Stonecoast Review

The Official Literary Journal of University of Southern Maine’s Stonecoast MFA

Summer 2024 Issue (#21) Theme: Ethical Storytelling

Sub­mis­sions open for the Summer 2024 Issue (#21) on Feb­ru­ary 1. Final dead­line is 11:59 p.m. on April 1st 2024.

Please read our mission state­ment and the infor­ma­tion below before submitting.

Sub­mis­sion Guidelines

  • Send sub­mis­sions via Sub­mit­table only.
  • Please include a short cover letter and bio (50- and 100-word max. respectively).
  • We accept one prose sub­mis­sion, one poetry sub­mis­sion (of up to three poems), or five pieces of visual art per author, per sub­mis­sion cycle. Sub­mis­sions that do not abide by these rules will not be con­sid­ered for publication. 
  • Your work must be pre­vi­ous­ly unpub­lished. (Stonecoast alumni may submit already pub­lished work for con­sid­er­a­tion as reprints.)
  • We encour­age simul­ta­ne­ous sub­mis­sions. However, please with­draw your sub­mis­sion imme­di­ate­ly if it’s accept­ed else­where. If you submit mul­ti­ple poems and one is accept­ed at another pub­li­ca­tion, please attach a note on Sub­mit­table iden­ti­fy­ing which poem is no longer available.
  • Please adhere to stan­dard man­u­script format: double spaced, 12 pt., Times New Roman font. Poetry may be single spaced. (If you tell us that diverg­ing from these rules is inte­gral to your piece, we will con­sid­er it.)
  • While we love to rep­re­sent stories with raw, emo­tion­al truth, we ask that you refrain from sub­mit­ting pieces fea­tur­ing exces­sive sex, vio­lence, assaults, or suicide
  • We will reject pieces deter­mined to be written by the use of AI soft­ware

Genre Guide­lines

  • Fiction. Limit sub­mis­sions to 5,000 words or fewer. One sub­mis­sion per author, per sub­mis­sion cycle. In the spirit of ethical sto­ry­telling, the fiction editors are search­ing for stories that invite the reader into radical empathy and explo­ration. We are looking for stories that push the bound­aries of tra­di­tion­al fiction with regard to form and content.
  • Popular Fiction. Limit sub­mis­sions to 2,500–5,000 words or fewer. One sub­mis­sion per author, per sub­mis­sion cycle. We are open to all kinds of genre/popular fiction: romance, fantasy, science fiction, mystery, dystopi­an, thriller, horror, or his­tor­i­cal fiction, and we encour­age genre blend­ing. We’re search­ing for serious or comedic stories that focus on char­ac­ter, a unique idea, or fun theme.
  • Cre­ative Non­fic­tion. Limit sub­mis­sions to 5,000 words or fewer. One sub­mis­sion per author, per sub­mis­sion cycle. We are looking for a diverse array of Cre­ative Non­fic­tion works that engage with our mission and chal­lenge the bound­aries of con­ven­tion­al sto­ry­telling. We encour­age exper­i­men­ta­tion with hybrid forms of essay and memoir and are par­tic­u­lar­ly inter­est­ed in works that are both rel­e­vant and personal. 
  • Poetry. Limit sub­mis­sions to 3 poems, with no more than 50 lines each. One sub­mis­sion per author, per sub­mis­sion cycle, of up to three poems. We are seeking poems that speak truth but do not exploit pain, acknowl­edge con­flict while holding on to hope, and call out oppres­sion through cel­e­bra­tions of love. These poems need not be overtly polit­i­cal, but they should strive to decen­ter, to redi­rect and decol­o­nize, to ground and set free. It’s the poet’s calling to find worlds not yet imag­ined and shape the future to hold them. Please send us your best work.
  • Dra­mat­ic Works. Limit sub­mis­sions to 12 or fewer pagesOne sub­mis­sion per author, per sub­mis­sion cycle. We accept dia­logue-driven plays, scripts, and exper­i­men­tal styles, includ­ing but not limited to one-minute plays, 10-minute plays, screen­plays, and mono­logues. We are espe­cial­ly inter­est­ed in pieces that demon­strate a com­mit­ment to ques­tion­ing the “truths” we take for granted, pushing the bound­aries of the status quo, and uphold­ing the dignity of writer and audi­ence in craft. 
  • Visual Art. Limit sub­mis­sions to five pieces. One sub­mis­sion per author, per sub­mis­sion cycle, of up to five pieces. We seek visual images for the cover and select­ed inside pages. We welcome exper­i­men­tal and unusual art forms. We accept 2D digital images of pho­tog­ra­phy, sculp­ture, paint­ing, and mixed media. Please send high-res digital images (300 dpi or higher) in JPG, PNG, GIF, TIFF, or RAW file format.

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