Contests & Calls with May and June Deadlines

A number of editors and contest organisers have contacted us recently for help getting the word out to our community about their contests and calls with upcoming deadlines. We’ve added a few more we thought would be of interest. Some offer free submissions, others charge a small fee.

Note: We are a creative writing school and compile these lists for the benefit of our students. We’re happy to answer questions about our courses but please don’t send us your publishing queries or submissions :). Instead, click on the green links to go to the publication’s website and look for their submissions page. For more great places to submit as well as our best tips on getting published, check out our other lists and resources.

Tint is an online journal that only publishes writers writing in English as a Second Language (or third language, as long as English is not your native language, you’re good to go). We’re huge Tint fans. They’re currently reading for their 10th-anniversary issue. Send in your ESL poem (only 1 per submission), flash (up to 800 words), or short fiction or creative nonfiction piece (between 1000 and 4000 words). For more about Tint and what they’re looking for, check out our interview with Tint editor-in-chief Lisa Schantl, who judged our spring student reading. Deadline: 31 May 2023

Tiny Spoon is devoted to flash prose – fiction and nonfiction. They publish around two print issues per year and online. Currently, they ask for your tiny stories and essays (1000 words or less) on the theme of Emergence: “which can mean emergency, emerge, emerging: coming out and being in the world, introducing, opening perspectives, shifting and sliding into new realities”. They appreciate work that pushes the boundaries of conventional genres. Deadline: 31 May 2023

The Quarter(ly) publishes themed print and electronic issues, you guessed it, quarterly. We love their themes. Upcoming: Let’s Go to the Movies (31 May), Weirder Still (31 August), and Laughter and Tears (30 November). They’re open to poetry (you can send in up to 5 poems or 1 is fine too) and fiction and essays (from micros all the way up to 10,000-word novellas). They’re looking for work with fantastical elements. Note: submissions may close early if the issue fills. They pay a small honorarium and a digital contributor copy. They try to make a decision within a month and usually succeed.

The Black Fox Literary Magazine is a print and online biannual. Send in your poems (up to 3), and fiction and creative nonfiction (up to 5000 words). Submissions are free but you can choose to pay a little something because you’re awesome or because you’d like an expedited response or because you’d like feedback (fiction only). They aim to respond within 4 months to general submissions but often take longer. Deadline for free submissions for their summer issue: 31 May 2023. They may close early if they reach their quota. Their next free submissions window is from September 1, 2023 – November 30, 2023. You might also consider entering their contest on the theme of “Secrets Unraveled”. You can send in a story or essay of up to 5000 words, 2 flash pieces, or 3 poems for an entry fee of $12. The prize is $300 USD and publication in the Summer 2023 issue. All submissions are considered for publication. Contest deadline: 18 June 2023.

The Phare is an online UK-based quarterly that welcomes international writers. They’re looking for poetry (submit up to two poems, maximum 40 lines each), flash fiction, and short stories and creative nonfiction (up to 2000 words). They do charge a small submissions fee to keep the lights on, and for a reasonable fee will also provide feedback on your work. We like that they provide a platform for the writers they publish to promote their other work. We also appreciate their relatively fast response time, generally within 2 months. Deadline for their summer issue: 18 June 2023. If you miss this one, they’ll be reading for their winter issue from 4 October to 29 November 2023.

Fairy Tale Magazine publishes four digital issues per year and an annual print edition. They’re currently accepting work on the  theme of “LOVE”, and of course they’re looking for that fairy tale feel with an element of the supernatural and of transformation. Send in your short stories of between 1000 and 5ooo words (no flash) and poems of up to 500 words. They tend to accept within a month or so and don’t respond to all submissions, so if you haven’t heard back in a couple of months, you can probably assume it was a no. Submission is free and they pay 50 USD per piece. Magazine deadline: 2 June 2023. You might also consider entering their poetry or flash fiction contest. Entry fee is 5 USD. The winner receives $100 USD, publication in digital and printed issues. Contest deadline: 30 June 2023.

The Letter Review runs regular short story, fiction and poetry contests. For an entry fee of $15 you can enter a poem of up to 70 lines or a flash fiction piece of up to 999 words. The entry fee for short stories (up to 3000 words) is $20. They offer discounts for multiple entries in all categories. Prizes range from $600 to $400 for first place plus publication. Second and third-place winners also receive cash and publication, and 20 entries per category are long-listed. All entries are considered for publication, submission to the Pushcart Prize, and for further anthologies. Next contest deadline: 30 June 2023.