If you would like to submit a manuscript to us, please check our Submishmash page for our status. We open and close to submissions at various times throughout the year, depending on our publication needs, and it's easier to update that page than this one. Alternatively, email us with a simple query, and we'll let you know how things look.
We only accept queries and manuscript submission via SubmishMash: Submit to Signal 8.
What we’ll consider and how to inquire:
- For fiction, query with a brief description of the book (length, synopsis) as well as the first three chapters. We would also like to know what draft it is, and we’d like to know about you and your publication history while you’re at it. (Don’t be put off by this last part; new writers are welcome!)
- If you are querying us about a short story collection, we’d like to see three sample stories as well as a list of the contents and the publication credits.
- For nonfiction, the same general guidelines apply, but we’ll need to see a chapter-by-chapter outline. We also need you to let us know what other books deal with the same topic, and how yours is different. What are your qualifications to write this book? Has any portion of it been published already?
- If you would like to propose a multi-author collection of either short stories or essays, with yourself as the editor, we’re also open to that idea. Please e-mail us with an outline of your proposal, a list of authors you’ve already talked to and/or will probably be able to secure as contributors, and a time line for completing the project.
Technical stuff:
- We only accept submissions in Word (but not .docx) and PDF format.
- In the subject line, type QUERY, the title of the proposed book, and your name.
- Please have the decency to use a standard serif font like Times New Roman, Garamond, or Book Antiqua, 12 point, 1.5 or double spaced, standard margins. (We don’t like Courier, FYI.)
- Be sure to include your contact information (name, e-mail address, phone number) in BOTH the e-mail query as well as on the first page of your sample chapters. (We’re extremely unlikely to call, since we’re probably not in the same time zone as you, but if all else fails, it’s better than nothing.)
- Do not send entire manuscripts unless and until we request them.
- Simultaneous submissions are OK, but we need to know whether the book is under consideration elsewhere. If another publisher accepts it, we need to know that too, obviously.
- Manuscripts not conforming to these guidelines will neither be read nor acknowledged.
What do we love? Japanese noir (Miyuke Miyabe, Natsuo Kirino, Kenzo Kitakata), Haruki Murakami, Ryu Murakami, Su Tong’s articulate historical snarks (especially Rice), John Burdett’s Bangkok series, Taichi Yamada, Ha Jin, travel memoirs like Andrew X. Pham’s Catfish and Mandala and Red Dust by Ma Jian, etc. We loved Kept by Euny Hong, I Have the Right to Destroy Myself by Kim Young-Ha, Brother One Cell by Cullen Thomas, Leave Me Alone by Murong, The Global Soul by Pico Iyer… the list goes on.
Not so much? Poetry, children’s literature, YA, erotica; these are all fine, but we’re not going to publish them. Also no: Books that bore us. Prose that oozes like tar in midwinter. Crappy grammar. Right-wing fundamentalist anything.
Disclaimers: When you query and/or submit work for consideration, do bear in mind that we are a small press with a very limited number of spaces on our list. We may love your book but simply not be able to publish it due to previous commitments. Having seen what happens when publishers overextend themselves, we’re not going there. Please allow two or three months to hear from us after submitting. If you haven’t heard from us by then, by all means send a friendly e-mail to check in.
