Thank you for your interest in The Dark Sire Literary Journal. Below are the submission guidelines. Please follow these to submit to our magazine.
We accept dark-themed short fiction (up to 5k words), serialized fiction (9k to multiple novel length), poetry (up to epic), and art (all types in .jpg, .png) submissions in gothic, horror, fantasy, and psychological realism. We do not accept cosmic, weird, or anything dystopian or sci-fi.
All works submitted must be a complete work, with the exception of SERIALIZED FICTION. For serializations, we accept works in progress. For submission purposes, we would need: at least first three chapters AND an outline for the rest of the story. NOTE: If you only have an idea for a story, we encourage you to email an inquiry to our EIC (darksiremag@gmail.com) with any and all details possible; this way the EIC can determine interest and whether TDS would like to pursue the story for publication.
Everything published will appear first on our blog, The Dark Forest, and then second in a special edition paperback. Paperbacks are published twice a year, while online content is available on a rolling basis. Typically, short stories, poetry, and art will be published weekly, and serializations will be published monthly. The seasons for TDS run from Summer to Fall and Winter to Spring.
TDS is a non-paying market, but we do our best to uplift our creatives by promoting them on our social media and through interviews.
Short fiction, poetry, and art creatives whose works are selected for publication in TDS give us first-publication rights for 6 months from the release date. Serialized fiction authors give us first-publication rights for the entirety of the serial PLUS 6 months from the final chapter release. After this period, publication rights revert back to the creative so they can seek further publication opportunities.
PLEASE NOTE: TDS has been on hiatus and has just returned to work in mid-February. New content will be rolling out in late-April to early-May, after the special edition paperback is released.
GUIDELINES:
Please submit original, unpublished short stories, poetry, and art AS AN ATTACHMENT to: darksiremag@gmail.com
Please use Garamond, 12-point font on all submission materials.
In the body of your email, please provide us with:
- SHORT FICTION – The title, genre (gothic, horror, fantasy, psychological realism), and word count
SERIALIZATIONS – The title, genre (gothic, horror, fantasy, psychological realism), and word count; divide story into CHAPTERS and clearly mark them on the page in bold
POETRY – The title, genre (gothic, horror, fantasy, psychological realism), and line count; for longer or epic poetry, use page count
ART – The title, genre (gothic, horror, fantasy, psychological realism), medium, year created, and dimensions - A brief (1-3 sentence) synopsis of the piece (this includes ART)
- Your professional bio (50-100 words) – written in 3rd person
- Your social media links and website URL for promotion
Submissions that do not follow the above guidelines or that are incomplete will not be considered for publication.
Typically, if a piece is selected for publication, we will email the creative within 3 months of the submission. However, sometimes, due to space or thematic limitations, we will consider a submission for up to 6 months from submission. After 6 months, however, we have decided to pass on the work.
If you have any questions, please reach out to us at darksiremag@gmail.com.
The Dark Forest 