CURRENT SUBMISSION STATUS: CLOSED

OCCULT DETECTIVE MAGAZINE opens once or twice each year for general submissions, depending on our backlog of material. There is no set schedule, but we try to announce Open Call periods widely, and always post such notifications in the ODM Facebook Group, amongst other places:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1200696889941920

We are a paying market for original fiction, plus non-fiction features and art. We are always looking for intriguing fiction which features those who investigate, explore, or face, the strange and unusual. Your protagonist does not have to have a professional role, and can be anyone seeking answers.

As it says on our main page, we love weird and literary tales, noir and folk-horror, will consider well-written Pulp, and will also look at fantasy and SF stories, as long as they fit the overall concept. We regularly publish subtle and disquieting tales alongside more traditional-style ‘cases’ and confrontations. Do read a back issue to get an idea of our range — a number of people who submit to us obviously haven’t read the magazine!

Submissions with more varied geographical and historical settings are encouraged as a welcome change from the usual 21stC UK and US settings (though we take these as well, naturally). We actively seek out new and established voices of all identities/orientations, and are very receptive to BIPOC and LGBTQ+ writers, and to characters with such backgrounds. Whoever you are, wherever you come from, the primary goal is to have a strong story with interesting characters and circumstances for our readers to appreciate.

We are NOT a generic horror or crime market. Please do not send us detective stories with no paranormal, occult, psychic or weird elements – or weird and paranormal stories with no investigative work of any nature.

FICTION

ODM takes unpublished stories from 5000 to 10,000 words, with a preference for the 5000 to 7500 range. Stories between 4000 and 5000 words will be considered if particularly inventive or ‘different’ in theme, style or setting. All the above are paid at our standard rate of 1/p (UK) word up to a cap of £50.00. We rarely take reprints, except for special projects. If we do, then these receive a flat rate of £25.00.

We do occasionally have an interest in longer novelettes, 10,000 up to 15,000 words, but have only a very limited number of slots for such ‘feature’ pieces. These MUST be queried in advance. If accepted, we offer 1/p (UK) word for the first 5000 words, and 0.5/word thereafter.

In the case of new, unpublished material, we buy exclusive first world print and electronic publishing rights for six months (period negotiable), after which we retain only non-exclusive print and electronic rights to use the work in materials directly related to Occult Detective Magazine and its promotion.

NON-FICTION

ODM also wants articles and essays that discuss this unusual genre, and the many writers who contribute or have contributed to it. We welcome literary criticism as well as retrospectives, and pieces about films, comics and graphic novels. Basically, if you have an article about ANY aspect of Occult Detectives, we might be interested. We take articles and essays between 2,000-4,000 words. Payment is 1 penny (UK) per word, with a £25 cap. Longer articles are possible, by mutual agreement.

Reviews are unpaid, but all reviewers receive a free .pdf copy of the magazine in which they appear.

ART

We are looking for talented artists to contribute to ODM. We need illustrators for stories as well as cover artists. If interested, please forward a small sample of your work (.jpg please) and we will add you to our list. Artists own copyright and rights to work after initial publication – we retain only the non-exclusive right to use the art solely for ODM promotional purposes.

We use a number of single-page illustrations in each issue, usually paid at £25-30 per interior B/W illustration. Cover art is negotiated separately.

SUBMITTING YOUR WORK

All submissions should be by email, with story or article attached, NOT in the body of the email. The subject line must have “Story/Article/Review” in it, plus your surname and story title, as in Story – Henderson – The Drowned Man. Your submission will be judged on the quality of the work attached, so there’s no point in sending loads of stuff about you or your past publications in the email. If accepted, we’ll request a short author bio closer to publication.

Submissions (fiction and non-fiction) should be in either .doc format, .docx or .odt (not pdfs or Google doc links et al) Use standard manuscript formatting, such as:

• double line spacing, no fancy effects
• italics for italics
• formatted with a simple indent at the start of each new paragraph, never by tab indents or space-bar, and no extra lines between paragraphs
• one common font like Times New Roman 12pt throughout, no changes in font size
• * * * centred to indicate major breaks
• no headers/footers/page numbers

All submissions should be to occultdetectivemagazine@gmail.com

Please try to contact us only through this address, and from a single email address of your own, so that things don’t get confused.

Stories will be separated from the emails, so the first page of all submissions should include the author’s name, address, a contact phone number (which we’ll only ever use if we needed to send a contributor copy after publication, as Amazon insist on it) and email. If you use a different email for Paypal, we’ll need that too if your work is accepted, but we will always check with you closer to publication date to make sure nothing has changed. Failure to keep to these guidelines may do our heads in, and prejudice your chances of being read.

Note: If we suspect you have drawn substantially on AI to generate the work, we will check it, and query you, so please don’t do that.

Acknowledgement of receipt is usually within a week; final response time should run at eight to sixteen weeks after the final deadline. Query after three calendar months if you are concerned, to the same email address above.

ODM is broad-minded and willing to experiment, but is not the place for extreme horror, and we do not want highly graphic slasher stories, or explicit rape or child abuse. Racism, misogyny, homophobia and transphobia are totally out, except in cases where an antagonist character exhibits such aspects for a defined storytelling purpose. We are unlikely to consider anything which includes animals being abused.

Once again, send your submission to: occultdetectivemagazine@gmail.com

Please do not send anything other than proposals/queries outside of stated Open periods (unless invited).