Fiction

Barrelhouse is now open for fiction submissions. Wondering if your piece is a good fit? The best way to know, of course, is to read some of our back issues and see if your writing would hang out in the same places as the writing we’ve published before. Short of that, here are some hot takes on the ways in which we tend to skew, followed by some boilerplate submission info. Hopefully this helps:

• We tend to choose polished work with an engaging voice, conceived with humility and somewhat clear intention. We love to find great new writing, and it doesn’t matter to us if your submission is your first or five-thousandth effort, as long as it is well done and worthy of praise.
• We are anti-fascist and anti-racist as a rule, so if your piece handles social, racial, sexual or what-have-you difference in an unthoughtful way, we will think that’s super weird and immediately move on to the next thing in queue. If you don’t know why this would be, or whether or not your piece is fair to all peoples and creeds, it’s probably best if we broke up right now.
• We do not hate on genre writing, although we do seek the traditional literary qualities we admire in such work. Which is to say, a good fantasy setting or interesting SciFi concept won’t be enough without good characters, solid storytelling and dramatic tension in which the readers feel something real and true is somehow at stake on the page. 
• We aren’t afraid of longer stories or other works (over 5,000 words-ish) if they’re awesome. However, thirty pages of writing in dire need of editing is a $100 fine for each word read after the 5,000th.
•  Please submit only one piece at a time.
•  No previously published work.
• We accept simultaneous submissions, on the understanding that you’ll tell us if you place the work elsewhere.
• It will probably take us about six months to get back to you. We try to do that faster, and sometimes take longer, but there are few of us and many of you.
• We pay you! You’ll receive $50 as a contributor to our print or online issues. Print contributors also receive two contributor copies of the journal. (We know it’s not gonna make a big dent in those student loans, although it could be enough to make you forget your troubles for a little while.)   

Always be writing, and stay righteous,

Team Fiction      

***Fiction submissions for this period will be capped at 650. If we hit that limit before 6/15, the submission window will automatically close***