WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR
Simply put, Scape is a fantasy, science fiction and horror e-zine with a young adult (YA) focus. We seek the best new short YA speculative stories, poetry and art. We also publish news and reviews on books, movies and trends in the speculative YA world.
STORIES AND POEMS
‘Scape’ for us means a lot of things. DreamScape, spaceScape, cityScape, mindScape, eScape…
All Scape fiction and poetry must contain a speculative component. We’re into sword and sorcery, urban fantasy, magical realism, hard sci-fi, cyberpunk, alternate history, supernatural, myth and legend, post-apocalyptic, dark, light and all shades in between. If you can imagine it, we’ll consider it. That being said, to catch our attention you’re going to need to bring something fresh and edgy if your story features well-worn ideas such as vampires or time travel.
Scape’s YA focus doesn’t mean we want ‘dumbed down’ or ‘censored’ stories. Quite the opposite. YA for us is broadly defined. It means fiction that is relevant, meaningful and of particular interest to young people. We’re not putting a specific age bracket on ‘young people’ and we aim for our publication to appeal to the ‘young’ and ‘young at heart’ alike. Obviously, we won’t publish stories containing gratuitous violence and/or sexual content. Equally, we are not a children’s literature outlet. We recognise that many themes relevant to young adults will acknowledge sexuality or aggression. We won’t discount stories with these themes as long as they are well written and the sensitive issues are dealt with intelligently.
We’re rather partial to two things:
1. Stories that make us think. Not stories that slap us in the face with a preachy, holier-than-thou message, but stories with subtext. Tales that we want to read twice or three times to really figure out. Well-realised characters facing situations that prompt us to question ourselves. Stories with something to say.
2. Unusual settings: unique worlds, fresh takes on the future, geographic and cultural contexts that aren’t often featured in fantasy and sci fi (eg. Asia, Africa, Oceania).
So, prepare to give us new settings to explore, 3D characters to love and hate, and plots and themes that push the envelope.
Still not sure? Check out Scape team member Morgan Dempsey’s article ‘What Makes YA?’ over at Broad Universe, or Pam Macintyre’s article ‘Speculation or Formula?’ in Issue 1 of Scape.
ART
We only publish art that is related to Scape fiction. We’re therefore always looking for artists, working in various media, who can illustrate Scape stories.
Images may be portrait or landscape orientated. However, all portrait images must have a 670 x 360 pixel section that is suitable for display on the Scape homepage. Images must be provided in jpg, gif or tiff file types.
If you are interested in illustrating for Scape, please e-mail our Art Director, Rebecca Ing, for further information, including a short bio and a link to examples of your work.
THE SPECIFICS
The following guidelines apply:
Short stories: Up to 8,000 words (no minimum word count). Bear in mind that the longer your piece is, the better it needs to be.
Poetry: Up to 100 lines (soft edges).
Art: We are looking for art across varied media to illustrate Scape stories. See above section for further details.
Reviews: If you wish to submit a book for us to review, please query Scape’s editor first, with ‘REVIEW REQUEST’ in the subject line. Please include author and publisher details in your query. If we are happy to proceed, we will provide you with a mailing address to where a review copy of the work can be posted.
All submissions must be your original work.
We do not accept fan-fiction or any works that are derivative in nature.
PAYMENT
All payments are paid on publication via PayPal only.
Short stories: One (1) cent U.S. per word for original short stories, with a U.S. $10 minimum payment.
Poetry: Flat rate of U.S. $25 per poem.
Art: Flat rate of U.S. $25 per illustration.
We hope to increase our rates in the future.
RIGHTS
For fiction and poetry, we claim first-printing English language world exclusive electronic rights for 90 days from publication. After the 90 days, you are free to sell your work elsewhere. We hope you will allow us to continue to display your work on the website, but this is not a requirement. You have the right to request your work to be removed from our site after 90 days.
For art, we ask for non-exclusive electronic rights. This means you are able to sell your work elsewhere at any time, as long as the buyer knows it is non-exclusive. Please note: art will remain displayed on the website in our issue archives.
SUBMISSION INFORMATION
All stories and poems must be submitted in .doc or .docx format (we will accept .rtf though this is not our first preference) via e-mail to: submissions (at) scapezine (dot) com.
Submissions should be made in standard manuscript format, but we don’t mind if you use Times, Arial or other easy-to-read fonts.
Our maximum response time is 90 days, though it is usually less. We will also announce submission status updates on Twitter. Please query if you haven’t heard from us after 90 days from making your submission, or if we have indicated that all submissions past the date you submitted have been sent responses. We do our best but e-mails can sometimes go astray.
Sorry, no multiple submissions. That is, please send only one story or poem at once – make it your best.
Sorry, no simultaneous submissions. If you have already submitted your work elsewhere, please wait until you hear back from them before submitting to us.
We do not consider unsolicited reprints. However, we will occasionally seek to reprint stories that have specific resonance with our mission.
We regret that we cannot provide individual feedback/comments on all submissions. If we do not accept your work, it just means that it wasn’t appropriate for us at that particular time.
Please do not submit any new work until 7 days after you receive an acceptance or rejection.
Any submissions not adhering to the above guidelines will be deleted without response.
CONTACT INFORMATION:
For inquiries: submissions (at) scapezine (dot) com
For submissions: submissions (at) scapezine (dot) com
Website: http://scapezine.com
READ NEXT:
