Issue 4: Summer 2025
Echoes
“If a story does its job, it doesn't ever end. Not really. But it can change. This is the nature of folktales. They shift to fit each teller. Take whatever form suits the bearer best. What begins as a story of sorrow can be acknowledged, held like a sweetheart to the chest, rocked and sung to. And then it can be set down to sleep. It can become an offering. A lantern. An ember to lead you through the dark”
—GennaRose Nethercott (Thistlefoot)
We’re looking for heroes, creatures, dreams, and the extraordinary. Folklore. Urban legends. Whispers. Echoes. Stories from your sleepy hometown that come from your grandma’s grandma’s grandma’s grandma. Traditions and the breaking of them. Especially the breaking of them.
Tell us—what’s your lore?
Submission guidelines:
Eavesdrop is a queer-focused multimedia magazine. Our tone is inclusive, playful, and passionate.
Eavesdrop accepts any and all genres. Space opera, niche cryptid horror, experimental formats, and anything in between. We love genre fiction, especially when it’s done well. However, please note that we will not accept graphic sexual violence, hate speech, or discriminatory works. If your piece contains violence, deliver it with purpose. We recognize that violence is, unfortunately, part of our queer experiences, and we never want to censor anyone’s experience, but Eavesdrop wants to create a safe community for our content consumers and fellow artists. If you have any questions about this policy, please feel free to email us at eavesdroplitmagazine@gmail.com.
This submission period will be from February 3rd to March 10th, 2025.
Who Can Submit?
Our mandate is to connect both emerging and established Canadian writers with audiences who care. Issue 4 is Open to Canadian writers (anyone living in Canada for work, school, asylum, etc, as well as artists living on traditional, unceded territories, is welcome to submit).
We prioritize submissions from BIPOC writers, writers with disabilities, LGBTQ2SIA+ writers, and writers from marginalized groups, but accept submissions from everyone. We also gladly accept submissions from artists we’ve published before, but will make a concerted effort to spread the love as much as we can so we can share more voices. Please send us your work, and tell your friends!
What We Accept:
Fiction and Plays
For this issue, we are seeking short stories and short plays of no more than 2500 words.
Poetry
We accept up to 5 poems in a submission. Each poem should be no longer than 2 pages single-spaced.
Creative Non-Fiction
For this issue, we are seeking short stories of no more than 2500 words.
Comics
Please submit up to 3 strips or 1 page.
Visual Art
Eavesdrop also accepts visual submissions. Paintings, digital and physical, photo collages, sketches, we want to see it! We are looking for cover art and pieces to put in the magazine.
Rate of Pay
In the 2023/2024 fiscal year Eavesdrop pays the following:
$30 per poem
$70 per short fiction, CNF piece, and short play
$70 per visual art piece
$30 per comic
How to Submit:
We strive to make our submissions accessible and meet artists where they are. We accept all literary submissions in written form, but also in spoken word and short audio plays. Our goal is to transfer all of our written content into audio and all audio into written form so your work can reach every eye, limb, and ear. Each issue becomes a digital and audio magazine, with all audio being read out by either the artist or a member of the Eavesdrop team.
Please keep audio/video time under ten minutes if possible. We are a small team and it will help us return responses much quicker.
We have been advised that Submittable is inaccessible to screen readers, so we have decided to host our submissions system entirely in-house. With in-house baking and a tight budget comes a bit of a submission shimmy. Please read the following submission instructions at least once, ideally twice, to ensure we receive your submission!
Eavesdrop accepts submissions via email or through the file function on the form. If emailing your work, please email us your piece at eavesdroplitmagazine@gmail.com with the subject line “(YOUR NAME)” and “(ISSUE NUMBER)” Submission. If using the form file upload, please include your name and the issue number in the file name. Alternatively, if you are more comfortable submitting audio through another platform such as YouTube or Vimeo, or on a personal website, please provide us access to a private link.
Upon submission, please also fill out the form to your right (below on mobile). To be considered, you MUST submit your piece AND fill out the form.
Written prose submissions should be typed, double-spaced, and paginated. Written poems should be single-spaced, unless you are using unique formatting that requires additional space (if you’re unsure, email us at any time :) All submissions should be set in a reasonably legible font (please, don’t make us return your piece because chalkduster font is edgy). Also, please send written submissions in DOC or DOCX files (not PDFs, .pages, or other random files that we can’t open on any computer/leave comments easily, because that makes us sad). Visual pieces should be scanned at a high quality and saved as high-quality PNG, PDF, or TIF files. Audio files should:
not have background music (unless there are sounds imperative to the performance/short play).
be submitted as a .wav file, as these are higher quality than a .mp3 file.
We now accept simultaneous submissions, but please let us know as soon as possible via email if your piece has been accepted elsewhere. We will send acceptance/rejection letters and initial editorial notes within two months of submissions closing.
All submissions should be original and previously unpublished. We do not accept any work that has been partially or entirely written by Artificial Intelligence or pieces with computer-generated text or visuals.
At this time, there is no fee to submit your work to Eavesdrop.