Thank you for your interest in Shadows & Tall Trees.
We are open to submissions of quiet, literary horror fiction from January 1 to February 28. We publish fiction that is offbeat and eclectic; dark, bizarre and psychological. Stories both subtle and prosaic. Weird, strange tales.
Shadows & Tall Trees is a literary journal of the dark and fantastic, with mainstream sensibilities. I am seeking low-key, literary horror.
I am not interested in any of the familiar tropes of the genre, i.e., vampires, werewolves, and zombies, in any of their forms. Nor am I interested in urban fantasy, occult/paranormal detectives, or magick. I like my urban fiction gritty and real. The journal is not a home for fiction that conforms to the contemporary definitions of fantasy; mythic, mediaevalist, sword & sorcery, high fantasy, etc. No elves, dragons, or faeries.
Shadows & Tall Trees is not a venue for science fiction, or for poetry.
Authors that I enjoy include Robert Aickman, Charles Beaumont, Italo Calvino, Ramsey Campbell, Raymond Carver, Elizabeth Hand, Glen Hirshberg, Shirley Jackson, Kathe Koja, Thomas Ligotti, Haruki Murakami, Joyce Carol Oates, Flannery O’Connor, M. Rickert, Lisa Tuttle, to name a few.
Submissions are assumed to be original and previously unpublished. We welcome submissions as an attachment via e-mail, in standard manuscript format, up to 7500 words. Please send submissions to undertowbooks (at) gmail.com.
Please do not query about reprints.
Response times will be fairly quick. As such, please do not send simultaneous or multiple submissions.
Unsolicited manuscripts accepted for publication are paid at 1-cent-per-word to a maximum of $50. Contributors will also receive 2 copies of the journal.