Issue 09: Chapters

All chapters must have an end. A final sentence, a closing line. And so does Wizards in Space. 

For our ninth and final issue, we’re ready to hear about the chapters of your own journeys. Which pages have you turned, and which are you now opening? We want your cliffhangers, we want your tidy knots, we want your open endings. Fresh starts and sweet farewells.

Send us stories that tell half-truths, that contain muddled middles, or cold opens. Pieces that reflect on an adventure — whether you’re still riding it out or looking back with nostalgia. Share with us the chapters of your life that most want to be shared, the ones that spill over their lines and beg you to keep reading. We invite pieces that say hello, how have you been, or until we meet again. We want this issue to be a reflection of everything that Wizards in Space has been over the years: a beginning, a middle, and now — an end.

You write the chapters, we’ll put it in the book. And then we’ll start looking for the sequel. After all, the end of one chapter means the start of another, and whatever is next for us and for you, these issues will always be here — on a long flight, a bedside table, or simply on your shelves. Nine reminders that magic is real and maybe, just maybe, wizards do travel in space. 

GENERAL SUBMISSION INFORMATION

Wizards in Space seeks writers from all backgrounds, and all writers are encouraged to submit. Voices of color, the LGBTQIA+ community, writers from outside the United States and writers whose first language isn’t English, disabled and neurodivergent writers and artists – we are a safe place for your work. We promise to review every submission with kindness and an open mind.

As you choose what to submit, please keep in mind that we are selective about the themes and images we share with our readers. While we will publish works that contain references to sex or violent scenes, we do not publish erotica and we typically avoid extreme gore and profanity. We will not publish fiction that contains upsetting and graphic images for the sole, explicit purpose of shocking the reader. In works that engage with darkness, we always search for light at its core.

All submissions will be judged anonymously. Please do not include your name or any identifying information in your uploaded document or in the file name to help us with our anonymous submission process.

A note on names: You are welcome to publish your work under whatever name honors you, chosen or given, or you can elect to be published anonymously. You’ll be able to specify during the submission process. (We will still need your info for payment.)

Other notes:

• Please title all individual pieces.
  • Please use the name of the piece–or in the case of multiple poems or art pieces, the title of the first piece–as the filename.
  • Use discretion about using the names of real people in your work.
  • If your work contains sensitive material, please include content warnings as necessary.

Visual Art Guidelines

• We will accept art in JPEG, PNG or TIFF formats.
• Artwork must be 300 dpi and in black and white.
• All artwork must be at least 4.5’’ x 7’’ to fit in the book, and should fit comfortably on a page of that aspect ratio in portrait orientation.
• Artists may submit up to four pieces, or a comic or visual story up to four pages in length.
• Lineart and comics print best in our books - please do not submit photographs, as we cannot accept them!

Written Guidelines

• We accept submissions in DOC, DOCX, and RTF formats.
• For poetry, up to four poems, one per page, no more than 40 lines per poem.
• For fiction and creative nonfiction, up to 3,500 words.

What you’re agreeing to upon submission and acceptance:

Writers keep all rights to their work. We ask that you refrain from posting or publishing your piece between when we accept it and when we publish it as a courtesy. We also ask that, after that point, if you publish online or in another publication that you cite Wizards in Space Literary Magazine as its original home.

We may make minor copy-editing or style alterations to the text of an accepted work (things like fixing minor punctuation, changing to house style, etc.), and the author may not see these minor changes before we publish. However, if there are larger structural edits we’d like to suggest, we would never publish those without your permission. The author may refuse to make our suggested revisions and instead withdraw the piece from consideration, but we hope we can find a happy medium. We also reserve the right to add or modify content warnings as part of our editing process.

Payment

At Wizards in Space, we believe all creators should be paid for their work. For Issue 08, our pay rates are as follows:

• $40 per original poem or per page of original art.
• $20 per reprinted poem or per page of reprinted art.
• $0.04 per word for original prose, based on final published word count.
• $0.02 per word for reprinted prose, based on final published word count.