Bards and Sages announces the launch of the Bards and Sages Quarterly, a journal of speculative fiction. The journal will be distributed in PDF format, Mobipocket format, and print. Subscribers to the Bards and Sages Monthly newsletter will get a coupon code to download the journal for free when it becomes available.
The journal will include original fiction and art, book reviews, interviews, and book announcements. At this time, the journal will not accept poetry. The journal will be produced in 7" x 10" format.
Fiction Guidelines:
We are interested in all aspects of speculative fiction, from gothic horror to high fantasy to futuristic adventures. The journal will be designed for a general readership, therefore please keep the audience in mind. We are not interested in supernatural erotica (and we have a particular hatred of the vampire erotica sub-genre). While we have no problem with the use strong language per se, if 10% or more of your story is dependent on expletives for effect, please expand your vocabulary a bit more before submitting. The same holds true for gratuitous bloodletting. If your story's entire premise is simply a laundry list of perverse or violent acts with no real plot or purpose, please seek therapy...not publication.
Stories should be 1,500 or less. We are interested in serializations, however each installment must be 1,500 or less and must stand alone on its own merits. Stories must be unpublished (including online) and your original work. Under no circumstances will we consider fan fiction.
Submit work in the body of and e-mail. Do not send as an attachment.
Payment is .01/word, upon publication, as well as a PDF copy of the issue your work appears in. We ask for first time worldwide print and electronic rights. All rights revert back to author upon publication.
Art Guidelines:
We are interested in either color or black and white original art for inclusion in the journal. Art must be previously unpublished. We ask for first time worldwide print and electronic rights. All rights revert back to artist upon publication. Art should "tell a story" and not merely be an inert character portrait. We are looking for art that shows action or conveys emotion. Payment is $15, upon publication., as well as a PDF copy of the issue your work appears in.
Submit art in jpg, ping, or tiff format as an attachment. Art should be sized for a 7" x 10" size page, full bleed, and at 300 dpi.
We may select a submitted piece of art for use on the cover. If your work is selected for the cover, you will receive an additional payment of a free print copy of the journal featuring your work.
Book Reviews:
If you would like to become a book reviewer for the Quarterly, submit a short review of approximately 500 words of a current (published this year) speculative work. Reviews should be honest and focus on the good and bad qualities of the work. Do not submit reviews of books written by people you personally know.
Submit reviews in the body of an e-mail, and include the ISBN (if available), format (trade paperback, hardcover, ebook, etc), page count, retail price and where the book is available for purchase in the case of micro presses and independent authors.
We do not pay for book reviews. However, you will get a PDF copy of the issue your review appears in. Also, reviewers can request to be added to our official list of reviewers, and will be eligible to receive free books from publishers and authors to review for the journal. When submitting your review, please let us know if you are willing to review ebooks, or if you prefer to review print titles only.
In all cases, our response time is two weeks. Because this will be a regular journal, there is no deadline. If we accept your work, we will let you know which issue the work will appear in.
Issue one will be released in January 2009. Payments are made via Paypal.
Interviews:
At this time, we will not accept submissions of interviews. Interviews will be handled by staff.
All submissions and queries should be sent to fiction (at) bardsandsages (dot) com.
If you would like to get the PDF journal for free, go to our website and sign up for our free monthly newsletter using the sign-up box.
http://www.bardsandsages.com/
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