I just updated my list of Short Fiction Markets, so it’s only fitting to add a post on where you can submit your stories this summer. There’s a lot of opportunity out there!
The following Canadian litmags are open for submissions in July and August.
This first batch is time-sensitive, with just a few days or weeks left in each magazine’s open submission period. So get writing your cover letters!
- The Ampersand Review is open to stories up to 3000 words until July 31st.
- Augur will be open to speculative stories up to 5000 words throughout August.
- Carte Blanche is open to fiction up to 3500 words on the theme of “Transformation” until August 11th.
- Event is open to fiction up to 5000 words until August 1st.
- Freefall is open all summer to fiction up to 4000 wrods.
- Geist is open to ’90s-themed fiction up to 5000 words until August 1st.
- long con magazine is open to art-inspired fiction up to 3000 words until August 15th (just extended!).
- Room is open to women’s fiction up to 3500 words on the theme of “Science” until they reach their cap, which could be any minute now.
- sub-Terrain is open to fiction up to 3000 words until August 15th.
- The/tEmz/Review is open to fiction up to 10,000 words until July 31st.
- The Walrus is open to fiction up to 5000 words until July 31st.
- Yolk is open to fiction up to 4000 words until July 31st.
This second batch of magazines has no set deadline. Some are open year-round; others close occasionally. But all of them are open right now. So why wait? Get your submission ready.
- Agnes and True is open to fiction up to 3500 words.
- Blank Spaces is open to fiction up to 3000 words.
- The Dalhousie Review is open to fiction up to 8000 words.
- Dreamer’s Creative Writing is open to fiction up to 2500 words.
- Fusion Fragment is always open to original speculative fiction.
- The Maple Tree Literary Supplement might be open — it’s hard to tell from the website.
- Nunum is open to flash fiction up to 500 words.
- Prism is open to fiction up to 4000 words.
- The Ex-Puritan is open to fiction up to 10,000 words.
- The Queen’s Quarterly is open to fiction up to 3,000 words.
- Riddle Fence is open to fiction up to 3000 words.
- The White Wall Review is open to fiction up to 6000 words.
Be sure to check the guidelines on each litmag website to make sure your work is a good fit and to learn their preferred formatting.
And remember that my lists are for fiction writers, and not even all of those — just the magazines I’m eligible to submit to. You might be eligible for other litmags that publish short stories from other demographics (like Ricepaper or Plenitude). And there are many other magazines that publish poetry or non-fiction. Search them out. Or find them handily listed on the National Magazine Awards website.
If you’re not ready to submit just yet, check out my full litmag list later in the year. There’s always something opening up.
Good luck!
(Coincidentally, none of the four magazines in my banner photo are open for submissions right now. TNQ is technically open but its submission cap has been reached. The Fiddlehead and Prairie Fire will open in September and The Humber Literary Review will follow sometime in the fall or winter.)
Visit each magazine’s website and subscribe to their newsletters to get the word on new issues, contests, and submission calls. And subscribe to a magazine or two, to support the enormous work required to bring a few good stories into the world.
Catherine Austen 