These are the guidelines we will use to judge your work.
Ignore them at your peril!
Yes, we know they're long, which may seem ironic for a publication devoted to flash literature. But they are long because they are thorough, and cover all of the questions you might have about submitting your work to us.
Guidelines at a Glance:
About flashquake:
flashquake is an independent, quarterly, web-based
publication that focuses on works of flash fiction, flash nonfiction (memoirs, essays, creative nonfiction, humor), flash
plays and short poetry. Each issue is organized around a theme (see "Publication
Schedule" for a list of themes), but non-themed work is also considered for
publication (see "Themed vs. Open Submissions").
It is our aim to make flashquake a top quality
paying venue for literary writers. We do not take advertising
or subsidies from sponsors. In order to fund the stipends for our contributors,
we require a $2 reading fee for each submission. We plan to award
stipends to three contributors of theme-related work in each category. We reserve the right to withhold some or all of the stipends to be awarded in each category if our editorial board doesn't feel that any of the work submitted in a particular category merits award.
If the proceeds from reading fees in any category exceed the amount of the three stipends normally paid, the excess funds will be used to expand the number of stipends awarded.
What we're looking for:
We are defining "flash" as works of under 1000 words in length. However, we admire brevity and will
receive shorter works favorably. For poetry, our uppermost limit is 35 lines per poem. We have no specific guidelines for prose poetry; it must be under our 1000 word limit.
Remember, flash literature is short in length, but good flash includes all of the elements of it's longer cousins.
flashquake welcomes your submissions in each of five categories:
- Flash fiction
- Flash nonfiction (memoirs, essays, creative nonfiction, humor)
- Flash plays
- Poetry
- Artwork
We're open to any type of writing within those categories, and specifically, we're looking for original stories,
nonfiction, plays and poems with fresh ideas and strong, clean, concise writing. We want to see pieces that readers will think about after they have finished reading them.
Although each issue of flashquake is centered around a theme (see our publication schedule for information on the theme for each issue), we also accept unthemed (open) submissions for each issue. However, only themed submissions are considered for compensation at this time.
Rights Sought:
The author/artist submitting their work retains the copyright to his or her work. We seek first publication
rights and request the following permissions from the author:
Permission to include your work in the issue of flashquake for which it's accepted.
Since flashquake is a quarterly publication, your work will be featured on the
flashquake site for three months.
After that period your work will be moved to our online archives, where it will remain indefinitely
unless you request that we remove it. Your work will also be included in the CD version of
flashquake which is presented to contributors. River Road Studios, the parent company of flashquake.org retains the copyright on the publication as a whole; we reiterate, however, that the author/artist retains all rights to their individual work. If your work is published elsewhere after its debut in flashquake,
we request that you credit flashquake as the venue where it was originally published.
Publication Schedule and Reading Periods:
As mentioned above, flashquake publishes quarterly, and our publication schedule for the
2001-2002 year is as follows:
Fall issue - Published September 1, 2001 - CLOSED
- Theme - Betrayal
- Submissions Accepted - June 15 to August 15
- Contributor Notification Deadline - August 24, 2001
Winter issue - to be published December 1, 2001
- Theme - Sacrifice
- Submissions Accepted - September 1 to November 10
- Contributor Notification Deadline - November 23, 2001
Spring issue - to be published March 1, 2002
- Theme - Weapons
- Submissions Accepted - December 1, 2001 to February 10, 2002
- Contributor Notification Deadline - February 22, 2002
Summer issue - to be published June 1, 2002
- Theme - Confession
- Submissions Accepted - March 1 to May 10
- Contributor Notification Deadline - May 24, 2002
How to Submit:
General Submission Information:
Proof your work thoroughly! Typographical and grammatical errors distract the reader. Such errors may disqualify your submission, and will certainly make a less than favorable impression on our editors.
We do accept simultaneous submissions. Please be sure to tell us immediately if your work is
accepted elsewhere. We do not accept multiple submissions.
Submissions are restricted to one piece of work per author/artist in any single category per reading period.
Your reading fee must be received before your work will be forwarded to our reviewers.
Submitted work for which the reading fee has not been received by our deadline will be destroyed unread. What Constitutes a Submission
Poets may submit up to three poems of no more than 35 lines each as one submission, but must
not submit more than one set of three poems per reading period. For all other genres, submit one piece of work only.
For fiction: Keep in mind our limit of 1000 words, but tell us a complete story with interesting situations and compelling characters. Excite us! Surprise us! Make us laugh! Make us think!
For nonfiction: The only limit here is length: 1000 words. Tell us your true story, and include the same elements as those of good flash fiction: interesting situations, compelling characters, fresh insights, memorable themes.
For poetry: Enclose your submission of up to 3 poems of 35 lines each formatted single-spaced. If you have special formatting requirements, please make note of them in the "Comments" section of the submission form.
For plays: Please see The Passion Peddler for an example of the format we prefer. We're looking for plays that would not exceed ten minutes in duration when performed on the stage or radio. That means no more than ten pages in the standard format. If in doubt, allow for approximately 150 words per minute. Better still, read your play aloud with appropriate-length pauses for stage directions to determine its length.
We're looking for pieces that are profound, funny, dramatic and original. Remember — these aren't short stories, they're PLAYS, and that means ACTION, whether physical or psychological. There is no limit to the number of props and characters allowed. However, the more you can do with less, the more impressed we'll be!
Electronic Submission:
This is our preferred method of submission. We have set up a procedure by which you can pay your reading fee via PayPal, a widely-used and trusted electronic payment service. After that process has been successfully completed, you will be sent to our electronic submission form, which will collect all of the information we need, and will include a space into which you can electronically paste your submission.
We do not accept e-mailed submissions. To submit electronically, you must use our form.
If you would like to submit electronically, but pay your reading fee via personal check, please contact us so that we can make arrangements. Keep in mind that your check must be received before your submission will be forwarded to our readers. Submissions unaccompanied by payment as of the closing date of a reading period will be discarded.
A Word About Preparing Your Work
We covered this earlier in the guidelines, but recent submissions have proven that it bears repeating: Proof your work thoroughly! Here are a few other general tips to keep in mind:
- Separate paragraphs with a blank line.
- Refrain from using fancy or script fonts. That old standby Courier works best.
- Make sure to include the title of your piece.
- If you are submitting electronically, the confirmation page that you see after hitting the SUBMIT key will show your work as you submitted it. Please don't be alarmed if your work appears not to have any line breaks in it. Line breaks ARE transmitted to us as you intended them.
Tips for Preparing Electronic Submissions
Prepare your submission as plain ASCII text.
Most publications that accept electronic submissions of flash literature accept them within the body of an e-mail message as ASCII text. Yet few provide any instructions for writers in how to do that. We hope to break that trend.
Assuming that most authors these days prepare their work in a word processing program, here are the generic steps to preparing your material as ASCII text:
- Open your document in your word processor.
- Open the "File" menu.
- Select "Save As."
- In most dialog boxes, below the entry for file name, you will see a pull-down menu for file type.
- Select "ASCII text," "text with line breaks (.txt)," "Generic word processor," or any other non-package-specific format.
- For Windows users, test the resulting document in Notepad (this is a generic word processor which comes with the Windows package). If you have saved the file to the correct format, it should be completely readable and should appear as you intended it. One telltale sign that it isn't in ASCII text format: if you see something like "’" where an apostrophe should be.
The old maxim "if at first you don't succeed, try again" applies here. The choices for file format when using the "Save As" feature of some word processors can be truly overwhelming. When you find the choice that works, make a note of it. You'll probably use it again.
DO NOT include your name in your submission. To ensure fairness, submissions are "blinded" — that is, all information pertaining to the author is stripped off — before the submission is forwarded to our editors.
Then, paste it into our electronic submission form. You will also need to include the following information:
- Your name;
- The title of your piece;
- The category in which you're submitting;
- For themed submissions, one or two sentences about how your submission relates to the theme;
- Whether your piece concerns our theme or is an open submission;
- Your e-mail address;
- Your land mail address;
- The copyright date of your piece;
- A brief (50-60 word biography);
- Whether or not your piece has been published elsewhere; and,
- Whether or not you would like us to include an e-mail link on your piece that readers can use to contact you directly with their comments.
There is also a space on the form for you to include any comments for us.
The electronic submission form also includes a link to PayPal for electronic payment of your $2 reading fee, so have your credit card handy.
NOTE: Your submission will not be forwarded to our reviewers unless your
reading fee is received before the closing date for the issue in question.
Submissions received after the deadline will automatically be carried over as open submissions for the next issue. Traditional (snail mail) submission:
All hardcopy submissions should be accompanied by a cover letter, which should include the same information as required on the submission form.
For fiction or nonfiction: Enclose your submission printed double-spaced on 8.5" X 11" paper. Please use a standard font, such as Courier, Arial or Times New Roman. Your submission will be scanned, then OCRed into electronic text for e-mail transmission to our editors. Using a non-standard font may result in a garbled scan. The general guidelines for each type of submission still apply.
For poetry: Enclose your submission of up to 3 poems of 35 lines each printed single-spaced on 8.5" X 11" paper. Make sure that your title is on each page of your submission, but DO NOT include your name on your submission.
For plays: Please be sure to use standard play format: single-spaced dialogue, plus a blank line between dialogue, character names and stage directions, on 8.5" X 11" paper. The general guidelines for each type of submission still apply.
Be sure to include your check (made payable to RIVER ROAD STUDIOS, and put the title of your submission in the "Memo" section) to cover the $2 reading fee. Send it to:
flashquake
ATTN: (Fiction, Nonfiction, Play, Poetry, Artwork) Editor
PO Box 2154
Albany, NY 12220-0154 Submission Guidelines for Photographs and Artwork:
We welcome submissions from photographers and artists in all disciplines. We ask for one time
publication rights, permission to archive the image on our site, and permission to include your work on the CD version of the issue which is presented to contributors. We will
consider previously published art as long as the artist has retained the rights.
Unfortunately, flashquake cannot pay for art at this time.
Because artwork will be published without possibility of compensation, there
is no reading fee required. The artist/photographer will receive a CD copy of
the issue in which the work appears. Artwork will be removed from our archive
upon request of the artist.
Artwork/photographs should not be sexually explicit or violent. We will
accept submissions outside the parameters of the announced theme of the issue.
Only those images which are marked as theme oriented will be considered for the
coveted spot on the Banner Page.
Electronic Submission: Send artwork in JPEG or GIF file format as
an attachment to an e-mail message. Our maximum size for display of artwork is 600 pixels wide by 400 pixels high (500 pixels wide by 350 pixels wide is optimum), and file size should be no more than 50 Kb to ensure acceptable download times. Include the heading "Art/Photo Submission:" in the subject
line along with the title of your piece, and indicate whether it is a "Theme" or "Non-theme" submission. Include
your name, address, e-mail address and telephone number in the message portion
of the e-mail together with a very brief biography (no more than 50 words). We also request that you
include a brief (2-3 sentence) written description of your work. This will be used to describe your work to
those readers with visual impairments.
Send the e-mail to artwork@flashquake.org. Those
artists selected for publication will be notified prior to publication date.
(See our Publication Schedule)
Payment for Themed Submissions Selected for Stipends:
The submissions in each writing category will be judged by our editors, whose decisions are final. Payment will be
made upon acceptance as follows:
- First place - $25
- Second place - $10
- Third place - $5
If enough submissions of exceptional quality are received, we may also elect
to publish up to three pieces in each category which merit honorable mention. Authors of honorable
mention pieces and contributing artists will receive CD versions of the issue
in which their work was published.
CONTACT INFORMATION:
Mailing Address:
flashquake
PO Box 2154
Albany, NY 12220-0154
Telephone Number: 518.424.4550
E-Mail Addresses:
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