Submissions

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Submissions

Manuscripts: We strongly  prefer snail-mailed mss, though we can handle digital submissions (in .doc or .txt formats only), emailed as attachments to Adam Brooke Davis in the case of writers located overseas. Please enclose SASE if you wish the ms returned, or for reply only (we will recycle your ms). Please include an email address. GHLL does not sell, give away or otherwise share submitters’ contact information, though a record will be kept for our own use. Volume of submissions does not always permit individual responses. We welcome work from established writers and newcomers alike.  No payment. GHLL takes first time rights. We read year-round, and publish a new edition in June. Reporting time 3-4 months. Writers whose work is accepted will be asked to send a digital version along with a short (50-100 word) bio. Writers are strongly urged to read several sample issues in order to learn what sorts of things we prefer. Send mss to: Green Hills Literary Lantern, Dept. of English, Truman State University, Kirksville, MO 63501 Please specify attn: fiction, nonfiction or poetry

Poetry: Submit 3-7 poems, typed, one poem per page.  There are no restrictions on subject matter, though pornography and gratuitous violence will not be accepted.  Obscurity for its own sake is also frowned upon.  Both free and formal verse forms are fine, though we publish more free verse overall.  Poems of under six lines or over two pages are unlikely to be published.  A genuine attempt is made to publish the best poems available, no matter who the writer. We try to supply feedback, particularly to those we seek to encourage.  –Joe Benevento

Fiction: We accept short stories, short shorts, and excerpts from novels.  Our maximum length is 7,000 words.  There is no absolute minimum. Most of our prose is fiction, but we occasionally use essays and reviews. We accept simultaneous submissions but discourage multiple submissions, though 2-3 “short shorts” are acceptable. We are interested in stories that demonstrate a strong working knowledge of the craft.  Avoid genre fiction or mainstream religious fiction.  Otherwise, we are open to short stories of various settings, character conflict, and styles, including experimental.  Above all, we demand that work be “striking.”  Language should be complex, with depth, through analogy, metaphor, simile, understatement, irony, etc. – but all this must not be overwrought, or self-consciously literary.  This does not mean that in rare cases, style itself cannot be center stage, but if so, it must be interesting and provocative enough for the reader to focus on style alone. We tend to be interested in stories with strong character, with conflicts that matter (where the stakes are fairly high), and with stories that do not have simple resolutions.  Stories that go nowhere, that get blurred in focus, or that seem thin in idea have little chance of being accepted for publication.  –Adam Davis

Creative Nonfiction: Green Hills Literary Lantern accepts essays, memoirs, travel-writing, excerpts from larger works, genre-blurring permutations, and all forms of prose that can be considered “creative nonfiction.”  What goes for fiction (size-wise, acceptable-content-wise, etc.) can generally be applied to what we’re looking for in nonfiction.  Admittedly, these guidelines are as open and ever-changing as the elusive/innovative genre of CNF itself, so it’s up to the author to make the call and take the chance and see what happens.   –Adam Davis