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Wednesday, June 15, 2016

Crab Fat Seeks Convinced Atheist Writers for Special Issue

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Deadline: June 15, 2016

Crab Fat Magazine is accepting submissions from convinced atheist writers for a second special issue to be released in July 2016. We seek to curate a collection of thoughtful prose and poetry by people who DO NOT believe in any god(s) and show that atheism goes beyond political, social, and racial barriers. We’re open to a wide variety of work, from “coming out” as an atheist, to the impact atheism has on both personal and professional sides of life, and everything in-between. However, to be clear, we’re not seeking tirades attacking religion with sweeping generalizations.

We accept:
  • flash fiction 
  • short stories 
  • poetry 
  • creative non-fiction 
  • visual art 
  • interviews with writers, musicians, artists, and other interesting artsy people 
  • stage/screenplays 
  • book reviews from small indie presses 


We do not accept email submissions. If you send us email submissions, we will delete them, unread. We use Submittable. Our interview editor is the exception. If you’d like to inquire about an interview with us please contact Mai for more information.

Crab Fat is interested in brutal honesty and authenticity. Don’t be afraid to use real language. Crab Fat is not interested in robotic academic language; frank language is always the best, even if that means using profanity and non-standard English. Break away from traditional structures and mainstream ideologies. Emotive writing is most important. We love well done second person POV in short fiction, and poetry with scientific language & outer space imagery, and prose that traverses the galaxy and reminds us that humanity is but a small part of the infinite unknown. We want poems about Batman & Joker & Gotham City. We want unique expressions of gender & gender neutral pronouns & mock interviews with dead celebrities & prose poetry & cross-genre experimental work. Use words as weapons, allow raw emotion to bleed into the work. Crab Fat wants your anger, your love, your disappointment, your peaks, your valleys, & above all, your best work.

Check out our Six Questions For… interview with Jim Harrington, as well as our LitBridge interview, NewPages Chat, and Duotrope Interview for a more in-depth discussion of what we’re after at Crab Fat.


Just a few formalities:

flash pieces, both fiction and nonfiction, should not exceed 1,000 words

short stories and creative non-fiction should not exceed 3,000 words (1,100-2,500 words preferred)

Please send no more than 10 pages of poetry at a time

images are limited to 5 per submission, please send hi-resolution (300 dpi), contact Justine, the art editor, for more information (if necessary)

transcribed interviews should not exceed 3,000 words, audio should be 10 minutes or less

we prefer shorter scripts, think somewhere in the 20-30 page range, though a little more or less won’t hurt
book reviews should not exceed 1,500 words

Crab Fat is currently a non-paying market, though we hope this changes in the future.

Crab Fat requires first North American serial publishing rights, after publication all rights revert back to the author.

Accepted work is subject for use in any future anthologies, both digital and print.

Crab Fat asks that any reprints give first publication credit–something like “XYZ originally appeared in Crab Fat Magazine.“


Crab Fat does not like to censor a writer/artist’s aesthetic or imagination, but there are certain topics that we are simply not interested in. With that said, please DO NOT send prose, poetry, or images that depict child molestation/sex fantasy, rape (unless it’s a vital part of the story and handled with sensitivity, ie–a revenge narrative), gratuitous violence or sex, bestiality, or necrophilia. Seriously, don’t do it. We will scream and add you to our auto-reject list.

Please withdraw any simultaneous submissions for poetry if publication is offered elsewhere by adding a note in Submittable–DO NOT WITHDRAW YOUR ENTIRE SUBMISSION UNLESS YOU NO LONGER WANT US TO CONSIDER IT. Failure to follow these guidelines will result in your submission being deleted, unread.

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