Before submitting, non-subscribers should read several issues of the magazine to determine if your work fits with Fiction. Portions of the current issue and past issues are available to read on this site. Print versions are available for purchase by single-issue order and subscription on our subscription page.
General Guidelines
Fiction will read unsolicited manuscripts from October 15 through April 15. Staying under 5,000 words is encouraged, but we will read short story, novelette, and novella fiction manuscripts of any length. We do not publish full length novels, flash fiction, non-fiction, stage plays, screenplays, poetry, hybrid works, or unsolicited interviews.
Simultaneous submissions are encouraged. However, if your piece has been accepted elsewhere, we ask that you immediately withdraw it by logging into our Submissions Manager and refrain from emailing a withdraw request for an electronic submission unless you have login issues. It takes longer for our readers to learn a manuscript is no longer available when you email your withdraw request, and it’s not uncommon for us to never see those messages because they mistakenly end up in our spam folder. Also, please do not assume that we have declined your submission and take no action at all if you have not heard from us within a certain time frame. We pride ourselves in thoroughly reviewing every submission, so not withdrawing your piece only causes an increase in our response time.
We regret that we cannot accept unsolicited submissions directly by email. To submit by snail-mail or our electronic submissions manager, please read the guidelines below.
As you might imagine Fiction is comprised of a small staff of dedicated readers and we therefore operate on a rolling submission basis. As a result, it may take us up to a year to review and respond to your submission. Your patience is appreciated.
Additional Guidelines
Please only submit one story at a time (do not include multiple stories in the same document when uploading to our submissions manager) and no more than two stories per reading period. Our submissions manager will prevent you from submitting a second story until after the first has been responded to by our staff. Any submissions that we receive which exceed these limitations will regretfully be discarded.
We do not accept science fiction, romance, erotica, young adult fiction, etc. What we are looking for the best new writing available, leaning toward the unconventional. We do accept a variety of genres including but not limited to: experimental, satire, literary, translations, and contemporary.
As the name implies, we exclusively publish fiction. Please remember: no scripts, plays, poetry, hybrid works, non-fiction, interviews, or unsolicited artwork.
While we have historically considered excerpts of novels for publication, we cannot publish novels in their entirety and are unable to read entire novels submitted to us. If you wish to submit an excerpt of an unpublished novel to us, we ask that you identify this in your cover letter and only submit the selection of your novel that you would like to be considered, rather than the full manuscript. Please do not submit excerpts from published work.
Further Reading
To Reach the Literary Editor: In this article, editor Mark Jay Mirsky elaborates on what he looks for in submissions and provides a glimpse into how Fiction’s selection process works.
Electronic Submissions
Our electronic submissions manager can be found at submissions.fictioninc.com.
File types we accept are .doc, .docx, .pdf, .rtf, .txt. You may write a note or a cover letter in the "Comments" field if desired.
Postal Submissions
Please send a printed manuscript with an SASE, and cover letter if desired, to:
Fiction
c/o Department of English
City College of New York
Convent Ave. at 138th Street
New York, NY 10031
To withdraw your postal submission, please email fictionmageditors@gmail.com.