Clarkesworld Magazine is a Hugo, World Fantasy, and British Fantasy Award-winning science fiction and fantasy magazine that publishes short stories, interviews, articles, and audio fiction. Issues are published monthly and available on our website, for purchase in ebook format, and via electronic subscription. All original fiction is also published in our annual anthology series from Wyrm Publishing. We are currently open for art, non-fiction, and short story submissions.

Fiction Guidelines

Word Limit: 1000-22000 words, no exceptions Pay Rate: 10¢ per word. Payment via PayPal or check. (International authors may request wire transfers.) Genres: Science fiction and fantasy. No horror, but dark SF/F is permitted. Language: English (We accept stories from all over the world. Translations are welcome and encouraged.) Rights: We claim first world electronic rights (text and audio), first print rights, and non-exclusive single use anthology rights for our annual Clarkesworld anthology. If you are unfamiliar with the term “First Rights,” an explanation can be found here.

Stories must be:

Well-written. Language is important. There is no distinction between “style” and “substance” or “story” and “writing.” Convenient for on-screen reading. Very long paragraphs or typographical trickery may work against you. Suitable for audio. Stories should be equally effective, but not necessarily the same, in text and audio formats.

Science fiction need not be “hard” SF, but rigor is appreciated. Fantasy can be folkloric, contemporary, surreal, etc.

That said, there are some things that we’ve grown tired of and can be difficult or impossible to sell to us: (this is not a challenge)

stories that include zombies or zombie-wannabes

stories about sexy vampires, wanton werewolves, wicked witches, or demonic children

stories about rapists, murderers, child abusers, or cannibals

stories where the climax is dependent on the spilling of intestines

stories in which a milquetoast civilian government is depicted as the sole obstacle to either catching some depraved criminal or to an uncomplicated military victory

stories where the Republicans, or Democrats, or Libertarians, or . . . (insert any established political party or religion here) take over the world and either save or ruin it

stories in which the words “thou” or “thine” appear

stories with talking cats or swords

stories where FTL travel or time travel is as easy as is it on television shows or movies

stories about young kids playing in some field and discovering ANYTHING. (a body, an alien craft, Excalibur, ANYTHING).

stories about the stuff your just read in Scientific American or saw on the news

stories about your RPG character’s adventures

“funny” stories that depend on, or even include, puns

stories where the protagonist is either widely despised or widely admired simply because he or she is just so smart and/or strange

stories originally intended for someone’s upcoming theme anthology or issue (everyone is sending those out, wait a while)

your trunk stories

stories that try to include all of the above

Plagiarism will not be tolerated. Anyone caught doing this will be banned from submitting stories. (Sadly, this happens.)

Simultaneous submissions (having a story under consideration at another market while it is under submission here) are not permitted.

Fiction Submissions Process

Do not email or mail submissions. Clarkesworld uses an online submissions system that has been designed to streamline our process and improve communication with authors. Go here to submit your stories.

Our submissions form asks for your name, email address, cover letter, story title, word count, genre, and the file containing your story. Guidance for what you should and should not include in a cover letter can be found here. All stories should be in standard manuscript format (modern preferred, classic accepted) and can be submitted in either .RTF, .DOC, or .DOCX format.

After you have submitted your story, a tracking number will be displayed and an automated email confirmation containing this information will be sent to you. If you have not received this email within 24 hours, please email us. Your tracking number will allow you to monitor the status of your submission via our website, so please don’t lose or share it. NOTE: Some email services occasionally treat our tracking emails as spam, please keep an eye on your spam folder.

Our average response time is usually under two days, but we occasionally hold submissions for longer periods. Please:

don’t send queries about pending submissions until after two weeks have passed. Use your tracking number to check on the status prior to that. Email queries to Neil at neil@clarkesworldmagazine.com.

don’t send revisions to a submission unless they have been requested.

don’t submit another story for a period of seven days after receiving a rejection.

don’t re-submit stories that have been rejected.

don’t argue with rejection letters.

If you are uncertain about anything above, we recommend following the most conservative interpretation.

Questions, concerns, or technical issues can be sent to Neil via email.

Confidentiality

An author’s personal information (name, address, email, phone, or secret identity) will not be shared with anyone outside our editorial staff, except in the following situations:

if we are compelled by law

if threats are made against our staff by the author

if our narrators require your assistance with pronunciation (email only)

if established year’s best editors would like to include your story in their anthology (email only)

if the author has instructed us to do so

Non-Fiction Guidelines

Clarkesworld Magazine is looking for articles of interest to readers of science fiction and fantasy. We are looking for a wide range of types of article including, but not limited to: discussions of the genre publishing business, essays on the writing process and the reading experience, scientific material that might be of use in SF stories, and so on. However, please see below for things that we don’t want. We pay 10¢ a word up to our word limit of 2500 words.

Please do not send completed articles. Instead send a query letter with the subject header NONFICTION QUERY: [title or concept] to nonfiction@clarkesworldmagazine.com. There are no response times. We will generally only respond to queries we wish to follow-up on. A follow-up email should not be taken as a guarantee of publication.

There are some common types of non-fiction article that we are specifically not interested in receiving queries for. These are:

Reviews—there are plenty of places that publish such material, we don’t; Literary Criticism—again no (especially if it is really just a review); Interviews—we do publish interviews, but they are handled separately from the non-fiction articles and are generally commissioned. Please do not pitch interviews to us. Reprints—every article we publish must be original to Clarkesworld. There is no point in sending us material that has already been published elsewhere, especially if it is elsewhere online.

As with any field, there are some subjects that have been done to death, or which don’t work well in practice. The following list should give you an idea of the sort of thing that is unlikely to make it out of the slush pile:

Explanations as to why your favorite genre or sub-genre is the best ever, and everything else is rubbish—because the chances are that most people won’t share your opinion; Anything that attempts to categorize genre literature—yes, we have a lot of geeky analytical readers, but the chances of your coming up with something genuinely innovative are very low indeed; Convention reports—because all too often they end up sounding like “what I did on my holidays,” and anyway we are not interested in the process of convention running; Articles about why a certain set of awards “got it wrong”—because no one ever agrees with award results; Articles about why someone is WRONG on the Internet and how we must organize a grass roots campaign to stop this perfidy—because we are not a blog and with our production schedules everyone will have forgotten about the issue by the time we publish your rant; Articles that purport to provide 10 rules for success/failure in a particular endeavor—because no set of rules fits everyone, real life isn’t that simple, and in any case if you shoe-horned your advice into a “magic” number like 10 then you’ve probably either left something important out or padded the list; Articles that list the 10 best/worst/hottest/daftest/weirdest/whatever examples of something (or any number other than 10); Your personal experience of alien abduction—because then it would not be science fiction, would it? Articles that make sweeping generalizations on the basis of a few personal observations—it may well be that the market for fantasy is the worst it has ever been, and that this is all the fault of global capitalism and the Internet, but you need to supply some data to back that up, and explain why “ever been” does not include the time before the publication of The Lord of the Rings; Details of the heinous and all-pervasive plot by the publishing industry that has prevented your blockbuster 10-volume fantasy trilogy from being published—because the chances are that it is you that is out of step, not the rest of the world; Manifestos for new literary movements.

In addition, here are a few comments about the style of articles that we prefer:

Keep yourself out of the article. We are looking for objective analysis of issues, not touchy-feely journalism; We are not an academic journal. Footnotes are fine, indeed we like them (though we don’t include them in the word count), especially if they come with web links. However, you need to pitch your writing style for a general audience, not for a group of fellow scientists or literature professors; Please, no interviews in disguise. An article about the work of an individual, stuffed with quotes from that individual, is functionally equivalent to an interview. An article that is mainly quotes from a group of people is functionally equivalent to an interview. We want your words, not someone else’s; Don’t bait the audience. There’s a certain style of article that deliberately seeks to incite rage across the blogosphere. We are not that desperate for eyeballs; Make sure you know your topic. If you are going to write about quantum physics, bear in mind that we probably have several quantum physicists reading this magazine and they will laugh at you (and us) if we run an article full of errors. You don’t have to have a PhD in the topic before you write for us, and we’d be happy to find someone to fact-check for you, but we do need to ensure articles are not an embarrassment to us, or to you.

Finally, what do we like to see?

Articles that are thoughtful, in-depth, and well-written; Subjects that we haven’t covered before; Accompanying illustrations (but please do check the copyright situation); A clear passion for the subject matter.

Art Guidelines

Each month, Clarkesworld Magazine features a single piece of artwork that will serve as the cover for our online, ebook, and print editions of that issue. Our rights are restricted to the covers and marketing materials for that specific issue. All other rights remain with the artist. Payment is $300 and two copies of the print edition. Artist’s bio and link to their online portfolio will be included in the issue featuring their art.

What Kind of Art We’re Looking For

Genre art doesn’t have to look genre. It can, but we strongly suggest that you take a look at the cover art from prior issues. These are just a few:

Color artwork is preferred. We have bought B&W art, but it is a very hard sell. Author names and our header will appear on all finished covers. If your art contains crucial elements that appear in these locations, it will not work for us. If we’re very enthusiastic about a piece that suffers from this problem, we may ask if you’d be willing to make changes. Landscape artwork is preferred but not required. Since we use landscape art as wrap-around covers for the print edition, it should be able to stand alone when only the right half is visible.

Artwork must be available in a 300dpi .tif. Landscape covers measure 11" wide by 8.5" high. (Portrait 5.5" wide by 8.5 high.) Artwork for covers must include a 1/4" bleed. Do not crop your own artwork if it goes outside these margins. Artwork must not suffer when resized. This sounds funny, but since we are using the cover on the website and on the print edition, we are working with very different dimensions and need pieces that work at several sizes. If your amazingly cool image looks muddy at 300 pixels high, it won’t work for us. We will not consider artwork that has been previously used for magazine or book cover. We reserve the right to make exceptions, but they will be rare and by invitation only. We prefer 2D art. Digital or traditional painting. Photography and photo-realistic styles are not typically used for our covers.

Art Submissions Process

Artists interested in submitting their work for consideration should send the URL of their online gallery or portfolio to Neil Clarke (art@clarkesworldmagazine.com). Please do not attach images to the message. We will get in-touch with you if we’re interested in licensing a particular piece as a cover. Your online portfolio will be periodically reviewed for new works, so there should be no need to send us updates unless you change the location of your portfolio.