A Variety of Markets

Today I’d like to introduce you to two markets which accept non-fiction and two markets looking for fiction. In the attempt to build a freelance career, I’ve been doing mostly research on non-fiction markets lately–since all my finished short stories are out to different competitions–but fiction will always be my passion and I suspect the great majority of you prefer to write fiction too.

Let’s start with the boring stuff to get it out of the way…

The Non-Fiction

Vibrant Life is a bimonthly publication promoting a healthy lifestyle and mental clarity. They’ve got lots of different sections and accept articles about any aspect of health or well-being. They’re looking for articles of no more than 1, 000 words, and shorter pieces are always in more demand. They also accept personal stories that fit with the theme of healthy living. Vibrant Life prefers that you submit finished articles to them. Payment ranges from $100-$300.

Divine is a Canadian women’s magazine, covering fashion, healthy living, love, and entertainment. They’d love to see articles about anything of interest to Canadian women, including careers and money management. They accept both queries and finished work, and they accept work from unpublished authors as long as it meets their standards of quality writing. Unfortunately, they don’t mention exactly how much they pay.

And now on to the good stuff…

The Fiction

Arc is a science fiction magazine looking for stories written in the near future. They want fiction of 3000-5000 words, and seem to be running a competition. First place wins five hundred Euros, and five honourable mentions win two hundred each. Seems like an interesting competition; if you write science fiction, don’t hesitate to submit.

Lamplight Magazine is a brand new quarterly looking for dark speculative fiction and horror. It’s published as an ebook and they pay a flat rate: $50 for flash fiction and $150 for short stories. They read year-round but have specific due dates for each issue. We’ve just entered the submission period for their winter issue, which ends on October 15th.

Hopefully one of these markets looks right for something you’ve been working on–or has inspired you to write something new. And don’t forget that if you keep writing, editing and submitting–in that order–you’ll eventually break through to the other side of published writer.

Markets for Non-fiction

In keeping with my goal of building a writing income, I’ve spent much of the last week researching markets which publish articles on the topics I’ve decided to focus on: mental health, travel and entrepreunership. These are all topics I can write about without much research. I have struggled with mental illness since I was eleven, I’m creating my own freelance business right now, and I can write about great destinations in my city while fine-tuning my article writing skills for when I can afford to actually travel.

I’ve decided to share some of the markets I’ve come across in my research with you. I hope sharing them will help you build your own writing income.

Today’s markets are all very different from one another, but they all accept travel articles of varying length:

In the Fray is a magazine that seeks to promote understanding between people, encouraging tolerance, and defying categorization. They accept News writing, Commentary–including personal essays and travel writing–and Cultural Criticism, which includes essays and reviews. Being a small publication, they don’t pay a lot, and pay is different for each category. Commentary, the category travel writing’s in, will pay you $25-75 depending on length and quality. Articles should be 1, 000–4, 000 words long.

Up! is a magazine run by Westjet, aiming to enrich travel experiences with a focus on Westjet destinations in North America and the Caribbean. There are several sections including features, Eat+Drink, and you can even submit for the website/blog. They DO NOT TAKE UNSOLICITED SUBMISSIONS. Instead they ask you query, for time-specific stories between six months and a year in advance due to long lead times. Pay rates aren’t mentioned specifically, but my understanding is the magazines connected to various airlines–several have them–pay quite well and are worth the time.

Journeywoman is a travel magazine designed just for women. They accept articles covering women’s travelling concerns. Length is up to 900 words, with sidebars containing additional information outside the 900-word article. Payment is a $35.00 honorarium and eligibility for the Journeywoman writing contest, which has a prize of $100. There are several categories to submit to and they prefer stories which contain actual travel tips rather than just telling a story.

Don’t forget to read the guidelines thoroughly and check out a couple of the available online articles for each before you submit/query these markets. Knowing your market and understanding what they’re looking for is the best way to create something they’ll want to publish.

Have you submitted any non-fiction before? Did you meet with success?

Market Listing June 22nd

I finished school two days ago and my brain was too dead to think up a theme for today’s listing, but I do have three markets for you which accept fiction AND non-fiction, so I guess that’s a theme of sorts.

And, without further ado:

42 Magazine Any fan of Douglas Adams will enjoy the title of this magazine, and maybe even the rest of it, too. What’s cool about this magazine is that they’ll accept stories written in any genre, of any length–though I’m sure they’re less likely to take stories beyond 10K–and from anyone who can write well. They also take “Extras”, which can be anything from political essays to how to articles to cartoons to video games sent on CDs to their subscribers. They’ll pay $20 for anything you can dream up–and do well.

AE Sci Fi–The Canadian Fiction Review is looking for short stories between 500 and 3000 words in length, and they’ll pay you six cents per word, which is one cent above what the SFWA deems a ‘professional market’. They also accept non-fiction, primarily interviews and profiles of important science fiction authors, preferably Canadian ones. They also have something called capsule reviews, which they pay $7 for. Articles get $20, and an interview will earn you $30–but remember to query first, because they don’t take unsolicited non-fiction.

Black Warrior Review is looking for poems, short stories of under 7000 words, and non-fiction of under 7500 words. They also accept artwork and comics, though it seems they take fewer of those. Being published in Black Warrior Review nets you a one-year subscription to the magazine and an unspecified amount of money.

Remember that while I tell you a bit more about the magazines than their names–what they pay, what their word count limits are, what genres they accept–it’s still important to read through all the guidelines on their page and make sure you understand it. The number one reason why stories are rejected is because the author didn’t follow the guidelines in an obvious way. Each editor wants you to format your story a little differently from the next–don’t hurt your chances of publication by not paying attention.

When was the last time you submitted work? Where did you submit it to?

Young Markets

If you’ve ever used Duotrope’s Digest to find a market for your work, you’ll notice that beside the name of some markets they’ve put the word “fledgling”. The word indicates that the market is less than six months old. Six months is used as the marker because most new markets fold within the first six months.

Today I’ve gathered three new markets that would love to see your work and will even pay you for it.

Specutopia is a brand new magazine looking for only the best speculative fiction. Their definition of speculative fiction includes science fiction, fantasy and everything in between, but doesn’t include horror. If they like your work, they’ll pay you one cent per word. They’d like to pay you more, but starting up a magazine, even electronically, costs money and they need to pay for their bandwidth. Oh well.

Abomination Magazine is a slightly less new magazine that, unlike Specutopia, would love some horror stories. In fact, they’d prefer you to scare their pants off. So much so that they won’t accept your story if it doesn’t scare them. However, they’re still only going to pay you one cent per word because they’re broke too.

Fantastic Frontiers Magazine I think this is the oldest one on today’s list, and this market is also the highest paying. They’d like to see your fantasy and science fiction stories of up to 2,000 words. Unlike the other guys, they had some proper money to get themselves started, so they’re willing to pay you three cents per word instead of one. Don’t you feel like you’re moving up in the world? Well, that’s only if they like your work.

Don’t forget to keep submitting your work. Every time you get a rejection, send that story back out. Every time you get depressed, write something new and send it out. The only way to get published more is by writing, editing and submitting more. Quite a number of writers spend months working on the writing and editing part and never get to the submission part. Start submitting now, and you’re one step ahead of all of them.

Canadian Markets

I’ve always been proud to be Canadian. Maybe it’s because Canadians are polite. Maybe it’s because Canada’s really, really pretty. Maybe it’s just because at least our politicians, while not the most intelligent or trustworthy, aren’t warmongers.

Whatever it is, I’ve noticed that Canada isn’t really given the recognition it deserves. Many of the best modern musicians, actors, artists and especially comedians, are from Canada. Here in Canada the arts thrive, aided by hundreds of grant programs, government-funded arts education programs and library-run creative programs. We may not have the same level of control over the mainstream media as the Americans, but with a tenth of their population, how can we be expected to?

More importantly, us Canadians like to do it ourselves. With a fondness for literature and a do-it-yourself attitude stolen from the pioneers, Canadians have created hundreds of magazines, dozens of which are specifically looking for fiction. Over the last year or so I’ve discovered many of these markets for writers, some of which pay small fortunes.

Today I’ve decided to share with you three not-so-famous Canadian magazines that will pay quite a bit for your fiction.

Descant Literary Magazine is a Canadian magazine, coincidentally run by the same people who run Now Hear This, the literacy company I worked for last year. They accept short fiction, short essays, reviews and poetry, and they pay $100 flat for accepted works. They prefer paper submissions and they do mention that it could take a long time to get a response and to go from acceptance to publication.

FreeFall Magazine is a quarterly Canadian magazine accepting poetry and prose. They also run occasional contests. FreeFall will pay you $5.00/printed page for published works.

The Fiddlehead claims to be the oldest literary journal in Canada. I can’t tell you for sure if this is true or not, not being well enough educated on the history of Canadian literary magazines(maybe I should do some research…) but what I do know is that they’re looking for short fiction up to 6,000 words and poetry. The other thing I know is that they’ll pay you $40/printed page when your work is published.

On my journey to discover Canadian literary culture, I’ve learned that Canadians tend to give fiction and poetry quite a high monetary value. Some of these pay rates made my jaw drop the first time I found them. I dream of someday being published by one of these magazines–maybe you should make it one of your goals, too.

If you’d like a more comprehensive list of Canadian literary journals, you can find one here.

Market Listing January 13th

I don’t know about you, but this year I’m planning on making several submissions and hoping for at least a couple of publications. Most of the markets I’ll be listing are markets that I’m thinking about submitting to. I will only be listing paying markets, as I will only be submitting to paying markets this year. For now all of the markets I’ll be listing are for speculative fiction. Almost all of the markets I’ll be posting accept electronic submissions, but don’t forget to read the guidelines thoroughly before you submit.

These markets accept longer short stories, for the most part under 10, 000. I’m hoping to find a home for the short story I just wrote, and maybe you will too after reading this list.

Abysss&Apex Magazine of Speculative Fiction Abyss&Apex accepts stories of up to 10, 000 words. They run on a quarterly schedule and have set fiction reading periods. The next one is in February. Payment is five cents per word up to 1, 500, with a flat payment of $75.00 for longer works.

Lightspeed Magazine Originally just a science fiction magazine, Lightspeed recently merged with its sister magazine to start accepting fantasy submissions. They are not accepting fantasy submissions until further notice. Paying five cents per word and accepting stories up to 7500 words long, this is a market to watch.

Strange Horizons This magazine is looking for speculative fiction stories of up to 9, 000 words. They do prefer shorter stories of under 5, 000 words, but it’s perfectly fine to submit a story between 5, 000 words and 9, 000 words. Strange Horizons pays its writers 0.07 cents per word. They are currently not open to fiction submissions, but they will re-open for fiction submissions on February first.

I hope that you’ll submit your fairly long short story to at least one of these markets. If you manage to find a home for one of your stories thanks to a market I sent you, let me know. I’d love to hear your success stories. If you’re too shy to comment, shoot me an email at diannalgunn@gmail.com .

Do you plan to submit more short fiction this year than you did last year?

Market Listings December 16th

I decided to start with market listings instead of a prompt because I figure there’s a pretty good chance you’ve got a short story sitting around somewhere that really should be sent out–or back out. Or maybe you’ve got a story that just needs one last good polish. Or maybe you’ve just written a story and you haven’t started editing it yet. The point is, you probably already have a story lying around, and I’m hoping you’ll consider sending it to one of these markets.

The First Line Short Fiction Magazine This market is good for those of you who don’t have a story. The First Line gives you the first line of your story and asks you to write the rest. If you write something particularly awesome, they’ll publish it and you’ll get paid. The first lines for 2012 stories are already up, so get to work making something. They pay $30 for short stories and $20 for non-fiction. They prefer short stories between 300 and 3000 words.

The Colored Lens The Coloured Lens will take speculative short fiction of up to 10, 000 words and even serialized novels up to 20, 000 words, but you have to query for the latter. They pay $20 per short story, and for novellas they pay $20 for the first 10, 000 words and $1 for every thousand words after that.

Ideomancer Ideomancer is looking for speculative short fiction up to 7, 000 words, and they will pay you 0.03 cents per word to a maximum of $40. They also publish poetry, and they pay a flat rate of $6 per poem.

These markets don’t pay at the professional level of five cents per word, but quite frankly, very few markets actually pay their authors that much anyway. If you’re thinking of submitting to one of these markets but you’re afraid, that’s okay. Submitting a short story for the first time is scary. But you can do it, and believe you me, you’ll feel much more like a writer after you do.

If you manage to get published at one of these magazines please let me know. I’d love to hear your success stories, and hopefully someday soon I can share one of my own.