Parageography

Submission guidelines

I am no longer accepting submissions. Events are forcing me to suspend publication. The last issue will clear out stories I already have. Sorry, and good luck submitting elsewhere.

Fiction

I am looking for quality speculative fiction with well developed fictional settings. I want stories that evoke the feeling of setting, stories with a strong 'sense of place', just in this case that place is an imaginary place.

While I want stories with well developed settings, they should also have good characters and plot. I don't want pieces that are primarily only descriptions of the setting. For instance, while Tolkien provides significant descriptions of Middle Earth in The Lord of the Rings, it is the story of the quest that makes the books classics.

I prefer stories that are no more than 5,000 words. I cannot consider stories that are significantly over the word-count limit, even as serials. In particular, I do not publish novels. Also, I cannot consider stories that are partial or incomplete.

I am not interested in stories with strong sexual content, or with excessive graphic violence.

Please, no simultaneous or multiple submissions. In other words, don't send them to me while you are sending them to someone else, and send only one story at a time. Also, no material that has been previously published.

I will pay $10 US for stories, of any length. I buy exclusive electronic rights for a period of 1 year.

Send submissions in plain text to editor@parageography.com. Paste the story into the body of your e-mail, or save as "Text Only" and attach. In particular, do not send MS Word .doc files, rich text, or printed stories.

In the subject line of your e-mail put:
FICTION: "Your Story Title"
but put in the actual title of your story. Do not put your name or any other information in the subject line.

Provide a short cover letter that contains:
Your real name,
Your physical address,
Your e-mail address,
An approximate word count,
The name you want printed as author.
Provide a short biography -- what I would list if your story is accepted. I will judge submissions based on the writing, not on your cover letter, so don't spend too much effort trying to impress me with it.

Please send plain text only. I will handle formatting for the web to match our style sheets. If you have text that should be in italics place it between underscores, like this: _text in italics_. Put blank lines between paragraphs. Indicate scene breaks with a hash sign # (shift-3 on a QWERTY keyboard) in the center of a separate line.

I will try to respond within 2 weeks. If things get busy it might take up to 1 month. (Based on experience, expect closer to 1 month). If you have not heard back from me after a month you can send me an e-mail to make check what is happening.

Book Reviews

I would like to engage one or two people to write book reviews. With a few reviewers writing on a regular basis, readers can learn the reviewers tastes. If you are interested in writing reviews on a semi-regular basis (once every couple of months) contact me by e-mail and we can discuss what is required. Please do not send unsolicited reviews.

Essays

I will publish a few non-fiction essays on world-building, analysis of famous authors worlds, symbolism, folklore, etc. These essays will all be solicited by me. If you are interested in writing a non-fiction essay for us, query by e-mail to see if your idea will fit my needs. Please do not send unsolicited essays.

Art

I am on the lookout for good fantasy and science-fiction art. The art I am looking for, like the stories, should strongly evoke the feeling of other worlds. I would like a "cover" piece for the entrance page and an "featured artist" piece, with a gallery of a few works and a short interview or article. Ideally these works would all be by the same artist. I will pay the featured artist as I do an author.

I could also use a few small pieces to decorate various pages, and occasional illustrations of specific stories. These will be negotiated individually. For small pieces I may not be able to pay, but I will always give artist credits.

If you have art you would like me to consider the easiest way is probably to send me the URL of a webpage that has some of your work. If that is not possible contact me by e-mail and we can arrange make other arrangements.