Categories

Submission Opportunities December 2025

The Welkin Prize |Deadline: Jan 2, 2026

Annual micro fiction (up to 100 words) for all forms of prose

Fee: No | Pay: First Place – £75

Type: Fiction and non-fiction up to 100 words

Note: Only one submission at a time, but upon rejection may submit another entry

WIP Prize | Deadline: Dec 31 2025

A prize to support writers in completing an important book-length literary work.

Fee: $35 | Pay: $500 and editorial feedback, coaching meetings, and an excerpt/interview feature

Type: In-progress book-length work of fiction, non-fiction, or poetry

Note: First 25 pages for submission

Dark Space Novelette Anthology | Deadline: Dec 15, 2025

Obsidian is the name of the anthology, to be published April 2026. They are looking for darker stories about exploration, isolation, and the harsh conditions of space.

Fee: None | Pay: 1p a word to a maximum of £100

Type: Science Fiction 9000-25000 words

Note: Novelettes/Novellas, so longer than typical short stories

Summer in the City Anthology | Deadline: Jan 31, 2026

Short story anthology focusing on cities. To understand the type of stories they like, check out our previous anthologies Winter in the City and Spring in the City.

Fee: None | Pay: $0.10/Word

Type: Fiction, 3000-7500 words

Note: The publisher generally seems to favor speculative fiction

Tales of Steel & Sorcery | Deadline: Dec 31, 2025

Pulp style fantasy stories.

Fee: None | Pay: $10

Type: Fiction, 2000-5000 words

Note: Not looking for fantasy in a modern setting or urban fantasy. Some science fiction elements may be considered, but generally, they are looking for stories that are low technology. 

Black Glove Press |Deadline: Opens January 1

Fledgling project seeking novels and novellas of the weird. Experimental, Literary, Mainstream, Surrealist

Fee: No | Pay: Unknown advance and unspecified help with marketing

Type: Fiction and non-fiction 20,000 to 100,000 words

Note: Due to length of submissions, response time is six months

Speck Magazine| Deadline: Dec 21 2025

A fledgling publication seeking sci-fi and fantasy, Theme: The Craft, be it witchcraft or spacecraft

Fee: No | Pay: $5 per page up to $50 and 2 copies of the print magazine

Type: Up to 3 pieces of poetry, visual arts, or fiction of 2500 words or less

Note: Must be 18 or older and live in North America to submit

The Deadlands| Deadline: Dec 31 2025

A quarterly speculative fiction magazine of the ends we face here, and the beginnings we find elsewhere.

Fee: No | Pay: $ .10 per word

Type: Fiction up to 5,000 words but prefer 3-4,000

Note: No simultaneous submissions. Accepts reprints.

Trace Fossils Review | Deadline: January 31, 2026

Seeks the ferocious, the silent, the shocking, the quotidian, the confused. Send us the pieces you’ve labored over. Show us what has fossilized within you

Fee: No | Pay: One copy of their yearly anthology

Type: Fiction and Non-fiction up to 4,000 words; Poetry and visual arts up to 3 pieces

Note: Decisions usually within 16 weeks

Michael Stubblefield
Latest posts by Michael Stubblefield (see all)

Sign up to our newsletter to receive new articles and events.

Written by

Michael Stubblefield

When I got my bachelor’s degree—decades ago, now—I started out in film school, with aspirations of making it big in the movies. However, over the course of four years, I ended up taking so many writing classes that I had to change my major to Media Communications, with a Scriptwriting emphasis, in order to graduate in my target year. In the two decades since, I found myself drifting through several jobs that just paid bills. I have worked as a photographer, a truck driver, tour manager, and online marketing consultant. Finally, the most recent decade, I have settled for working as a software engineer. It pays well, and is something I am actually pretty good at. But I find myself longing to go back to the roots of what I really want to do—what my earlier college career should have told me I need to do—write.

Post navigation