Weird Circular #47 February

The February Weird Circular

February 03, 2021

This month's Weird Circular is live with submission ideas, prompts, and more!

Welcome to the Weird Circular

Dear Fellow Weird Writers,

It's a new year and I don't know about you, but it already feels like a doozy. One thing I'm thinking about lately is accountability. Who are you accountable to with your writing? Maybe it's your critique group or your writing friends, maybe it's your publisher or editor. But in the end, I think we're really mostly accountable to ourselves. 

There's a tendency to let the voices in your head that tell you "You can't do this" or "you'll never finish this" win. However, you have the power over which voices you choose to listen to. So this month, I'm sending you some strength to sort through the noise. 

Your corporeal host,

Holly 

Submission Calls

Upcoming Submission Windows:

February

  • Lightspeed, limited demographic window, deadline 2/7: Open to BIPOC for short stories / novelettes (1500 to 10k words). Pays .08/word.

  • Lambda Literary Awards, deadline 2/15: Various opportunities for LGBTQ authors with book-length projects (although this is not always a requirement. 

  • Luna Station Quarterly, deadline 2/15: Short fiction 500 to 7k words. Pays $5/story.

  • Bitch Media, deadline 2/22: Theme: Plastic. Essays, interviews, and creative nonfiction of differing word lengths. 

  • It Gets Even Better: Stories of Queer Possibility, Anthology, deadline 2/28: Theme: Queer Possibility ("speculative fiction that posits queer affirmation and joy.") Flash fiction and short fiction (up to 15k words, max 3 stories at once.) Pays $.08/word.

  • Chicken Soup for the Soul, deadline 2/28, theme: Cats: Short stories and poems up to 1,200 words. Pays $200. 

March

  • PANK, deadline 3/1: Theme: Environmental Futures. Up to five pieces in one file of poetry, fiction, nonfiction, hybrid, art. 

  • Eye to the Telescope, deadline 3/15: Theme: Weird West. 1-3 speculative poems. Shorter generally does better. Pay is $.03/word.

  • Master's Review, Volume X anthology, deadline 3/29: Fiction and narrative nonfiction up to 7k. $1,000 prize. 

  • Bracken, deadline 3/16: Theme: Nature. Poems up to 100 lines. Pays $30.

Need more submission ideas? Check the

newest markets,

, Duotrope's

,

, or Literary Mama's

.

YOU SHOULD BE WRITING

Exercise:

This is an exercise from my journaling workshop. Make a list of the things you are grateful for about writing or in your writing practice. Studies have shown that journaling about things you are happy about or positive journaling can increase your joy. 

Bonus Round:

How can you cultivate the things that "spark joy" in your writing in the New Year? For a minute, allow yourself to ignore that we are in a pandemic. Instead, think about your writing as a daily practice that you can come back to again and again. 

Exercise:

I'll be teaching a workshop on feminist poetics in March at the

 We'll be writing poems inspired by feminist poets. Here's a poem by Rita Dove: 

The Secret Garden

I was ill, lying on my bed of old papers,

when you came with white rabbits in your arms;

and the doves scattered upwards, flying to mothers,

and the snails sighed under their baggage of stone . . .

Now your tongue grows like celery between us:

Because of our love-cries, cabbage darkens in its nest;

the cauliflower thinks of her pale, plump children

and turns greenish-white in a light like the ocean’s.

I was sick, fainting in the smell of teabags,

when you came with tomatoes, a good poetry.

I am being wooed. I am being conquered

by a cliff of limestone that leaves chalk on my breasts.

For this exercise, write a piece inspired by this poem. You can take a line from the poem and make it the title of your piece, or you might try writing a piece with the same title, or just write about why you like this piece. 

Exercise: I'm sharing a video with you this month that's from my journaling for poets class, which will be coming soon from the Poetry Barn. I feel like this topic seems particularly needed right now. I hope you enjoy it!

Editing tip of the month: Language is constantly changing. This month, look for dialogue in your writing. Think about your character's personalities, backgrounds, histories. How do these come through in their dialogue? To make your dialogue spark, try listening to conversations on TV shows or on the news. Write down the dialogue. How would you write it, if the conversation were in a book? (Dialogue does NOT always have to sound exactly like real life.) 

Inspiration from the Ether

News From Your Corporeal Host

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