Guidelines

Submission Guidelines:

What I want - Fiction: Hard-hitting, exciting, rough-and-tumble military science fiction action and adventure, starships, laser cannon, machineguns, ground and space action, but most especially I want a story. Know your equipment, your calibers, your vehicles and weapons and systems. Know your history, your organizations and officers. I might be more forgiving if you make a mistake in all of those and have still told a good story . Font:12-pt Times New Roman font. DO NOT send me anything in Arial or some weird font or size. My eyes are getting too old. File Type:RTF files ONLY. I won't even open a Word document from anyone I don't know or trust implicitly. Spacing: Single or double-spaced with 1 blank line between paragraphs. Spelling: Spell-check your manuscripts, for Gawd's sake, please! Rights: I want First Internet Publication, non-exclusive rights for 30 days ONLY. That means that I get the right to publish your manuscript online and keep it there for 30 days. After that, you're free to do with it as you choose. If, at any time, you want me to take down a story, ask me to do it, nicely, and it will be done asap. If a story is good enough and there are enough good stories, I might, sometime, ask you for anthology rights, but that's a whole 'nother kettle o' fish and is at least 2 years away by my reckoning. Language: English only, please. I have a hard enough time speaking and writing my own language. A sprinkling of foreign words or terms here and there might be okay, but 99.99% of the rest of the manuscript should be in words I know and recognize. Payment: Exposure only, at this time, but by December, 2008 or January, 2009, I hope to be able to pay 1/4-cent per word, $5 minimum, and hopefully rising over time as money allows. Per our contract payable within 30 days of contract signing date. Artwork will be paid at the rate of $12.50 per submission accepted, $20 if used for the issue's cover image, also payable within 30 days of contract signing date. Poetry: No poetry, no songs, no sonnets, no rhymes, no limericks. Word Count : Around 5 thousand words is a good starting point. Do not go above 10 thousand unless you ask me first. Do not go below 1 thousand (Firepower! is not a flash fiction market). Art: Digital space and science fiction artwork. Send me an initial sample of the work sized to 320x240 pixels in jpeg or gif format only. No bitmaps. By submitting you certify that you are the original artist responsible for the work and have full rights to the work. Finally, you will be asked to sign a simple contract. This contract guarantees your rights and mine. It gives both sides certain legal protections in the event of disagreement (which I sincerely hope never happens, but you can't be too careful these days). The contract is the one suggested by the SFWA and Ralan at Ralan's.com. I like it. It's simple, to the point, and covers the required bases. I intend to live up to my end of it, you have my word. Sample Contract

What I Don't Want : Porn, foul language for foul language's sake only (yes, soldiers curse, sometimes, but not all the time and not in front of the officers or civilians), blood & gore for blood & gore's sake only (yes, war is a bloody business, but the blood & killing has a purpose and a point and not even soldiers dwell on the blood and killing), psychopathic killing (soldiers are trained killers, not psycho's - the psycho's get weeded out real fast). Don't send me fantasy thinly disguised as military science fiction (that means no orcs, dwarves, or elves, magic, sorcerors, kings, princesses, or the like). Don't send me a love story thinly disguised as military science fiction (unless it really is a really good love story and then it's still likely to be rejected because it's better off going to a romance market). Absolutely NO Star Wars, Star Trek, Babylon 5, Battlestar Galactica, or other genre stuff owned by somebody else. As my friend Chris L'Etoile would say, "Don't even think about it, cupcake." Don't try to disguise it because I watch the shows too. This includes Stargate, Dr. Who, Charlie Jade, Anita Blake, etc., etc., etc. If somebody else owns the license, don't send me the story. No superhero stuff (ie no X-Men, Iron Man, Hulk, or other spinoff material that somebody else owns the license to). No political diatribes. I don't particularly care what your political beliefs are. I simply don't want to hear it or publish it. Reprints: No reprints. If your story has been published somewhere else in any form, I can't use it. I plan to publish 5-6 original pieces of military science fiction in Firepower! initially bi-monthly, eventually rising to monthly, possibly more as time and submissions allow. Remember, something like 99% of all stories that pass over a real editor's desk get rejected for one reason or another (and I'm not a real editor so don't confuse me with Stan Schmidt or Gordon Van Gelder or Gardner Dozois - I ain't them). Rejection happens. Get used to it. It is not a reflection on you as a person. Rejection really means that you took the time and put in the effort to write a story and submit it, that's saying something in and of itself. Even the Big Names get rejected and none of them are submitting stories to Firepower! Remember, don't quit your day job to become a writer. That's a fast way to end up broke and on the street. Besides, you're not going to make your first million (which ain't that much anymore anyway) writing stories for Firepower! no matter what. How To Submit: Send an email to fotsgreg@aol.com with your story attached as an RTF file. Put the word SUBMISSION: followed by the story's title in your subject line. Make sure your contact information, word count, and real name is included as the first 4 lines of your story. If you don't know how to format a manuscript, learn. There are a thousand web pages out there right now that will show you how. Finally, DO NOT reject your story for me. As Stan Schmidt at Analog says "That's my job". Thanks, Greg

HOME     ABOUT     STORE     BACK