Call for Submissions – Queer Halloween!

October 24, 2023

We’re seeking your queer Halloween feminist bicycle science fiction and fantasy stories for the 13th anthology in the Bikes in Space series of books, guest edited by Summer Jewel Keown!

Please submit your original queer Halloween short fiction (in written or comics form) about bicycling from a feminist perspective. We’re looking for stories that give us a shiver or make us leave the hallway light on at night. Raise our hair and make our spines tingle. We’ll also consider Halloween-themed stories that aren’t as frightful, but they should still be infused with all things spooky season.

Stories should be written by authors who consider yourself queer (in whatever way you identify), and should feature Halloween and/or otherworldly elements, and queer characters/themes, as well as feminism. All four elements should be intrinsic to the narrative:

Halloween (or stories sufficiently scary or thematic enough to be read around Halloween)
Queer
Feminism (it is sufficient to simply not include sexist themes or tropes)
Bicycles

The genre can be anything fantastical—ghost stories, horror, hard sci-fi, comedic fantasy, slipstream, or anything in that constellation—despite the series title, stories need not be be set in space. No fanfic, poetry, nonfiction, or erotica for this series, please. Stories should not include extreme body horror or graphic violence.

For this volume of the anthology, we ask that all authors be queer/part of the queer/LGBTQIA+ community, in some way, shape or form. We aren’t the queer police (which sounds both fabulous and like a bad idea) and if you identify as queer/LGBTQIA+, that’s good enough for us.

We welcome submissions from marginalized authors and first-time authors.

Stories are submitted in consideration for inclusion in the anthology. Submission is not a guarantee that any given story will be accepted or included. All stories are selected by the editors.

Word count: 500 – 6,000 words

Format: MS Word or PDF. Comics submissions of up to 6 pages can be submitted in thumbnails. Contact us if you are unable to submit in one of these formats.

Payment: A portion of profits after expenses from the Kickstarter project used to fund this book is split between contributors, with a guaranteed minimum of $50 each, plus copies of the book.

Deadline: April 15, 2024

Submit via Google Form here: https://forms.gle/41PxyvJUtiLR1kqb7

Questions? Email summer@microcosmpublishing.com. Please do not email your submissions. We don’t want any getting lost in spam!

Haven’t checked out the other Bikes in Space books yet? Take a look at them here!

Call for submissions: Bikes in Space, gardens and plants edition

August 22, 2022 — by Elly Blue

We’re seeking your feminist science fiction and fantasy stories for the 12th anthology in the Bikes in Space series of books!

Please submit your original short fiction (in written or comics form) about bicycling from a feminist perspective. Stories should feature gardens, plants, or other products of photosynthesis. All three of these elements (bicycles, feminism, greenery) should be intrinsic to the narrative. Send your most creative imaginings of organic bicycle design materials, green witches delivering remedies by bike, time traveling wheels embedded in trees, hydroponics experiences in a carbon-neutral future, horticulturists going for a new pedal-powered land speed record, or whatever green and growing scenarios your brain can produce.

The genre can be anything fantastical—from hard sci fi to comedic fantasy to horror to slipstream or anything in that constellation—despite the series title, stories need not be be set in space. No fanfic, poetry, or erotica for this series, please.

I welcome submissions from marginalized authors and first-time authors.

Word count: 500 – 6,000 words

Format: Google doc, MS word, Pages, text document, or PDF. Comics submissions of up to 6 pages can be submitted in thumbnails.

Payment: A portion of profits after expenses from the Kickstarter project used to fund this book is split between contributors, with a guaranteed minimum of $50 each, plus copies of the book.

Deadline: January 15, 2023

Submit via email to elly@microcosmpublishing.com

Queering Consent: Call for Happy Endings

March 04, 2022 — by Lydia Rogue

Microcosm Publishing is soliciting submissions for our Queering Consent series of queer erotica stories, novellas, novels, illustrated books, and comics!

Pitch us your work in progress or your completed work—make it sexy, make it hot, make it consensual, and make it queer! Titles that fit this series show complex, healthy, joyful queer relationships, have a happy ending, and feature explicit erotic content forming the core of the work.

Anything queer is great! We are especially (but not exclusively) looking for:

Lesbian erotica
Real-world (present or past) settings
T4T content
Polyamorous content

For books, manuscripts should be no fewer than 2,500 words (for a short story zine) and top out around 40,000 words for a book. Manuscripts can be composed of short stories or one longer narrative. Black and white illustrations are also welcome, and we love graphic novels. We are not able to publish poetry or fan fiction. We will consider previously-published work so long as you own the rights.

We are especially looking for submissions from authors and artists who are Black, Indigenous, people of color, mixed race, disabled, neurodivergent, queer, transgender, nonbinary, or who don’t see themselves well represented in mainstream publishing—including (but not exclusively) #OwnVoices content from these writers.

Here’s a sampling of what we’ve published so far:

the book cover of Queer Werewolves Destroy Capitalism, featuring a werewolf holding and licking a laughing man — *Queer Werewolves Destroy Capitalism* – A collection of m/m(+) short stories by MJ Lyons with a science fiction theme

*Experience Points* – An illustrated m/m novella about the evolution of a relationship that is profoundly healing for both people involved

*Even Cowbots Get Blue Balls* envisions transformative encounters between various beings

*A Tight Squeeze* shows a rich variety of transfeminine experiences and pairings

We also publish short stories in quickly-read, pocket-sized zine format!

Just a few of our growing collection of Queering Consent zines!

We also are delighted to consider pitches for nonfiction books and zines about queer relationships and sex!

If you have something you think fits, take a look at our full submission guidelines here and drop us a line through the contact form at the top of that page!

We can’t wait to read the wildest adventures and happiest endings your imagination can produce!

Call for Submissions: Books & Bikes in Space

May 04, 2021 — by Elly Blue

a victorian lady reading a book while bicycling

It’s time to start planning the tenth volume of the Bikes in Space feminist bicycle science fiction anthology! The theme for this one is books.

Submissions are now open for original short fiction about bicycling and books, from a feminist perspective. These elements need to be intrinsic to the story. Send your most creative tales of bicycle-powered interlibrary loan on the moon, characters who literally leap out of books and go for a ride, a two-wheeled revolution sparked by seditious literature, the competing stories of steampunk velocipedists, a manual for futuristic bike messengers, a Borgesian meta-library, a literal rewriting of gender norms… Have fun with this one!

I especially welcome #ownvoices submissions and work by first-time writers.

Genre: Stories can be in any speculative or fantastical genre—hard science fiction, space opera, epic fantasy, alternative history, paranormal romance, hope punk, modern fairy tales and anything around or in between. No fanfic, poetry, or erotica, please.

Word count: 1,000 – 6,000 words

Format: Google doc, MS word, Pages, text document, or PDF. Comics submissions of up to 6 pages can be submitted in thumbnails.

Payment: A portion of profits after expenses from the Kickstarter project used to fund this book is split between contributors, with a guaranteed minimum of $50 each, plus copies of the book.

Deadline: September 1, 2021

Send your submissions to elly at microcosmpublishing dot com

I respond to all submissions and share my reading notes on request.

Summoning All Witches

February 02, 2021 — by Elly Blue

Since 1996, Microcosm has published and distributed books, zines, and other goods that put your power in your hands. Including, lately, an increasing number of pagan, mystical, and othersuch witchy books, zines, and decks.

We’ve recently updated our submission guidelines to make it extra clear: We’re looking to publish and distribute more works of magic, witchcraft, and pagan spirituality. Send us your anarcha-feminist oracle deck, your spellbook for finding queer platonic relationships, your comics journalism about the history of witchcraft, a guide to the magic your grandparents taught you, agricultural tips for witches, adorable drawings of animals on broomsticks, or whatever creative way you’ve found to help people see beyond the pale of normalcy to change their lives and the world.

We are always, especially, looking for submissions from authors and artists who are Black, Indigenous, people of color, mixed race, disabled, neurodivergent, queer, transgender, nonbinary, or who don’t see themselves well represented in mainstream publishing.

What we publish

We’re proud to publish Friday Gladheart’s annual The Practical Witch’s Almanac — an incredible resource and weekly planner.

Francesca Black’s Year of the Witch: A Planner and Spellbook for the Novice Witch is a great resource for beginners, and also serves as a weekly planner.

Our first tarot deck, The Gold Lyre Tarot, was funded on Kickstarter in early 2021.

And we have many more books, zines, and stickers in print and on the way, like these:

To submit your work to our publishing program, check out our submission guidelines to assess if we might be a good fit. We aim to work with authors and creators who can work within our processes, so following our guidelines exactly is an important first step when submitting a project.

What we distribute

Microcosm is also a specialty wholesaler, selling thousands of books, zines, and decks from other publishers, big and small primarily to non-book-focused gift stores. We work with Big 5 publishing houses, zinesters cutting and pasting in their closets, and everyone in between. And these folks are putting out more and more books celebrating paganism, crystals, astrology, tarot, the occult, the moon, and more.

a screenshot of a page from microcosm's catalog — A page from our online catalog, sorted by the “Witchy” subject tag

If you already have your own publishing program and want to see if our wholesale program is a good fit, check out our distribution info.

Call for Submissions: Queering Consent

March 24, 2020 — by Lydia Rogue

To start Queering Consent off I’m looking for nonbinary pairings. Nonbinary folks with each other, nonbinary folks with men, nonbinary folks with women, nonbinary folks in polycules… So long as at least one of the characters is explicitly nonbinary, I’m not too fussed about who they’re with or what pronouns they use.

A really successful erotica anthology also needs a theme to go with the pairing. For that, I started asking what we needed more of, but in reality, I didn’t have to look any further than my own passion and knowledge of popular erotica and romance: historical romance, pre-1950s.

Why? My first two books were both anthologies, and I found myself enjoying working with multiple authors considerably. When my publisher (and now employer), Microcosm Publishing, announced they’d start doing queer erotica, I knew I had to start doing anthologies for that too. I pitched them three (!) and they eagerly accepted all of them, which I was not expecting.

To get a better feel for the market, we’re doing them as a zine series, entitled Queering Consent.

Submissions are due by ~~August 1, 2020~~ DEADLINE EXTENDED now due August 28, 2020

The nitty gritty:

Word count: 1,000 to 3,000 words (longer stories are welcome, but may be published separately or considered for a later book version) or 2-6 pages of black and white comics

Format: Word, .ODT, PDF or Google document emailed to lydia(at)microcosmpublishing(dot)com

(If submitting comics, please ask for specs before submitting artwork.)

Works must be original fiction (no fanfic, sorry!) though reprints are allowed.

More about the theme: There simply aren’t enough nonbinary people represented in historical fiction, even though nonbinary folks have always been here. So… why not make it sexy?

Also, if it’s not consensual it’s not sex and not welcome in this series!

Payment: $25 flat fee; if we include your contribution in a book edition, there will be additional payment

I am encouraging marginalized authors who do not see themselves in most mainstream fiction to submit, including (but not limited to) BIPOC, disabled, neurodiverse, queer and trans folks. Write the stories you wish had been published and submit them to us. #OwnVoices work is encouraged, but not strictly required.

If this pairing or theme isn’t up your alley, the next two themes and pairings are:

woman/woman in science fiction or fantasy settings
man/man’s tender first times (with each other, or first time at all)

You can submit those whenever (or if you have an idea for future themes, let me know!) or you can sign up for my newsletter to find out when the submission period officially opens for future volumes.

Reposted from LydiaRogue.com

Call for submissions: Bikes in Space, trans/nb edition

July 09, 2018 — by Elly Blue

It’s time: We’re requesting stories for the seventh volume of feminist bicycle science fiction series Bikes in Space.

The fifth volume, Bikes Not Rockets, is funding on Kickstarter through August 8th. The sixth, with the working title Dragon Bike, is in edits. This seventh volume is scheduled to come out in early 2021.

For the first time we’re excited to welcome a guest editor to the series: Lydia Rogue, who stepped in to edit the most recent issue of the Taking the Lane zine, True Trans Bike Rebel, pitched the theme for this volume and we couldn’t resist.

Without further ado, here are the submission guidelines:
The theme for this issue is: trans and nonbinary characters and writers. Working title: The Great Trans-Universal Bike Ride
(more…)

Call for Submissions: True Trans Bike Rebel (Taking the Lane #15)

January 02, 2017 — by Elly Blue

button with a cat riding a bike in a hoodie
Deadline extension: The deadline has been extended to June 15th, 2018 so that folks who find out about this call for submissions via our Kickstarter project will have time to write something.

Taking the Lane #15 is called True Trans Bike Rebel and guest edited by Lydia Rogue. They are looking for nonfiction writing about the experience of bicycling while being transgender or gender nonconforming. Submissions can be essays or reporting about bicycling, or other topics or stories in which bicycles play a part (or other human-powered transportation—skateboards, rollerskates, walking, you name it).

Submissions can be any length; word count between 500 and 2500 words is ideal for this format. Single-color illustrations and photos are also sought. Please submit your work as an attachment or link in an email to lydia at taking the lane dot com. Feel free to send any questions or ideas to them at that address as well. The deadline is June 15, 2018.

All contributors will be paid a share of the net profits from the Kickstarter project used to fund the zine.

Taking the Lane is a feminist bicycle zine published since 2010. Find other issues and read more about it here.

Call for Submissions: Bikes in Space 5 (Theme: Intersections)

December 21, 2016 — by Elly Blue

Submissions are open for Bikes in Space Volume 5, published by Microcosm’s Elly Blue Publishing imprint. The theme is Intersections. Stories that are accepted will all have a feminist perspective and incorporate bicycling in some way, whether or not they are actually about feminism or about bicycles. We especially welcome submissions from writers of color and transgender and nonbinary writers, and seek stories that portray more diverse perspectives than are classically found in sci fi.

Your story should be in the neighborhood of 2,000 to 6,000 words. If your story needs to be longer or shorter, then by all means write it to be the length it needs to be and we’ll work with you on edits as needed. There are no formatting, document type, or style requirements, and no strict definition of what exactly counts as science fiction. You may want to familiarize yourself with previous volumes in the series before submitting.

Black and white art is also sought. Payment for art and writing is a share of net profit from the Kickstarter project that funds the book.

The deadline for this volume is March 1, 2017.

Send submissions and questions to elly at takingthelane dot com

P.S. Volume 4, Biketopia, is funding on Kickstarter through March 2, 2017.

Call for Submissions: Journal of Bicycle Feminism on Money and Class

October 20, 2015 — by Elly Blue

How does bicycling fit into your personal economy? Your social standing? How do your choices when it comes to bicycling relate to your income, and how do they relate to your attitudes towards money? Did your bike cost a lot or a little, and how do you feel about that? Have you done economic research or reporting on bicycle issues? What are your observations about the costs and benefits of cycling?

The first volume of the Journal of Bicycle Feminism, Cycletherapy, was about feelings: joy, grief, and healing. The second volume is about money, status, and wealth, whatever those topics mean to you.

A wide variety of submissions are sought, particularly from underrepresented perspectives. Personal narratives, essays, and reporting will be the bulk of the volume—lengths between 1,000 and 3,000 words are ideal, but if a piece needs more words we can talk. Illustrations and photographs are sought as well. I’d like to include one piece of fiction, and one very short (around 500 words) and funny piece for the end of the book.

The submission deadline is February 1, 2016. Email questions, queries, or submissions to elly at microcosmpublishing dot com.