Call For Submissions

It’s time for an experiment.

Dragon Moon Press will be opening its virtual doors for submissions for the month of December, 2009.

WHAT WE WANT: Completed 80,000-100,000 word novels in the following genres: Fantasy, Science Fiction, Gentle Horror, in any flavor or variety.

WHAT WE DON’T WANT: Children’s, middle grade, YA, nonfiction, biography, short stories, or the NaNoWriMo novel you just completed (send it NEXT YEAR, once it’s been edited!).

WHAT TO SEND: A query letter as the body of your email (with the usual query letter features: your contact info, genre, word count, a short 1 – 3 paragraph synopsis and relevant credits), followed by the first fifteen pages, also in the body of the email.

This is a departure from our regular submissions guidelines, and it’s intended to help me deal with the increased volume of submissions. DO NOT SEND ATTACHMENTS. Unless we specifically request an attachment from you, attachments will not be opened and your mail will be deleted.

Please do not include a bio if it’s not relevant, and please do not include a long synopsis. I just want to see what the story’s about, presented briefly and compellingly. Long chapter-by-chapter, point by point summaries will not be read.

FORMAT: Please leave an extra space between paragraphs and do not use special fonts or special formatting. Readability is my priority, and I will be grateful if it is your priority, too.

WHERE TO SEND IT: Address your email to DMPSubmissions @ gmail . com (without the spaces, of course), with “OPEN SUBMISSION: [Book Title]” as your subject.

WHEN TO SEND IT: Between December 1 and December 31, 2009. Not before, not after. Submissions are open for one month only. After that, we will return to our closed, solicited submissions policy.

WHEN TO EXPECT A RESPONSE: Please expect a response within 4-6 months. If your book sells elsewhere within that time, congratulations! Please drop us a line and let us know to remove it from consideration. Be aware that we have a full slate of great books for 2010, so any submissions received will be in consideration for 2011 or beyond.

QUESTIONS: Will be addressed between now and December 1. Please leave questions in the comments for this post.

The recent archives on this blog are full of advice regarding submissions and writing query letters. Please take the time to browse through. I am going to be handling these submissions personally, and any insight into the personal preferences of the submissions editor to whom you’re submitting is valuable insight.

But don’t just take my word for it, either. There are many excellent posts around the internet on the subject. Listen to Jeff Vandermeer about “what editors want”, listen to The Rejectionist about “what editors don’t want”, and listen to Kit Whitfield about “what editors mean” — (a great post that takes the sort of subtle dating analogies I used in “Dealing with Rejection” to a whole new level!).

Good luck! I’ll be posting progress through the month of December. If this works out well and I survive, I might just try it again next year!