How to Submit Your Fiction to McSweeneys

How to Submit Your Fiction to McSweeneysHow to Submit Your Fiction to McSweeneysDave Eggers founded McSweeneys in 1996 in order to provide a home to work being rejected elsewhere (though contributors have since included David Foster Wallace, Rick Moody, and Heidi Julavits). The New York Times accurately described the journal as quirky, whimsical and slightly Victorian, so read a few issues to be sure your work fits. McSweeneys is a publishing company based in San Francisco. As well as operating a daily humor website, they also publish Timothy McSweeneys Quarterly Concern, the Believer, and an ever-growing selection of books under various imprints. You can buy all of these things from their online store. Theyre also transitioning to a nonprofit and would greatly appreciate your help. You can support them today by making a donation. Cover Letter Advice For new writers, McSweeneys has encouraging words about cover letters Please keep yours brief, though we do like to hear from peopl e who read and like the magazine. Were notlage concerned about writing degrees or past publications, though, so dont be daunted if you dont have an MFA or much in the way of previously published work. Guidelines for Book Submissions While submissions are open, please send along manuscripts that meet the following criteria- we remain, as always, incredibly excited to read your work. And please note that we only accept electronic manuscripts. Poetry submissions are addressed further down this page, and do not belong on our Submittable site. Because we are a very small organization with an even smaller editorial department, it often takes us a long time to respond to our submitters. We appreciate your patience with us as we work on getting to your manuscript. LENGTHThere are no guidelines for length. DEGREE OF COMPLETENESSComplete manuscripts only, with the exception of cookbooks- we are happy to accept cookbook proposals or full manuscripts. Please do not submit illustrated works. Multiple submissions are fine, but if your manuscript is accepted elsewhere, please withdraw your work from our system. If youve read all the above, please continue to our Submittable site. Guidelines for Web Submissions We gladly consider unsolicited works, but because we are a very small organization with an even smaller editorial department, it often takes us a long time to respond to our submitters. We appreciate your patience with us as we work on getting to your piece. SUBJECT MATTERIs addressed below, toward the end.LENGTHIs up to you.FORMATTINGIts better if you dont use colors or Fun Fonts or strange formatting.YOUR CONTACT INFORMATIONShould be on your submission- not just on the cover letter. Cover letters can disappear. Please include your name, mailing address, phone number, and email address, ideally on every page.AUTHOR BIOSFeel free to include a brief biography of yourself.PAYMENTFluctuates somewhat, but has been impressing contributors recently. Contributors are paid at the time of publication. RESPONSE TIMECan be anywhere between a few weeks and nine months. Please be patient. Were really reading as fast as we can.SPECIAL ISSUES AND READING PERIODSBecause our staff is so small, we arent continually reading submissions for the quarterly. More often than not, we read in month-long bursts, when were approaching the deadline for a new issue. And special issues sometimes create longer delays in our response time. For example, if we just closed an issue, and we know that the issue after that will be devoted to political journalism, that would mean we wouldnt be reading new fiction submissions for up to four months, as we prepared the journalism issue. Our response time, then, can vary a great deal. And given that were a quarterly, and not a weekly or monthly, we ask that all submitters bear in mind the very slow nature of the entire enterprise.