Articles by Emily Harstone

Emily Harstone is the pen name of a published writer. Her work has been published in ten countries, four continents, by over fifty different journals. She is a professional submissions adviser and editor. If she owned a dog it would be named Wystan.

MARY: Now Seeking Submissions

MARY: A Journal of New Writing, is a thoughtfully designed online journal sponsored by the MFA in creative writing program at Saint Mary’s College of California. MARY is buzzing with daring, strange fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and hybrid writing from both new and established authors. They’ve published work by D.A. Powell, Dorathea Lasky, Peter Orner, Bruce…

78 Poetry Manuscript Publishers Who Do Not Charge Reading Fees

Most traditional poetry manuscript publishers charge their readers a fee to submit. You can read about why that is the case here. This article focuses on a number of poetry manuscript publishers who do not charge submission fees to writers, which is good news for poets. This is the longest and most accurate list of…

Whiskey Tit: Accepting Manuscript Submissions

Whiskey Tit attempts to restore degradation and degeneracy to the literary arts. We are unwilling to sacrifice intellectual rigour, unrelenting playfulness, and visual beauty, often leading to texts that would otherwise be abandoned in a homogenised literary landscape. In a world gone mad, our refusal to make this sacrifice is an act of civil service…

Prometheus Books: Accepting Submissions

Updated September 17th, 2025 Prometheus Books is an established publisher of what they like to call “intelligent non-fiction”. They specialize in publishing non-fiction books that fall into the following categories: Popular science, philosophy, atheism, humanism, and critical thinking. Prometheus books was started in 1969 by the philosopher Paul Kurtz, who was also the founder of…

Five Journals Open to Submissions this January

All of these literary journals just re-opened to submissions on January 1st. As always, all of the literary journals do not have a reading fee. The literary journals are in no particular order. Naugatuck River Review This print journal focuses exclusively on publishing narrative poetry. Narrative poetry is poetry that tells a story or has…

Self Promotion For Introverts

  “Writing is something you do alone. Its a profession for introverts who want to tell you a story but don’t want to make eye contact while doing it.”  ― John Green As an introvert, a writer, and a very reluctant self-promoter, this quote has always struck me as being particularly profound. Not just because…

10 Literary Journals that Publish Longer Fiction

Most literary journals are only interested in publishing short stories that are up to 3,000 words or so in length. So it can be harder for someone who wrote a longer short story to place it in a good home, unless they are publishing a collection of short stories. The following literary journals are all…

Polis Books: Now Accepting Book Queries

Updated April 28th, 2024: They went under quickly and all that was really shared was a twitter post here, with the sreenshot below (from the founding editor) Polis Books is an independent publisher of fiction and nonfiction, founded in 2013. Their focus is on publishing new voices. They are a technologically driven company. They publish…

Why Writers Need To Be Readers

“You have to read widely, constantly refining (and redefining) your own work as you do so. It’s hard for me to believe that people who read very little (or not at all in some cases) should presume to write and expect people to like what they have written, but I know it’s true. If I…

42 Literary Journals that Publish Genre Writing

Most literary journals are interested in literary work, by which they mean, not genre work. The definition of genre is a category of artistic composition, as in music or literature, characterized by similarities in form, style, or subject matter. However, in the context of writing, genre can refer to poetry, prose or nonfiction in terms…

ThunderStone Books: Now Accepting Manuscript Submissions

Update March 8th, 2023: Website not working. Consider defunct. ThunderStone Books’ motto is global education for young minds. They focus on publishing children’s books with an educational aspect. The attention is particularly on books exploring a new language/culture in a fictional setting. Their area of primary focus is Mandarin Chinese (language, culture, setting and/or mythology)….

The Most Common Mistake Writers Make When First Submitting to Publishers

There is one mistake that most authors make when submitting their work to literary journals and magazines for the first time. It is a mistake I made when I first started submitting work. It is a mistake that most of the serious authors I know made. What is that mistake? Is it a terrible cover…

The 10 Major Publishing Trends of 2018

I am starting off this article with a disclaimer. This article is not going to tell you what publishing trends are up and coming. I don’t know whether books about cats in Egypt are going to be the new board book trend or not. That isn’t my area of expertise, and it is not where…

Red Deer Press: Now Accepting Manuscript Submissions

Updated July 2022: They specifically encourage submissions of Canadian authors. They don’t officially prohibit submissions from non Canadians, but we’ve removed them from listings because of this emphasis/focus. Red Deer Press is a small press based out of Canada. They focus on publishing children’s books. They publish books for a whole range of ages starting…

Paper Darts: Now Seeking Submissions

Paper Darts is an online and print platform for flashes–fiction and nonfiction–that push boundaries, challenge beliefs, and showcase underrepresented perspectives. They pair unexpected flashes from unheard voices with custom artwork, and sometimes dabble like artistic outlaws in deviant endeavors like pop-up shops, art museums, readings, short story collections, vinyl records, and other such obsessions. You…

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