Call for Submissions

I edit The Best Horror of the Year for (Night Shade Books) and am currently reading for the fifteenth volume, covering material published in 2022.

I am looking for stories and poetry from all branches of horror: supernatural, uncanny, sf horror, psychological, dark crime, terror tales, or anything else that might qualify. This is an all reprint anthology,  so I’ll only consider material published in 2022. Deadline is December 1st 2022. Authors please confirm that your publishers are sending me review copies. If a book or magazine is coming out after my deadline, I’ll look at galleys or manuscripts. DO NOT WAIT UNTIL THE LAST MINUTE. The only excuse is if you’re a foreign publisher and shipping everything at one time saves postage. If you want your work to get a fair read, do not do this. I do not have time to carefully read a year’s worth of magazine issues and 10-20 original anthologies in two weeks.

I’ll look at e-versions of anthos and collections only if they’re navigable and have running heads. Otherwise, they won’t be read. I always prefer print, if available.

Authors can query as to whether I have/need your collection or an anthology/magazine in which you have a story at datlow@yahoo.com. My summation of “the year in horror” in the front of every volume includes novels, anthologies, collections, chapbooks, nf, poetry, art books, and “odds and ends”– material that doesn’t fit elsewhere but that might interest horror readers. But I must be aware of this material in order to mention it.

Ellen Datlow

Best Horror of the Year Volume Fifteen

8 Stuyvesant Oval 9G

NY NY 10009

****I regularly cover many magazines/webzines that publish horror (Black Static, Cemetery Dance, F&SF, The Dark, Nightmare, crime digests, and webzines such as Horrorzine, Uncanny, Apex, etc.-when their publishers send me the material).

Please ask your publisher to send the entire magazine or book-unless the venue doesn’t regularly publish horror. In that case, you can send me a word file of your story.  For online publications, email individual word doc files—not pdf files– including on the ms where the story has been published.

If  I choose a story you will be informed. Otherwise, you will not hear back.

thank you

Ellen Datlow

www.datlow.com

And here we go-my next original anthology Screams From the Dark: 29 Tales of Monsters and the Monstrous will be out from Nightfire June 7th.

On sale 6.7.22, pre-order now: https://tornightfire.com/catalog/screams-from-the-dark-tales-of-monsters-and-the-monstrous-ellen-datlow/… Design: Esther Kim

Art: GettyImages

Although I hate doing this, everyone seems to expect it these days. Here are the works I acquired/edited in 2021. Obviously all the  authors of the original stories/novelettes/novella/collection are also eligible.

For Tor.com (online for free)

Shards by Ian Rogers is a horror novelette 9500 January 27 2021

Across the Dark Water by Richard Kadrey is an sf novelette  13,000 February 3, 2021

The Tyger by Tegan Moore is a horror story  6200 February  24 2021

Now We Paint Worlds by Matthew Kressel is a far future novelette 9200 July 7, 2021

Black Leg by Glen Hirshberg is dark fantasy  5200 July 14, 2021

L’Esprit de L’Escalier by Catherynne M. Valente is a Dark fantasy 9200 August 25 2021

The Wonderful Stag, or The Courtship of Red Elsie by Kathleen Jennings is a  dark fairy tale  1900 September 1 2021

A Better Way of Saying by Sarah Pinsker is a fantasy 6000 November 10 2021.

For Tor books:

Burning Girls and Other Stories by Veronica Schanoes is a collection of stories and the title award-winning novella on Jewish/feminist/political themes by one of the brightest fantasists writing today. March 9, 2021

For Nightfire

Nothing But Blackened Teeth by Cassandra Khaw is a horror novella  21,500 October 19  2021 Nightfire

Anthologies:

Tool Tales: Microfiction Inspired By Antique Tools Paperback (IFW International(– April 8, 2021 Multi-award winning creators Ellen Datlow and Kaaron Warren teamed up on Facebook a few years ago

when Ellen posted photos of antique tools and Kaaron wrote microfiction pieces to accompany them, without either of them knowing what the tools were for.

This chapbook collects and preserves their playful interaction for readers to enjoy.

When Things Get Dark: Stories Inspired by Shirley Jackson (Titan) September 28

A collection of all new short stories inspired by, and in tribute to, Shirley Jackson.

Shirley Jackson is a seminal writer of horror and mystery fiction, whose legacy resonates globally today. Chilling, human, poignant and strange, her stories have inspired a generation of writers and readers.
This anthology, edited by legendary horror editor Ellen Datlow, will bring together today’s leading horror writers to offer their own personal tribute to the work of Shirley Jackson.
Featuring Joyce Carol Oates, Josh Malerman, Carmen Maria Machado, Paul Tremblay, Richard Kadrey, Stephen Graham Jones, Elizabeth Hand, Kelly Link, Cassandra Khaw, Karen Heuler, Benjamin Percy, John Langan, Laird Barron, Jeffrey Ford, M. Rickert, Seanan McGuire, Gemma Files, and Genevieve Valentine.

Body Shocks: Extreme Tales of Body Horror (Tachyon) all reprints (October 19)

Twenty-nine intricate, twisted tales of the human body, soul, and psyche, as told by storytelling legends including

Carmen Maria Machado, Richard Kadrey, Seanan McGuire, Caitlín R. Kiernan, Nathan Ballingrud, Tananarive Due, Cassandra Khaw, Christopher Fowler, and many more.

The Best Horror of the Year Volume Thirteen (Best Horror of the Year, 13) (Night Shade) November 16

Addison, Linda D. & Manzetti, A.“The Place of Broken Things,” (poem) The Place

Armfield, Julia “Stop Your Women’s Ears With Wax,” Salt Slow.

Barron, Laird “We Used Swords in the ’70s,” Weird Fiction Review Fall.

Bartlett Matthew M. “A Strange Haze,” Wicked Weird.

Baxter, Alan “The Ocean Hushed the Stones,” Served Cold.

Begg, Charlotte “After I Devoured the Beast,” (poem) Vastarien Fall.

Benedict, R.S. “All of Me,” F&SF, March/April.

Bestwick, Simon “And Cannot Come Again,” (novella) And Cannot Come Again.

Bodard, Aliette de “A Burning Sword for Her Cradle,” Echoes.

Breukelaar, J. S. “Fixed,” Collision.

Bruce, Georgina “The Lady of Situations,” This House of Wounds.

Bryski, KT “The Path of Pins, the Path of Needles,” Lightspeed #115, December.

Cadigan, Pat “About the O’Dell’s,” Echoes.

Chronister, Kay “Thin Places,” The Dark #50, July.

Cisco, Michael “Their Silent Faces” Spirits Unwrapped.

Cluley, Ray “6/6,” Black Shuck Books.

Coffman, Frank “The Witches Rite at Beltane,” (poem) Spectral Realms 10.

Connell, Brendan “All the Wild Animals,” A Miscellany of Death and Folly.

Dean, David “The Squatter,” EQMM Sept/October.

Ford, Jeffrey “The Jeweled Wren,” Echoes.

Gardner, Cate “The Mute Swan,” Terror Tales of Northwest England.

Grant, John Linwood “Records of the Dead,” The Twisted Book of Shadows.

Hodge, Brian “One Last Year Without a Summer,” Skidding Into Oblivion.

Holmes, Carly “A Shadow Flits,” Pareidolia.

Jamneck, Lynne “Lies I Told Myself,” Nox Pareidolia.                 

Johnstone, Tom “The Wakeman Recreation Ground,” Last Stop Wellsbourne.

Kassel, Mel “The Coffin, The Ship,” Black Warrior Review fall/winter.

Kiste, Gwendolyn “The Eight People Who Murdered Me…” Nightmare#86November.

Langan, John “Natalya, Queen of the Hungry Dogs” (novella) Echoes.

Larson, Rich “Painless,” Tor.com April 10.

LaValle, Victor “Up From Slavery” Weird Tales #363.

Littlewood, Alison “The July Girls,” Echoes.

Lombardi, Nicola “Striges,” The World of SF, Fantasy and Horror vol. IV.

McCarthy, Cori “You Wake With Him Beside You,” (poem) Betty Bites Back.

McHugh, Maura “Suspension,” The Boughs Withered When I Told You My Dreams.

Meijer, Marys “Pool,” Rag.

Moore, Tegan “A Forest, or a Tree,” Tor.com July 10.

Oates, Joyce Carol “The Surviving Child,” Echoes.

Raye, J. C. “Eternal Roots of Lane County,” Nightscript V.

Read, Sarah “Into the Wood,” Pareidolia.

Rees, Matthew “The Lock,” Keyhole.

Lee, Seulmi “When I Stopped Eating Earth,” Black Warrior Review fall/winter.

Sharma, Priya “Ormeshadow,” (novella) Tor.com

Smith, Michael Marshall “The Burning Woods,”  I Am the Abyss.

Tantlinger, Sara “To be Devoured,”   (novella)

Tem, Steve Rasnic “When You’re Not Looking,” The Night Doctor and Other Tales.

Thomas, Lee “Flowers For Bitsy,” Spirits Unwrapped.

Volk, Stephen “Unchain the Beast,” Black Static #68, March-April.

Warren, Kaaron “Into Bones Like Oil,” (novella) Meerkat Press.

Wilkinson, Charles “The Festival of Conformity,” Dark Lane 8.

Honorable Mentions.

Addison, Linda D. “Mud,” Don’t Turn Out the Lights.

Bailey, Dale “Das Gesicht,” Final Cuts.

Barrett, E. C. “We Aren’t Violent People,” Bourbon Penn #20.

Barron, Laird “Ode to Joad the Toad,” Miscreations

Burke, Kealan Patrick “I Used to Live Here,” A Winter’s Tale.

Day, Victoria “The Mosaic Maze,” The Ghosts & Scholars Book of Mazes.

Duffy, Steve “White Noise in a White Room,” Weird Horror, issue 1, fall.

Evenson, Brian “The Cabin,” Come Join Us By the Fire Season 2.

Ferrell, Keith “Cronenberg Concerto,” It Came From the Multiplex.

Files, Gemma “Carmagnole,” The Willows: Complete Anthology.

Hand, Elizabeth “The Owl Count,” Grendel’s Kin,  Conjunctions 74.

Ho, Millie “A Moonlit Savagery,” Nightmare 91, April.

Hodge, Brian “Insanity Among the Penguins,” Final Cuts.

Houser, Chip “Smilers,” Bourbon Penn #20.

Howell, A.P. “5:37,”Translunar Travelers Lounge Issue 3, August.

Iglesias, Gabino “The Song of the Lady Rose,” Come Join Us By the Fire Season 2.

Jennings, Kathleen Flyaway, (novella) Tor.com.

Jones, Stephen Graham “Wait for Night,” Tor.com September 2.

Jones, Stephen Graham Night of the Mannequins (novella)  Tor.com

Kadrey, Richard “Razor Pig,” Tales of Dark Fantasy 3.

Kiernan, Caitlín R. “Cherry Street Tango, Sweatbox Waltz,” Tales of Dark Fantasy 3.

Kilworth, Garry “Lirpaloof Island,” The Alchemy Book of Horrors #2.

Kornher-Stace, Nicole “Getaway,” Uncanny 33.

Langan, John “Altered Beast, Altered Me,” (novella) Final Cuts.

Littlewood, Alison “Swanskin,” After Sundown.

Malerman, Josh “One Last Transformation,” Miscreations.

Malik, Usman T. “City of Red Midnight: A Hikayat” Tor.com October 21.

Manzetti, Alessandro “From Hell,” (poem) Whitechapel Rhapsody.

Marr, Melissa “Of Roses and Kings,” Tor.com April 27

Mason, Rena “To the Marrow,” Weird Tales 364.

Mason, Rena “To the Marrow,” Weird Tales 364.

Moraine, Sunny “If Living is Seeing I’m Holding My Breath,” Come Join Us…Season 2.

Nix, Garth “Many Mouths to Make a Meal,” Final Cuts.

Parenti, Dino “Blue Was Her Favorite Color,” Arterial Bloom.

Parker, Michael “Las Llorasangres,” Penumbra No.#1.

Rebecca, Parfitt “Sometimes They Come Late,” New Gothic Review #2.

Richardson, Endria Isa “The Black Menagerie,” Fiyah #15.

Rickert, M. “The Little Witch,” Tor.com Tor.com October 28.

Rogers, Ian “Go Fish,” Tor.com April 15.

Van Samson, Steve “No God But Hunger,” Slay: Stories of the Vampire Noire.

Volk, Stephen “The Naughty Step,” After Sundown.

Wagner, Wendy N. “The Smell of Night in the Basement, PseudoPod 730.

Ward, C.E. “Real Estate,” The Ghosts & Scholars Book of Mazes.

Watson, D.A. “Restless Natives,” Footsteps in the Dark.