A UK submission schedule for the rest of 2017

The second half of the year seems to have fewer competition and magazine-window opportunities for me. Here they are -

• July -
  • 1st-31st - Magma ("Europe" issue) window (poetry)
• August -
  • 1st - Into the void window opens (poetry and prose)
  • 1st-1st October - Ambit (poetry) window
  • 31st - Neon window closes (prefers darker pieces, especially those with an element of the surreal or speculative). Theme - “The Apocalypse” (poetry and prose)
  • 31st - Flash Frontier deadline for max 250 words on Trees
• September -
  • 1st - Litro deadline "After dark, after hours" (prose)
  • 1st-1st October - Ambit (prose) window
  • 25th - HU Submission deadline
  • 30th - Magma deadline (poetry)
• October -
  • 1st-31st - Interpreter's House window (poetry and prose)
  • 1st-31st - Envoi window (poetry)
  • 1st-31st - Under the Radar window(poetry and prose)
  • 13th - The Mick Imlah Poetry Prize (TLS) deadline.
  • 16th - Walter Swan Short Story Prize deadline. Max 2000 words. 1st prize £200. Entry fee £3. 20 stories will be anthologised.
  • 31st - National Poetry Competition deadline
  • 31st - Bare Fiction competition deadline (poetry, flash, stories)
  • 31st - The Dinesh Allirajah Prize for Short Fiction. 1st prize £500. Theme - Cafe Stories (2,000-6000 words). Free entry.
  • 31st - Indigo Dreams pamphlet competition deadline
  • 31st - Cambridge Short Story Prize deadline 1st prize 1000. Entry fee 8. 1,500 – 3,000 words. Anthology publication for the winners and shortlisted writers.
• November -
  • 1st - Commonwealth Short Story Prize (free) deadline
  • 5th - Shooter ("New Life" issue) deadline
  • 30th - Cinnamon debut poetry collection prize deadline
  • 30th - Cafe Writers poetry competition deadline (1st prize 1000. Entry fee 4)

New Walk magazine closes

After 14 issues the UK poetry and prose magazine "New Walk" is shutting down. Instead they'll produce poetry pamphlets - see https://newwalkmagazine.com/purchase-submit.

Reading stories online

There are some easy-to-dip-into magazines online if you like reading stories that are up to 1000 words long and not too literary. The author bios are online too, so you can be selective. Here are a few to choose from

• Spelk (3 a week)
• The Story Shack (weekly)
• Everyday fiction (daily)
• SmokeLong Quarterly (weekly)
• Flash Fiction Press
• Jellyfish Review

Of course, you can send them stories too - some of them pay. And you can often leave comments about the pieces. The emergence of Flash has led some magazines to specify minimum word-lengths. The following readable sites have pieces longer than 500 words -

• Literally Stories
• Fictive Dreams

Writers and families

You can prove anything with statistics. By looking at this graph see if you can deduce when I got married, when the first child became independent, and when they both became independent.