Online – CLOSED
In Print – CLOSED
Eligibility
We are an Australian online magazine with a mission to showcase the work of Australian emerging and established horror and dark fiction writers. We actively encourage submissions from traditionally under-represented voices.
Submissions will be considered from Australian residents (or citizens currently living overseas) only.
What we’re looking for
Given our focus on Australian writers, we love and greatly value receiving submissions with a particular Aussie flair and focus, but we love dark stories and poetry that encompass the broad spectrum of horror and dark genres.
We encourage writers to take chances with their fiction and push the envelope. Don’t be afraid to experiment with something out of the ordinary, or that falls outside the ‘regular’ horror categories. Nothing is off limits; when we decide to publish a submission, we’re looking at the quality of the story and characters, not the genre ‘box’ it fits into.
What we’re not looking for
We do not publish works that dwell unnecessarily in or are unchallenging of racism, misogyny, bigotry and sexual violence. Similarly, extreme/graphic violence and gore can be a part of your story, but they can’t be the story.
Fan fiction and stories that are derivative in nature, particularly those based on TV series are not accepted. We do not accept excerpts or chapters from longer works but will consider serialised stories (as long as each story meets the word count).
AI-assisted submissions
We will not consider any submissions written, developed, or assisted by Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools. We will not knowingly accept and publish AI-generated or assisted art, fiction or poetry. Attempting to submit these works may result in automatic rejection of your submissions to Nightmare Fuel in the future.
Submission guidelines
Please read the following guidelines carefully before submitting via the link at the bottom of this page.
Word count
We accept fiction and poetry up to 666 words in length. Submissions over this limit will not be considered.
Format
Use a minimum 12pt font, double-spaced, with the word/line count printed at the top of the first page. We prefer Australian/UK spelling and punctuation conventions. Submissions should be a MS Word document (.doc/.docx) or Google Doc. Don’t send us PDFs or RTFs.
Be sure to include your byline as you’d like it to appear in publication, and an email address for contacting you. No need to include your address or telephone number, unless you’d like to. We also encourage you to state your pronouns (he/she/they, etc) in your byline and author bio.
Author bio
Include a short author bio, written in third person, at the top of the first page of your submission. We’re also happy to include links to your website and/or social media in your bio also, so please don’t be shy to promote where readers can find and follow you.
Multiple/simultaneous submissions
You can make one submission per category (fiction/poetry), per submission window. Simultaneous submissions are welcome, provided you inform us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere.
Please mail editor@nightmarefuelmagazine.com if you need to withdraw your submission as its been accepted elsewhere (congratulations!)
Reprints
We only publish work that has not previously been published. Please don’t submit work previously published in print or online, including on blogs.
Rights
All rights remain with the author, regardless of submission outcome.
Confidentiality
An author’s personal information will not be shared with anyone outside our editorial team, unless the author gives us express permission to share such information or we have a legal obligation to do so.
What happens after you submit your work
You will receive an acknowledgement of receipt of your submission.
During open calls, all submissions will receive a response from our editorial team within 30 days. When we run calls for submissions based on a theme, you may not hear from our editorial team until the submission window closes. Please be patient!
Once decisions are made, you will be contacted via email regarding the outcome, whether or not your work is accepted. Unfortunately, we do not have the resources to provide individual feedback on submissions that are not accepted.
Although our expectation is that selected works are likely to require minimal editing, we will edit/proofread the pieces for publication. You will be consulted on all changes and will have final approval of your work.
Payment
We currently pay $0.02 per word. These amounts are in Australian Dollars (AUD). All payments are made to the contributor via PayPal.
We acknowledge that this is a token payment, but it’s important to us to pay our contributors for their work on principle. We hope to be able to increase the rate of payment in the future, but as a volunteer-run publication we rely on donations to help us do that. If you’d like to help us support our contributors, please consider making a one-off or regular donation.
Payment is made within 30 days of your submission being accepted and always before the work is published on our website.
Ready to submit?
Submissions are free.
Complete the submission form (via Google Forms) below. Please do not email your submissions directly to us.
Thank you for your interest in submitting your writing to Nightmare Fuel. We are looking forward to reading it.