Call for Submissions for 2021 Issue Has Closed
Thank you to all who submitted!
General Submission Guidelines
We are an online literary magazine publishing one issue per year in the month of March.
There is NO submission or reading fee. All submissions are blind, until a piece(s) is accepted or declined for contribution.
Each issue of Ailment will focus on responses to a single creative prompt. The creative prompt will be included in the “call for submissions” communication. The submission period will be three months. We accept simultaneous submissions, however, please inform us immediately if your piece is selected by another publication, as we would like to give all submitters equal opportunity to be considered.
The reading period will begin the day after the submission period closes (January 1, 2021 will be the start of the reading period). The contributions for the 2021 Issue of Ailment - Chronicles of Illness Narratives will be selected during this reading period.
Submissions from patients (those with chronic mental and physical illness), caretakers, family and friends affected by a loved-one’s illness and practitioners (healthcare providers) will be considered. Responses to the creative prompt may be submitted in non-fiction, essay, poetry, photography, drawing or painting form. Details on accepted word-length, formatting and confidentiality are included on the submission form(s) for each category.
In the description of the submission you MUST include how you are connected to chronic mental/physical illness and your experience creating to the prompt. If this information is not included, your submission will NOT be reviewed.
The creative prompt for the 2021 issue is “Hope is …”
We take up to 3 (three) submissions per submitter per reading period. This means that a submitter could submit pieces for three different categories and be published in one or more of those categories. For example, a submitter may submit 1 (one) nonfiction piece, 3 (three) poems and 2 (two) drawings. If at least 3 (three) of the pieces are accepted for publication, they will be published as a collection.
Contributor’s Rights
Ailment is a non-profit publication donating any/all proceeds to organizations that further the betterment of those of us who suffer from chronic illness. As a person with a chronic illness I am welcoming of places to express my experiences and share my story and want to extend the same to others. Again, there are no fees for reading or submitting, because of these reasons we are unable to compensate contributors. There may be opportunities to pay contributors in the future, seeing as this is our inaugural issue the focus is on extending a creative space for contributors' voices, as well as elevating the conversation around the lives of those who are affected by chronic illness.
We’re happy to link to our contributors’ donation sites, published books, and social media links. We promote everything we publish and continue to support our contributors’ endeavors by sharing their future works and projects with our followers.
Ailment will not make any editorial or formatting changes without the contributor's approval. Contributors retain the right to review the final draft of their work prior to publication.
Contributors retain copyright. However, upon publication, contributors give Ailment permission to promote and distribute their work, including the contributor’s name, pseudonym and biography, accordingly. We ask for first electronic rights (meaning no one else has published the work before online) and electronic archival rights (meaning we are allowed to keep your work online forever). Our rights are nonexclusive (meaning you can republish the work elsewhere later). If you do republish the work, we’d like to be mentioned as the first publisher.
Please click the link in the top left-hand corner of this page that says “Click here to Submit” to access Submission Forms for each Category for specific guidelines and upload instructions.
Have questions not answered here? Contact Us