Deadline: December 31st, 2017

Payment: $0.06/word

WE’RE LOOKING FOR STORIES THAT:

Have a main character that a middle grade reader (ages 8-12) can identify with;

Show a diverse set of real characters;

Are well written, fun to read, and encourage a love of reading science fiction;

Tell of adventure, space, science. Give us rockets, robots and alien encounters, and we’re pretty happy; Steampunk, time travel, weird west and alternate history are all fine;

Are between 3,000 and 6,000 words.

To be super clear – we’re looking science fiction, in all its variants. While we love fantasy as well, please don’t submit fantasy stories for this anthology.

We’re especially looking for stories:

Of adventure! We love a good dystopia as much as the next robot, but remember – this is the Young Explorer’s Adventure Guide;

Where the main character is of a population that has traditionally been under-represented in science fiction, e.g. girls, people of color, differently abled people;

Where the main character has agency, exercises it, and isn’t just along for the ride.

We are strong supporters of both the #weneeddiversebooks and #ownvoices movements.

We’re not interested in:

Stories where the female characters primarily exist to be rescued or as a prize for the males;

Stories where the primary plot or subplot is romantic in nature;

Stories with graphic violence or any form of sexual activity;

Stories with any violence towards animals;

Stories about the first girl to do X, surprising everyone;

Stories that depict any ethnicity or gender as universally bad or stupid.

Please note: although we’re aware kids have a wide and varied vocabulary, we’d prefer not to have swearing in the stories. If your story has swearing, please rephrase before submitting.

Submission deadline, mechanics and planned schedule:

Anthology will be open for submissions from July 1, 2017 – December 31, 2017, with a reading period of January and February 2018.

While we prefer original stories, if you have something perfect that had a limited run elsewhere, query us and we’ll talk;

Acceptance notices will be sent by March 30, 2018;

In the summer we will launch a crowd-funding campaign to help with pre-publication costs. Regardless of results of crowd-funding campaign, we are committed to publishing the anthology. We’ve successfully funded the previous three anthologies this way, chances are favorable.

Rights and Payments:

Authors will be provided with a complete Anthology Contract for review and consideration with the notice of accepted submissions.

In keeping with SWFA’s guidelines, we pay $0.06/word on final edited word count for one-year exclusive worldwide English rights and nonexclusive right to republish, print, or reprint the complete anthology in any language or format after the first year, print and electronic, and two contributor copies. Payment upon final edit.

If the crowd-funding fails, please note that we are still committed to this anthology, and will find other ways to fund the project. However, there may be delays. If authors feel the need to withdraw their submission due to delays, we understand.

We will provide professional editing, primarily for issues of grammar and spelling.

If authors have other questions about rights or payments, please contact us before submission. We want to make sure all concerns are addressed.

More questions? Check the full description page for last year’s anthology here. Have more questions? Contact us!

Submit your work at the bottom of this link: Dreaming Robot Press.