

It’s easy to tell if your work would be a good fit or not, because they very much inhabit a niche market.

To submit a proposal to them, or to learn more, go here.

Emily Harstone is the author of many popular books, including The Authors Publish Guide to Manuscript Submissions, Submit, Publish, Repeat, and The 2023 Guide to Manuscript Publishers. She regularly teaches three acclaimed courses on writing and publishing at The Writer’s Workshop at Authors Publish. You can follow her on Facebook here.

Ylva Publishing is the home of lesbian fiction and fiction about women-loving-women, and not surprisingly given the context, they only publish women.  They mainly publish romance genre, but they are open to other genres, including historical fiction, crime, action, mystery, young adult, and erotica.

They state: “We want our books to have a rich diversity and we’re committed to representing authors from a wide variety of backgrounds, both already published and due in the coming year. We actively encourage submissions by authors of color and writers with disabilities. Writers of any religion, nationality, and age are welcome at Ylva.” Which covers a lot of ground, but doesn’t make it clear if they accept work by non-binary writers. I have assumed, because they have not stated otherwise, that they are open to the writing of trans women authors.

Because they are not open to all authors, we are publishing this as a bonus article this week.

They do not disclose any details in terms of royalties, and they do not mention advances. They make it clear that the pressure is placed on the author to self-promote their work. Their covers are mostly mediocre, but fit within genre expectations. You can get a feel for what they most recently published here.

They try to respond to all submissions within 8-12 weeks, and have specific manuscript formatting guidelines you should follow.

You can read their full manuscript submission guidelines here.

Emily Harstone is the author of many popular books, including The Authors Publish Guide to Manuscript Submissions, Submit, Publish, Repeat, and The 2023 Guide to Manuscript Publishers. She regularly teaches three acclaimed courses on writing and publishing at The Writer’s Workshop at Authors Publish. You can follow her on Facebook here.

By Ellen Levitt

Lately when I ride my local trains and buses, I see most passengers spending their time on their cellphones. A few might read tangible printed materials such as books, magazines, even a newspaper. Others chat with people, stare into space, or nap. Maybe one person is knitting.

Occasionally I find someone doing what I’ve often done, which is writing. They might be jotting down ideas in a notebook or tapping at a tablet or even a small laptop. (I admit to looking over their shoulders.) I’ve seen a few who sketched diagrams or actual pictures and wrote, going back and forth between the two activities. Ahhh, the life of a dedicated writer, using time wisely while traveling on mass transit! And some intrepid (and fast-thumbed) folks might try to tap out short stories and novel segments on their phones.

It’s not exactly easy to write on a bus or train while it’s in motion but it can be done, and if you are willing to overlook your possible messy penmanship or misspelled words, it is a wonderful endeavor. You can also write or jot down notes while you are waiting at a train or bus station or waiting room, or in a bus shelter. This is why I, as well as other writers, do carry around notepads and pens, tablets or even scraps of paper, so as to write when the inspiration strikes.

Last year after seeing plays on Broadway, while riding on the subway trains homeward, I wrote notes for reviews in the playbills that I carried. Some of my notes were messy but I was able to decipher them, sat them next to my laptop the next day, and wrote out the actual review pieces.

What about driving? Many people commute in that manner and I’m not advocating writing and steering simultaneously. Multitasking is dangerous, I’m not joking. But some writers will take notes verbally while they drive (speech to text). Or if you want to devote more time to a particular writing piece or sketch, pull into a temporary parking spot, or a rest area, and write. Keep a notebook and pens in your car.

Perhaps the commute itself is offering something inspiring to write about. Did you just pass by a gorgeous tree, an eerie abandoned house, a bizarre billboard, and you want to write about it? Is your train going over a bridge or along an elevated segment, and something catches your eye that you want to turn into a poem, lyric or mini-memoir? Is there an intriguing person (or persons) in your bus or train car, and you want to write a scene for a play about them?

One year while taking the train to and from a particular high school where I taught, I wrote a series of poems about New York City. Many of the poems, free verse as well as haiku, I wrote first during my afternoon return commutes, primarily because those trips were less crowded than the morning commutes which were often so crowded with passengers. I wrote many of those poems on scraps of paper, and at home I would put them in a large envelope for safekeeping. I accumulated an assortment, which I occasionally edited, and a few were quite good.

Those who use their commutes to write often perceive it as a valuable use of their time, especially when we have so many other daily responsibilities and tasks. Especially for those people who face lengthier commutes, this makes writing possible at all. But you might feel the pressures of Writing In Public, feel exposed and vulnerable. You need to overcome that feeling and realize that the majority of people surrounding you on the train, bus or waiting room are not paying attention to you; they are immersed in their music or reading or perhaps their own writing!

If you are reluctant to try writing during your commute, particularly if you are surrounded by other people, don’t write penetrating journal entries. Try less personal work. If you feel pinched for time but want to write, work on letters to the editor, short poems, haiku, review pieces, sketches that you can flesh out more fully later on, and the like.

However you commute and write, please remember to be aware of your environment. Never completely let down your guard. Stay alert, to some extent. You will probably find it easier to write if you are sitting. But if you are standing, you can still write. Find a comfortable way to stand and try it. Hey, maybe this will force you to stop procrastinating on a writing assignment.

For the drivers amongst us, perhaps if you do some writing while you are still in your parking spot, and then make one or two stops along the way, you can push through with your writing work.

Come to think of it, there are other times and situations where you could be writing instead of playing games on your phone: during downtime on jury duty, in the waiting room of a medical office, on the line to be seated at a restaurant, and so on. Keep a notepad and pen, or a small tablet, with you most of the time so that you can do some writing.

There are authors out there who claim that they were able to use their regular commutes so as to write full novels, memoirs, or collections of essays. While this might be rare, you can still board that train or bus, or find time right before your car ride, and do worthwhile writing, brainstorming or lines. Perhaps get into a regular routine with this, and you might find yourself producing quality work.

Bio: Ellen Levitt is a writer and teacher, and a lifelong resident of Brooklyn, New York. She is the author of The Lost Synagogues of Brooklyn, The Lost Synagogues of the Bronx and Queens, and The Lost Synagogues of Manhattan (www.avotaynu.com) and Walking Manhattan (www.wildernesspress.com). She has also written many freelance articles and essays for online and in-print publications.