Guidelines
for Regular
Submissions

(Guidelines Updated 9/15/07)

What We're Looking For

At Cezanne's Carrot, we're looking for high-quality literary work that explores spiritual, transformational, visionary, or contemplative themes. We are most interested in the personal quest for evolution and understanding, whether that quest takes place within the context of a religious tradition, an inner temple of your own making, or a seemingly mundane neighborhood or backyard.

We're looking for work that:

• Creates a sense of possibilities.
• Looks at the more expansive aspects of human nature, our interactions with the natural world, or our relationships with each other. We prefer work that highlights the connections between us, rather than what divides us.
• Explores the range and depth of our experiences with what lies beyond the five senses. Call it the Universe, God, a different dimension, or simply the great, mysterious unknown, but show us how you see our common reality blending with the next.

We see little separation between the ordinary and the extraordinary, the playful and profound. But we don't require that every piece we read be cheery or force a happy ending. We will consider dark-tunnel work that also delivers a glimmer bright enough to lead us back toward the light. In other words, we like stories that leave us feeling enlightened or hopeful; we're likely to reject stories that leave us feeling hopeless or depressed.

Careful attention to craft is equally important. We want polished work that displays an accomplished level of expertise. We're looking for talented writers, both new and established. In the end, we're more interested in your work than your resume.

Above all, surprise and delight us with your vision.

Submissions and Response Times

• We accept simultaneous submissions. If a piece is accepted elsewhere, please let us know as soon as possible by sending an email to query@cezannescarrot.org.
• We accept reprints as long as the author has retained all rights to the piece. In your cover letter, tell us where and when the piece was originally published.
• Submit only one piece per category, and then wait to hear from us before submitting again.
• We read continually. Any work received after the deadline for one issue will be considered for a subsequent edition.
• Regretfuly, because of the number of submissions we receive, we are unable to comment on every one.
• To make sure that our response makes it past your spam filters, add editors@cezannescarrot.org to your address book or list of allowed addresses.
• Response times will vary. If it's been four months since you submitted and you haven't heard anything, send an email to query@cezannescarrot.org.

Schedule for Upcoming Publications

Cezanne's Carrot appears quarterly, on each Solstice and Equinox:

Issue	Appearing	Deadline for Consideration
Vol. 3 Issue 2	Summer Solstice (6/21/08)	May 21, 2008
Vol. 3 Issue 3	Autumna Equinox (9/21/08)	August 21, 2008
Vol. 3 Issue 4	Winter Solstice (12/21/08)	November 21, 2008
Vol. 4 Issue 1	Vernal Equinox (3/21/09)	February 21, 2009

Payment

• Two $25 Editors' Prizes will be awarded each issue; all fiction and creative nonfiction will be considered. (We hope, in the future, to be able to pay all our contributors.)

How to Submit

• Email your submission to the appropriate email address (see individual sections for more information)
• Please include this information in a cover letter:
  • Your full name (and pen name, if appropriate)
  • Your mailing address
  • Your telephone number
  • For prose, the title and word count
  • A brief bio—up to 100 words
• NOTE: By submitting, you are affirming that the work is entirely your own creation, that you own the copyright to the work, and that the work's publication in Cezanne's Carrot would not violate the rights of any publication, organization, or individual.

Please read the specific guidelines for each genre:
Fiction     Creative Nonfiction     Visual Art

If Your Work is Accepted:

• We will ask for a contributor's statement (100 words max.), a photo, and your email, website, or blog address if you'd like it posted with your bio.
• We'll ask you to agree to a simple email contract that gives us permission to publish your story.
• We reserve the right to correct usage, punctuation, and grammar problems. We may request other changes, as needed. Every contributor will have the opportunity to preview their work before the issue goes live.

Rights for All Works Accepted by Cezanne's Carrot

Cezanne's Carrot asks for the exclusive right to publish your work electronically for the three months that the issue is live, as well as the right to publish it in any future CD or audio versions. We ask for the right to maintain your work in the archives indefinitely or until you ask us to remove it. We also ask for one-time rights to publish your work in a future print and/or electronic anthology.

Authors retain the copyright to their work.

If your work is subsequently published elsewhere, we ask that Cezanne's Carrot be credited in the acknowledgement.

Fiction

We accept flash fiction and short stories from 100 to 3,000 words. Novel excerpts are acceptable if they stand on their own and stay within the word limit.

We accept: mainstream literary, visionary, magical realism, irrealism, surrealism, humor, experimental, speculative, and other genres as long as the work strives to be literary and embraces our mission and theme. We don't want to see: horror, gore, murders, serial-killers, abuse or drug stories, vampires and monsters, political stories, stories written for children, or stories that primarily promote an agenda or a particular religion.

Qualities we look for in fiction:

• Three-dimensional characters that do more than just serve a plot
• Good use of imagery and detail
• Realistic dialogue
• A beginning, middle, and end (doesn't need to be as clearly defined in flash or experimental works, but we do like to see some sense of movement or change)
• Smooth, tight prose that is the result of several, careful edits

Submissions should be in standard email format: single spaced, with one blank line between paragraphs. Use *asterisks* to indicate italics, double hyphens (--) to indicate a dash, and a number sign (#) to indicate a section break. If there are other formatting considerations, please explain them at the beginning of the piece.

Fiction writers may submit one story, pasted in the body of an email. Attachments will not be opened. Put your last name and the title of the work in the subject line.

Submit to: fiction@cezannescarrot.org

Creative Nonfiction

Give us your compelling personal stories, told in 100 to 3,000 words.

We accept personal essays and memoirs that deal with topics related to our theme. We're not looking for how-to articles, scholarly discussions, or political or dogmatic essays.

Qualities we look for in creative nonfiction:

• Good use of storytelling devices: imagery, plot, distinctive details, dialogue, etc.
• Tight prose that's gone through more than one good edit
• Emotional honesty and involvement in the piece
• Work that does more than simply describe an incident or experience
• Work that explores a universal theme within a personal story

Submissions should be in standard email format: single spaced, with one blank line between paragraphs. Use *asterisks* to indicate italics, double hyphens (--) to indicate a dash, and a number sign (#) to indicate a section break. If there are other formatting considerations, please explain them at the beginning of the piece.

Writers may submit one story, pasted in the body of an email. Attachments will not be opened. Put your last name and the title of the work in the subject line.

Submit to: nonfiction@cezannescarrot.org

Visual Art

We are interested in visual art inspired by our theme both for our art page and to illustrate poetry and prose selections. We are open to any medium.

Please submit three to five samples of your work in JPEG or GIF format. (A lower-resolution version is preferred. If your work is selected, you'll have the opportunity to send higher-quality images.) Send them as attachments to an email. In your email, also include information about the medium and size of the original work, its publication history, whether or not a work is available for purchase, and a website link, if applicable. Also tell us about the meaning of the work, as you see it. Put your last name and the title of at least one of your works in the subject line

Submit to: art@cezannescarrot.org