How To Promote Your Poetry Without Paying A Penny

Updated January 19th 2017 Many writers ask me this question all the time: “How do you promote your poetry without paying anyone?” There is more then one answer to this question, but it mostly comes back to hard work. In my experience, outside of paying to enter contests, it is very easy to promote one’s…

Atticus Books: Accepting Manuscript Submissions

Last Updated May 2017 – They recently changed owenership and they may or may not reopen to book submissions at some point, but they are for the foreseeable future, closed. Atticus Books is a small publisher based out of New Jersey. Atticus Books was interested in publishing unusual literary fiction. They publish books that are…

Announcing the Winners of the Six Word Memoir Writing Contest

Congratulations to the winner’s of this weeks writing contest! They are listed below. But first, a bit about our new contest series. Every week we are going to have a contest on our Facebook Page. The contests will change from week to week but the winners will always be published in the magazine. The contest…

Quote of the Week

Writing Prompt: Gender Swap

Are you working on a novel? Or do you have a favorite character from a novel by another writer? This is an exercise that requires an established character, one that you know really well, although it does not need to be one you created. Pick a character and then write down his or her name…

The Active Writer

Phillip Roth has often said that he walks a mile for every page he writes. He also writes those pages standing up. Hemingway was also known for standing while he wrote, and many modern writers from John Green to Susan Orleans have been known to use a treadmill desk. The famous Japanese Novelist Haruki Murkami…

Caboose: A Journal of Really Awful Poetry

Have you ever written a poem, read it over, and groaned? Was it a truly terrible poem that was overwrought, confusing, and mixed metaphors the way a blender does? I know I have written these poems, even if I didn’t know it when I wrote them. Months later I will stumble across them and flush…

Beorh Quarterly: Open To Submissions

Beorh Quarterly is an online literary journal that publishes four issues every year. They accept poetry, fiction, and creative non-fiction, they are also open to work from any genre, except they are not interested in erotica or romance.  Horror, science fiction, mystery, and most other genres are fine. They are only interested in work that…

Prism Books: Open to Manuscript Submissions

Updated March 19th, 2020 Prism Books used to be an independent press but was recently acquired by Pelican Book Group, so you submit to them using the same website. Prism is a Christian company, and while they do not only publish Christian books and their authors do not need to be Christians, they are not…

Voluted Tales: Accepting Submissions

Voluted Tales Magazine publishes four monthly e-editions, roughly one each week of the month. All regular editions are edited and published by Mark Turner. These  weekly editions include a Voluted Tales General edition, a Voluted Tales Themed edition, a Voluted Tales Serials edition and a Voluted Tales Classics/Steampunk edition. They publish around 48 issues a…

Quote of the Week

Writing Prompt: Unusual Houses

When I was growing up I was obsessed with the Boxcar Children, not the later books when the children were wealthy and supported, but the first book when they were making a life for themselves in an abandoned boxcar. The books where homes were established in churches, barns, buses, boats, and trees all captured my…

Caketrain: Accepting Submissions

Update: In the Summer of 2015 Caketrain went on an Indefinite Hiatus.  Caketrain is a primarily print journal based out of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It was founded in 2003 and their goal has stayed the same: To publish the best contemporary works of poetry, fiction, and non-fiction. They have become a respected modern journal and are…

Clean Reads: Accepting Manuscript Submissions

Updated March 17th 2020: They have not published a book or an update in over a year on their website. I am considering them defunct.  Astrea Press officially launched in 2010 and published it’s first e-book in early 2011. It was founded because the owner, Stephanie Taylor saw a gap in the e-book market when…

The Routines of Successful Writers

I have always been fascinated by the routines and daily schedules of other writers and artists. Writing is not a job with hours or even deadlines, unless you count the self-imposed ones. There is so much self discipline involved in being a dedicated writer. Some of my friends write best in bars, others measure their…