Submit Here

Important Thing. pay attention.

We are currently closed to fiction and poetry. Look for us to re-open on May 1st. Find our Moksha here. Unless you're an AI or J.K. Rowling. Then you can fuck off. 

Standard manuscript format is preferable, unless you messing with the format is part of your story. We'll be doing our best to reply to all submissions with a decision within 15 days of receipt. Some will take longer -- feel free to query at any time. I promise we never mind.  Simultaneous submissions are fine, multiple submissions are not. Rejections will be short, polite, and typically begin with the words 'We're passing on this one'. Please don't take the brevity personally. 

Every so often we'll close to submissions for a little while to let us take stock, do admin, and catch our breaths. During those windows, any submissions received will be deleted unread. Please feel free to submit them again once we reopen. 

 Rights

We require first electronic rights for any accepted pieces for a period of 3 months, and non-exclusive anthology rights for a period no longer than 24 months (dependent on when in our 24-month publication cycle your story is accepted). Further details will be enclosed within your contract should your work be accepted for publication. 

We enjoy receiving author photos of the writers we publish, but appreciate that not everybody loves that practice. If you'd prefer to send us a picture of something else that feels representative of you, we're all for that. 

Queries should be sent to sam@thecosmicbackground.com, where he'll do his best to get back to you as quickly as he possibly can. Please read our guidelines before submitting.