Updated October 24th, 2023 – Recently we’ve received reports about various issues occurring at Level Best Books, including but not limited to delayed release issues, issues with filing for copyright, etc. We have seen proof of some of these issues, and we are encouraging authors to steer clear.

Level Best Books publishes an annual anthology of Crime Stories set in New England each November, as well as various other anthologies throughout the year. Well-regarded by readers and reviewers, stories published by Level Best have won the Agatha, Anthony, Macavity, Derringer and Robert L. Fish (Award for Best First Short Story presented at the Edgar® banquet) Awards and have been recognized as “Distinguished Mystery Stories,” by the editors of the Best American Mystery Stories series. Level Best also publishes the winning story from the Al Blanchard contest every year.

Level Best Books has been in publishing for over a decade, focusing exclusively on mystery anthologies. On March 1st, with a new editorial team on board, they opened their doors for the first time to agented and unagented manuscript submissions. So well Level Best Books has been around a long time it is also clear that they are trying new things with a mostly new team of editors.

The good news is that all the editors have experience and you can learn more about them on the website.

They are interested the crime fiction in the following categories mystery, thriller, suspense, historical, traditional, and contemporary. They are not interested in publishing any other work.

To submit, email your previously unpublished, complete manuscript. Do not submit samples of unfinished manuscripts. They are not in interested in previously published work.

When you submit please do the following:

• Please indicate if the work is a standalone novel or part of a series (completed or planned)
• Include your name, address, phone number, email, title of your novel, total word count of your novel, and a brief summary of your publishing experience (if any) in the body of the email
• Please paginate your submission (format page numbers in either the header or footer of the document)

Make sure the subject line of your email is NOVEL submission.

There is a turnaround time of six weeks. To learn more, visit their manuscript submission guidelines.