Submissions
are currently:
OPEN
A Night In The Woods
There's a threshold every forest keeps: the line where the last light gives out and the trees stop being scenery. Cross it and the rules change. A snapped twig becomes a question. A shadow becomes a possibility. This issue asks you to spend a night out there, in the dark between what you know and what you don't, and bring back whatever you find. A ghost story, a tree that seems to be talking, a long look with a deer, an epiphany that arrives quiet and unannounced. We want the transmission, and we're ready to receive it.
From The Void,
Jonathan Newsly
Information
Reprints: We do not accept reprints. The only exception is if the only place it was previously published was a personal website. That does not include social media or other blogs. Strictly a personal website.
Rights: First Serial (with 90-day exclusivity), Archive, Non-Exclusive Anthology, and Digital.
To put it plainly: First Serial means your piece must be previously unpublished (blogs and social media count as published!) and that we get to be the first and only place it appears for 90 days. After that window, all rights revert to you — publish it anywhere, we just ask you credit BHN as the first publisher. Archive means we can keep hosting it non-exclusively on our website. Non-Exclusive Anthology means if we ever make a 'Best of BHN' issue, we can include your story (and this never stops you from using it in your own collections). Digital means we can publish it on our website and in digital editions, and share excerpts on our socials to promote it. You retain copyright at all times. We believe that these terms are standard and writer friendly.
Pay: Currently we do not pay. We hope to be able to at some point in the near future, but as of right now there is not pay provided. The only thing we do provide is a print copy to the contributors.
Simultaneous submissions: No thank you.
AI Policy: We don't want anything written by AI. We want to hear you, not ChatGPT, Claude, or any other multi-billion dollar LLM. We guarantee that your voice is more interesting!
Deadline:
Submissions close
August 17th!
Black Hole News is seeking bold, emerging, and underrepresented voices. We’re drawn to work that feels unexpected; pieces that bend genre, disrupt convention, and rethink what deserves attention in the literary world. Send us writing that fractures the familiar.
We also strongly encourage submissions from writers who have experienced marginalization or exclusion themselves. Literary spaces have historically centered certain voices over others, and we are committed to uplifting work, and writers, that have too often been left out.
If it feels strange or too unconventional for other outlets, send it our way. That’s exactly what we’re interested in.
*Black Hole News will not consider submissions that endorse prejudice, racism, xenophobia, classism, sexism, ableism, fat-shaming, homophobia, or gratuitous violence. We reserve the right to reject such submissions outright and reject further submissions from the author. We also reserve the right to remove content from our journal if an author is known to be harassing or abusive. We do not accept plagiarized content in any form. We care deeply about hearing human voices and are not interested in stories that are generated from machines.
Our AI Policy:
AI is a tool to be used, but we here at BHN do not believe that it is a tool that benefits an individual's pursuit of writing.
If you're interested in submitting to Black Hole News, the work you submit should be created by you, a person with a unique perspective, history, and set of challenges, rather than strung together from an LLM or chatbot that cannot possibly be as interesting as you and your unique, individual voice.
We want to hear YOU! Not your tokens!
Fiction
Word count: 1,500–7,500 words
Please submit one fiction story per entry.
Reframe the familiar, unsettle the everyday, and take us beyond expected boundaries—whether through stories of alienation, nonconformity, or imagined worlds that stretch across time and space.
Flash Fiction
Word count: 1,500 words or less
Please submit no more than three flash fiction pieces per submission.
Submissions for Flash Fiction may also be considered for BHN.TODAY
Poetry
Length guidelines: up to 5 poems, 10 pages maximum
Submit no more than five poems per entry, with a total length not exceeding ten pages. Please combine all poems into a single document.
We welcome poetry that uses intricate line breaks and varied indentation. That said, keep in mind that longer or highly complex pieces require careful, line-by-line formatting for web publication—so please be mindful of overall length and presentation.
Submissions for Poetry may also be considered for BHN.TODAY
Art, Comics & Photo Essays
We’re looking for art, comics, and visual storytelling in all their forms—work that is both thoughtful and compelling. We’re especially interested in pieces that engage directly with the present moment: work that observes, reshapes, and imagines new possibilities for the world as it is and as it could be.
We also welcome work that extends beyond the page. Multidisciplinary and nontraditional formats—such as textiles, collage, sculpture, installation, or conceptual works—are encouraged. If needed, you can submit documentation through photographs. If your work can be translated onto the page in some form, we’d love to see it.
*Black Hole News will not consider submissions that endorse prejudice, racism, xenophobia, classism, sexism, ableism, fat-shaming, homophobia, or gratuitous violence. We reserve the right to reject such submissions outright and reject further submissions from the author. We also reserve the right to remove content from our journal if an author is known to be harassing or abusive. We do not accept plagiarized content in any form. We care deeply about hearing human voices and are not interested in stories that are generated from machines.
Other
None of these options applies to me.
The Void has shared something completely different.
Throw us a curveball.