Reycraft Books is linked to Newmark Learning and Benchmark Education.

They publish original and licensed works from authors and illustrators around the globe. They accept direct submissions and well as submissions from agents. All of their covers are beautifully illustrated. Their books are all hardcovers. Many receive Kirkus Starred reviews and a number have won other awards.

Their editorial team is experienced and also primarily from diverse backgrounds. To find out more about them, you can scroll to the bottom of this page.

They accept work for children ages 5-12. They are not interested in work aimed at young adults at this time.

If you are submitting a picture book or early reader, please submit the cover letter + full text, without art, unless you are a professional artist. They ask for the cover letter and full text of chapter books. Illustrators can also submit their work.

To learn more about their full submission guidelines and to submit, go here.

At MudRoom, they’re interested in the dirty work—the hands-on craft of writing. In addition to poetry and prose, they publish advice columns and essays about the how writing intersects with everyday life. They aim to make the practice of writing available to everyone.

Since launching in 2020, MudRoom has published four issues, each with work from around seven contributors. They publish quarterly, in the Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall. Right now through October 31, MudRoom is accepting submissions for their Fall issue.

Poets may submit three to five poems. Authors of prose (fiction, essays, and essays in translation) may submit up to 6,000 words. All authors published in MudRoom are paid $15.

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

MudRoom only accepts submissions that adhere to the guidelines they’ve posted online. Please read these guidelines in full before submitting.

If you’d like to learn more or submit to MudRoom, please visit their website 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.

Every writer knows that exhilarating moment when inspiration hits. Aha! Eureka! All those unconnected thoughts at last are woven together into a cogent—quite possibly brilliant—narrative. You dash to your computer or the closest piece of paper to capture the flood of words. After so many unsuccessful attempts, the story seems to write itself.

The only problem with inspiration is having to wait for it to appear. Sometimes, unfortunately, waiting for a very long time.

For me writing fiction was very different from the writing I was used to doing as a newspaper reporter and as a public relations writer. In fiction I was faced with a blank page, not a notepad crammed with facts and quotes I could put in my story. Oh, maybe I had a few ideas jotted down, a possible character or plot. But I required inspiration to breathe life into my ideas, to put the pieces together to create an intriguing story. In nonfiction my main problem was organizing the information I had and then presenting it in a cohesive and readable fashion. No inspiration was required.

When I started writing fiction—short stories at first, then novels—I waited impatiently for my story’s inspiration to show itself. There were a few ways I could sometimes coax it to appear. First I would write out all the story tidbits, the random characters, the bit of dialogue or possible plot points. Then I would walk away and do something else, something that required absolutely no thought. Sometimes, if I was lucky, inspiration snuck up on me during these mindless activities: taking a shower, washing dishes, chopping up onions. Aha! Eureka! I’d grab a towel or wipe the onions  off my hands, then grab the nearest pen and piece of paper. When inspiration struck I wanted to remember all the words.

But then I had a baby. Suddenly those chunks of uninterrupted time I’d used for writing stories no longer existed. My adorable baby was now in charge of my time. I realized quite quickly that I was not able to write coherent sentences when he was awake.

The obvious solution was to write when he was asleep. I was too wiped out to write when he went to sleep at night, but I was wide awake when he took his nice, long two-hour nap after lunch.

The two hours became my writing time. I learned that nap time—my daily window of opportunity—would end whether or not I had written a single word. No inspiration for that story? Too bad. There was always tomorrow.

To my surprise—and let’s not be modest here, my pride in myself—I soon became a disciplined fiction writer. No more waiting for inspiration. I had to use the two hours that I had. If the pieces of my story had not gelled together, I used the time to brainstorm more notes. If the words had come effortlessly the previous day, but not today, I edited yesterday’s work and, more often than not, added at least a few new paragraphs or pages. Every writing session I did something, and most of the time I managed to write at least a little.

Some days I wrote page after page and was frustrated when my son’s whimpering announced that writing time was over. Sometimes I only managed a single page filled with awkward sentences I probably would throw away the next day. It didn’t make any difference–I had tried. And let me be clear, I still welcomed inspiration whenever it appeared—for me, usually in the shower. I still wrote out all the snippets of ideas I had and then set them aside, awaiting the flash of inspiration that would weave them together.

But what I did NOT do was set my writing aside while I waited passively for inspiration. Instead I kept on writing, day after day, sometimes on another project. I don’t know if inspiration came more quickly than before, but I do know that I realized inspiration was not necessary for me to write my story or novel. It was certainly welcome, but it was not required.

Years later, when I was under a publisher’s contract to produce the third book in my mystery series by a date which was several months less than I usually needed to write a book, I knew I could do it. From my nap time writing, I had developed a certainty that I could sit down and write it. And that’s what I did. On time.

Yeah, you say, I don’t have a napping baby or any obvious daily chunks of uninterrupted time to write. Okay, but I think if you look carefully you can find the time.

Some writers who spend their work week at another full-time job do their writing on the weekends. That is their scheduled writing time. Other writers I know wait until their families are asleep to do their own writing. That might mean delaying their bedtime until 1 or 2 a.m., but they do it, night after night. I’ve read about other writers who set their alarm clocks for a couple of hours earlier than they needed to get up. Then they would write until it was time to get ready for work.

The point is that you can find a time, even if it is a few hours a week, when you can write. And then you have to do it, writing day after day, week after week. Because you are a serious writer, and that’s what serious writers do.

Today, for the first time, Canada honors National Truth and Reconciliation Day, as a federal holiday. The day honors the lost children and survivors of residential schools, their families, and communities.

This is happening now, because of ground penetrating radar was used at former Residential School sites (the last school closed in 1996, when I was 11), to discover the remains of Indigenous children. I use the word discover because I could not think of a better word. The fact is Indigenous people have always known the bodies were there, but it was widely unacknowledged by the media and non Indigenous individuals and organizations.

For those who do not know, Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their families, and sent to residential schools, where they were not allowed to speak their native languages, among many other abuses. These schools had the explicit goal of erasing Indigenous cultures. This happened in both Canada and the U.S.

Since June 17th, remains have been found at 10 residential schools across Canada, although the vast majority of schools have still not been searched. Similar searches are planned in the U.S.

September 30th is also known as Orange Shirt Day. Orange Shirt Day was created by Phyllis Webstad, a residential school survivor, and you can learn more about Orange Shirt Day here.

Not all of the provinces have decided to support this decision by the federal government, including the province we are currently based in, Ontario.

This is far from ideal, but reconciliation is not just about the government, but the people who live and work on these territories.

People, like me, the editor of Authors Publish, who grew up in Toronto, or Tkaronto, which was this region’s traditional name.

Toronto is covered by Treaty 13 and the Williams Treaties, and is the traditional home and unceded land of the Ho-de-no-sau-nee-ga (Haudenosaunee), the Anishinabewaki ᐊᓂᔑᓈᐯᐗᑭ, 
Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation, Mississauga and the
Wendake-Nionwentsïo. This information was gathered from the very helpful website native-land.ca.

I have a mixed relationship with land acknowledgements, which is to say that I think it is very important to acknowledge whose land we are really living and working on, and that this acknowledgement can be a potential source of disruption, but I also feel like it can come off as rote, as something said without intention or meaning, or follow up.

Hayden King, an Anishinaabe writer, and the executive director of the Yellowhead Institute, has written about regretting writing a territorial acknowledgement here, in a meaningful and honest way.

But I think it’s important to have these conversations and to actively work towards learning the truth of what happened, and continues to happen in Canada, and across Turtle Island.

I’m going to end with a few resources and recommendations that I personally found helpful. If you have any questions, corrections, recommendations, or feedback of any kind, I am open and listening and can be reached at caitlinelizabethjans@gmail.com.

Many of the links talk directly about genocide and abuse, as well as other hard to read topics.

Resources about Truth and Reconciliation and Residential Schools

Cultural genocide’: the shameful history of Canada’s residential schools – mapped

21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act by Bob Joseph

How To Talk To Kids About The National Day For Truth And Reconciliation

Talking to Kids about Residential Schools

Truth and Reconciliation Commission Calls for Action

Beyond 94 (a website that monitors progress on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s 94 Calls to Action)

The Gatherings: Reimagining Indigenous-Settler Relations by Shirley N. Hager and Mawopiyane

Indian Horse by Richard Wagamese

Places to Contribute

I really encourage to look into local Indigenous led groups to support, but Canada wide the Indian Residential School Survivor Society is a good starting place .

In Toronto the Anishnawbe Health Foundation is doing important work, as is Indigenous Harm Reduction.

Additional Resources

Telling Our Twisted Histories

Unreserved

Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

Heart Berries: A Memoir by Terese Marie Mailhot

Indigenous Toronto: Stories That Carry This Place edited by Denise Bolduc, Mnawaate Gordon-corbiere, Rebeka Tabobondung

What Is Land Back?

What is Land Back? A Settler FAQ