The next update of Aswiebe’s Market List will be after 7/15/2022. If you don’t want to miss an update, subscribe to the Aswiebe’s Market List newsletter: https://aswiebe.com/marketlist/subscribe-to-market-list/
Thoughts in Passing
27 Places to Sell Flash Fiction
What even is flash fiction? Because the major awards don’t have a “flash fiction” category, there is no standard definition. Most publications agree that if it’s under 1,001 words, it is flash fiction. Some stretch that to under 1,501 words or even 2,001 words. Some ask for fiction that’s under 501 words. (And then there’s micro-fiction, which is usually under 300 words, and drabbles, which are exactly 100 words long.)
How do you know if a publication is flash fiction friendly? Even if they don’t list a minimum wordcount in their guidelines, flash fiction may be a hard sell. If they specifically mention flash fiction in their guidelines, that’s a good sign! If they say that they have more room for shorter stories, that’s a good sign!
What’s the best place to sell flash fiction? Flash fiction contests are worth considering. Low risk, high reward! Publications that specialize in flash fiction are a good bet. When comparing publications, remember that a flat pay rate instead of a per-word pay rate may be a better deal for flash fiction. And for these very short pieces, it’s great to find publications with a minimum guaranteed payment.
Here are 27 places to sell your flash fiction.
| Name | Min Wordcount | Max Wordcount | What they want | Pay Per Word USD (originals) | Flat Pay USD (originals) | Payment Notes | Website | Notes |
| Factor Four Magazine | 0 | 1,000 | All speculative flash fiction, especially SF, fantasy, supernatural, and superhero fiction | $0.110 | https://factorfourmag.com/submissionsinfo/ | |||
| Arcanist, The | 0 | 1,000 | SF/F/Horror flash fiction | $0.100 | https://thearcanist.io/a-call-for-submissions-244f646d25a4 | |||
| Third Flatiron Press | 600 | 3,000 | Science fiction, fantasy, horror, themed issues. Flash fiction, no theme required. | $0.080 | https://thirdflatiron.com/ | ONE-TIME THEME: 7/19/22 – 8/2/22 things with feathers (hope or the loss of) | ||
| Baffling Magazine (Neon Hemlock) | 0 | 1,200 | All speculative flash fiction | $0.080 | https://www.bafflingmag.com/submissions | |||
| Pseudopod (Podcast) | 500 | 6,000 | Horror and dark fantasy | $0.080 | $100 for reprints, $20 for flash fiction | http://pseudopod.org/submissions/ | An Escape Artists publication. ONE-TIME SUBMISSION PERIODS: 3/1/22-7/31/22 (2022 anthologies and collections), 8/12/22-8/21/22 | |
| Gargantua (Air and Nothingness Press) ONE-TIME ANTHOLOGY – DUE 12/1/22-1/31/23 | 1,000 | 1,000 | All genres, flash fiction, themed to massive engineering megastructures | $0.080 | http://aanpress.com/submissions.html | |||
| Metastellar | 0 | 1,000 | Fantasy, SF, and horror flash fiction | $0.080 | https://www.metastellar.com/write-for-us/flash-fiction-story-submission/ | ONE-TIME SUBMISSION WINDOW 10/1/22 – 10/31/22. NOTE: submission gives right of publication, even without a contract signing | ||
| Campfire Macabre Vol 2 (Cemetery Gates Media) ONE-TIME ANTHOLOGY – DUE 6/1/22-8/15/22 | 500 | 1,500 | Horror flash fiction, themed to When We Were Getting High, My Last Trick ‘r Treat, Body Grotesquerie, Ominous Visitors from Deep Space, or Out in the Fields, Forests, and Lakes | $0.080 | https://cemeterygatesmedia.com/submissions/ | |||
| Cast of Wonders Podcast | 0 | 7,500 | Clean YA SF/F/H | $0.080 | $100 flat for reprints, $20 for flash fiction | http://www.castofwonders.org/submissions/ | ONE-TIME 2022 SUBMISSION PERIODS: 06/15/22 – 06/30/22 (Young Authors), 08/01/22 – 08/31/22 (Flash Fiction Contest) ### Query first for > 6,000 words. | |
| Podcastle (Podcast) | 0 | 6,000 | Fantasy fiction | $0.080 | $100 for reprints, $20 for flash fiction | http://podcastle.org/guidelines/ | An Escape Artists publication. Original fiction up to 6,000 words, reprints up to 17,000. ONE-TIME SUBMISSION THEME: Indigenous Magic (#ownvoices) 7/1/22 – 7/31/22 | |
| Frozen Wavelets | 0 | 1,500 | Speculative flash fiction and poetry | $0.080 | https://earthianhivemind.net/frozen-wavelets/ | Reprints 500 – 1,500 or fewer words, original fiction 750 or fewer words. | ||
| Orion’s Belt | 0 | 1,200 | Literary speculative flash fiction | $0.080 | https://www.orions-belt.net/submissions | |||
| PodCastle Flash Fiction Contest RECURRING CONTEST – DUE 3/1 – 3/31 | 0 | 500 | Fantasy flash fiction | $0.080 | https://podcastle.org/2021/02/16/podcastle-flash-fiction-contest-vi/ | Recurring contest, rotates between Escape Artists publications Escape Pod, PodCastle, and PseudoPod. | ||
| Flame Tree Newsletter Flash Fiction | 700 | 1,000 | Horror and sci-fi, themed. Subscribe to free newsletter for themes. | $0.080 | https://www.flametreepress.com/submissions/ | SUBMISSION PERIOD: usually 2 weeks at the beginning of the month | ||
| Shoreline of Infinity | 0 | 6,000 | SF and Fantasy | $0.052 | Pays £40/1,000 words | http://www.shorelineofinfinity.com/submissions/ | RIGHTS: Also takes audio rights. ONE-TIME 2022 SUBMISSION PERIODS: 6/13 – 8/28 (flash fiction competition), 9/11 – 9/14 | |
| Apparition Lit | 0 | 5,000 | Speculative fiction, themed. Separate monthly flash fiction contest. | $0.050 | $50 min | https://apparitionlit.com/submissions/ | Submission periods: 2/15 – 2/28, 5/15 – 5/31, 8/15-08/31 (ONE-TIME 2022 THEME: Nostalgia), 11/15 – 11/30, with a 1-week extension each period for BIPOC. | |
| Dose of Dread | 500 | 1,000 | Flash horror fiction | $0.020 | https://dreadstonepress.com/submissions/ | SUBMISSION PERIOD: 1st – 15th Jan, Apr, Jul, Oct | ||
| Wyldblood Press – Wyld Flash | 0 | 1,000 | Speculative flash fiction | $0.012 | Pays £.01/word | https://wyldblood.com/submissions-2/ | ||
| Starward Shadows Quarterly | 500 | 4,000 | All spec-fic | $0.010 | Flash fiction is paid $10 flat. | https://starwardshadows.com/submissions/ | ||
| Wyngraf – flash fiction | 0 | 1,001 | Secondary world cozy fantasy flash fiction | $0.010 | https://wyngraf.com/2022/03/20/now-open-to-cozy-flash-and-microfiction/ | |||
| Hypnos Magazine | 0 | 10,000 | Weird fiction and cosmic horror | $0.010 | $.03/wd for flash fiction | http://www.radiumtownpress.com/guidelines.html | Fast response time. | |
| Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine | 0 | 10,000 | All speculative fiction and poetry, especially humorous and lighthearted | $0.007 | AU $0.01, min AU$20, max AU$100. Flash fiction and poetry AU$10. | https://andromedaspaceways.com/submissions-manager/ | Subscribers and AU/NZ authors can submit up to 20,000 words. ONE-TIME CLOSURE until 7/1/22. | |
| Electric Literature | 0 | 10,000 | Literary, all genres, incl. experimental. The Commuter takes flash fiction. Recommended Reading takes short stories. | $300.00 | $100 for flash | https://electricliterature.submittable.com/submit | SUBMISSION PERIODS: Recommended Reading (short stories) has 2 1-week open submission periods, usually in Spring and Fall, The Commuter (flash fiction) has 4 1-week submission periods. NOTE: Long response time. | |
| Craft Literary | 0 | 6,000 | Literary, with a focus on writing craft | $200.00 | $100 for flash | https://www.craftliterary.com/submit/ | ||
| Three-Lobed Burning Eye | 0 | 7,500 | All speculative fiction, western, and suspense | $100.00 | $100 per story, or $30 for flash fiction. | http://www.3lobedmag.com/submissions.html | ||
| Flash Fiction Online | 500 | 1,000 | All genres, including SF/F/H and literary | $80.00 | https://www.flashfictiononline.com/submission-guidelines-flash-fiction/what-were-looking-for-and-not/ | Submission period: 1st to 21st monthly, closed December. | ||
| Daily Science Fiction | 100 | 1,500 | SF, fantasy, slipstream, dark fantasy but not pure horror, etc. | $0.080 | Plus $.05/wd if they choose to use story in anthology. | http://dailysciencefiction.com/submit/story/guidelines |
Do you have a writing question? Send it to me, either by replying to this email or by using the contact form on my website, and it may get answered in the next newsletter.
What I’ve been up to lately, writing-wise:
My cozy, funny, queer story about a haunted drag show and an unusual pest control specialist is now up at PodCastle! Go to Episode 740 to read or listen, or find it in your preferred podcast stream.
Note: ASL is its own language, with its own grammar and syntax that is different from English. This story is written to convey the meaning, not as a direct word-for-word translation. Special thanks to Anna Dudda for providing a Deaf expert reading.
Things Shiny or Useful
Archive of all shiny or useful links: https://aswiebe.com/marketlist/shiny-or-useful-writing-links/
Five PR Tools Every Writer Should Know About: https://www.authorsguild.org/industry-advocacy/five-pr-tools-every-writer-should-know-about/
9 Things We Learned From Tracking 150k Books for 3 Years on Amazon: https://www.ingramcontent.com/publishers-blog/9-things-we-learned-from-tracking-150k-books-for-3-years-on-amazon?
Dark Art as an Access Need: https://adahoffmann.substack.com/p/dark-art-as-an-access-need
Digital Security for Filmmakers: https://www.digitalsecurity.film/
Crash Override Network: http://www.crashoverridenetwork.com/resources.html
How to Write Character Arcs: https://www.helpingwritersbecomeauthors.com/write-character-arcs/
Setting boundaries (thread
): https://twitter.com/AyanaGray/status/1535431505270525953
Accessible links (thread): https://twitter.com/Em1lySm/status/1516741011422199810
How to See if a Song is Copyrighted: https://legismusic.com/how-to-see-if-song-is-copyrighted/
List of Public Domain Music: https://www.pdinfo.com/public-domain-music-list.php
Free adspace on Dead Headspace for LGBTQ+ community through 7/24/22: https://horrortree.com/dead-headspace-is-offering-free-ad-space-to-the-lgbtq-community/
Reimagining Conflict: https://www.sfwa.org/2022/05/10/reimagining-conflict-writing/
Reasonable Agreement: On the Crapification of Literary Contracts: https://doctorow.medium.com/reasonable-agreement-ea8600a89ed7
Using Writer’s Block to Diagnose Story Problems: https://www.tiktok.com/@maryrobinettekowal/video/7081295775627480362
Classes for BIPOC writers: https://twitter.com/tinytempest/status/1537421038115381249
Atticus (for creating ebooks): https://www.atticus.io/
Sorting Hat Chats: https://sortinghatchats.wordpress.com/2020/01/17/the-basics/
What Debut Authors Should Know (thread): https://twitter.com/MissDahlELama/status/1537437057332617216
Artbreeder (Creative Commons AI art generator, great for character art!): https://www.artbreeder.com/beta/about
Upcoming Virtual Conventions/Workshops
(Any registration fees are noted.)
Westercon (?), July 1-4, 2022: http://westercon74.org/
ChiCon 8 / WorldCon ($30), Sept 1-5, 2022: https://chicon.org/
The Nebula Conference ($150) is over for 2022, but purchasing a membership now still gets access to recorded panels and year-round special events: https://membership.sfwa.org/event-4563942
Featured Market
Mysterion wants speculative fiction that engages with Christianity. Open for submissions during July 2022.
We are looking for speculative stories that meaningfully engage with Christianity.
Your story doesn’t need to teach a moral or cleave closely to an approved theological position.
Your story doesn’t need to be pro-Christian. We’re unlikely to publish anything that insults us, but we do want to read stories that challenge us. Having said that, there are tropes we see too often in stories critical of Christian faith and tradition: evil preachers, theocratic dystopias, Christians abandoning their faith because something inexplicable happened, crazy Christians trying to bring about the apocalypse by doing something in Israel, an unambiguously evil God. Any of these will be a hard sell.
There are tropes we see too often on the pro-Christian side, too. Stories where the plot resolution hinges on one or more characters becoming Christian, apocalypse stories based on a literal reading of Revelation, rapture stories, spiritual warfare with angels and demons as characters, retold Bible stories, allegory, theocratic utopias, anything that reads like C.S. Lewis fanfic. You’d have to do a very unique take on one of these to get anything other than a quick rejection.
Mysterion
Basics: themed speculative fiction, up to 9,000 words, pays $.08/wd for original work, $.04/wd for reprints, reprints okay, annual submission periods in January and July.
Guidelines: https://www.mysteriononline.com/p/submission-guidelines.html
Market List Updates
To see all the details about these new listings and what they're looking for, as well as hundreds of other listings, go to Aswiebe's Market List and download the latest version of the spreadsheet. Note: going forward, limited demographic market listings will be italicized.
| Test | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Name | What they want | Pay Per Word USD (originals) | Flat Pay USD (originals) | Website | Notes |
| Alternate History (Flame Tree Publishing) ONE-TIME ANTHOLOGY – DUE 7/11/22 | SFF themed to alternate history | $0.080 | https://blog.flametreepublishing.com/fantasy-gothic/alternate-history-call-for-submissions-0-0 | ||
| Baffling Magazine (Neon Hemlock) | All speculative flash fiction | $0.080 | https://www.bafflingmag.com/submissions | ||
| Hidden Realms (Flame Tree Publishing) ONE-TIME ANTHOLOGY – DUE 7/11/22 | SFF themed to hidden places | $0.080 | https://blog.flametreepublishing.com/fantasy-gothic/hidden-realms-call-for-submissions-0? | ||
| Mysterion | SF, fantasy, and horror with Christian themes | $0.080 | http://www.mysteriononline.com/p/submission-guidelines.html | SUBMISSION WINDOWS: January, July | |
| Third Flatiron Press | Science fiction, fantasy, horror, themed issues. Flash fiction, no theme required. | $0.080 | https://thirdflatiron.com/ | ONE-TIME THEME: 7/19/22 – 8/2/22 things with feathers (hope or the loss of) | |
| Mythulu | SF/F/H, themed | $0.040 | https://mythulu.com/emagazine-submission-call/ | ||
| Night Frights (Dark Moon Digest) ANNUAL ANTHOLOGY – DUE 8/1 | PG-rated YA horror | $0.030 | https://perpetualpublishing.com/2022/05/21/now-open-for-submissions-night-frights-a-ya-horror-magazine/ | ||
| Superstition (Redwood Press) ONE-TIME ANTHOLOGY – DUE 7/1/22 until full | Horror and dark fiction and poetry themed to superstition | $0.020 | https://redwood-press.com/category/submissions/ | ||
| Wyldblood Press – Wyld Flash | Speculative flash fiction | $0.012 | https://wyldblood.com/submissions-2/ | ||
| Museum Piece (Metaphorosis Books) ONE-TIME ANTHOLOGY – DUE 7/31/22 | SFF themed to museums | $0.010 | https://books.metaphorosis.com/open-calls/ | ||
| Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine | All speculative fiction and poetry, especially humorous and lighthearted | $0.007 | https://andromedaspaceways.com/submissions-manager/ | Subscribers and AU/NZ authors can submit up to 20,000 words. ONE-TIME CLOSURE until 7/1/22. | |
| Islandia Journal | All genres, themed to myth, folklore, history, and ecology of Florida and the Caribbean | $100.00 | https://www.islandiajournal.com/ | ||
| Short Story Substack | All genres | $100.00 | https://shortstory.substack.com/p/coming-soon | ||
| Flash Fiction Online | All genres, including SF/F/H and literary | $80.00 | https://www.flashfictiononline.com/submission-guidelines-flash-fiction/what-were-looking-for-and-not/ | Submission period: 1st to 21st monthly, closed December. | |
| Reclaiming Joy (WriteHive) ONE-TIME ANTHOLOGY – DUE 7/1/22 – 8/30/22 | Speculative fiction themed to reclaiming joy after difficulties | $30.00 | https://writehive.org/news/coming-soon-reclaiming-joy-anthology/ | ||
| Future Fire, The | Progressive speculative fiction and poetry | $20.00 | http://futurefire.net/guidelines/fiction.html | Prefers under 7,500 words. | |
| Haunted Train, The: Creepy Tales from the Railways ONE-TIME ANTHOLOGY – DUE 8/15/22 | Stories about trains | $10.72 | https://www.raynehall.com/general-8 | ||
| Incubate (Speculation Publications) ONE-TIME ANTHOLOGY – DUE UNTIL FULL | Feminist horror themed to rage | $10.00 | https://www.speculationpub.com/submissions | ||
| Insignia’s Best Asian Speculative Fiction ANNUAL ANTHOLOGY – DUE 6/1 – 6/30 | All speculative fiction set in Asia with an Asian main character, reprints only | $5.00 | https://insigniastories.com/subs/ | ||
| Wyldblood Press – Novels and Novellas | Science fiction and fantasy | $0.00 | https://wyldblood.com/submissions-2/ |
Keep writing, keep submitting, and good luck!
Abra Staffin-Wiebe, Compiler of Lists
Aswiebe’s Market List
Abra Staffin-Wiebe’s Author Website
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