About Us

Crow's Nest Magazine was founded in 2009 and is an imprint of Black Lantern Publishing. Crow's Nest seeks to publish well-written, dark, imaginative and speculative fiction for Young Adult audiences, but also accepts stories of love, friendship, and the hardships of being a teen. We believe strongly in the ability of literature to leave a lasting impression on a person's life, and we seek honest, genuine characters who can connect with our readers and keep holding them for many years to come.

Submission Guidelines

Crow's Nest Magazine accepts literature that is dark and imaginative, as well as speculative, targeted towards Young Adult readers, ages 14 and up. We believe that well written Young Adult literature can transcend age boundaries and can be enjoyed by teenagers as well as adults. Please read the below guidelines carefully before submitting your work to Crow's Nest Magazine.  We have recently changed our submission guidelines for all of our imprints.

Please note that these guidelines have been recently revised.  As of August 1, 2010, we will be closed to submissions.  Please note that as of this time, we do not have a set date to reopen our submissions, as Black Lantern is undergoing some new and improved changes, though hope to begin accepting submissions again in 2011.  At that time, please refer to our revised submission dates prior to submitting your work. 

Writers

Short Fiction 
 

Crow's Nest seeks well written, dark and imaginative literature, as well as speculative literature. Crow's Nest also accepts stories about love and friendship. We particularly enjoy works with strong, Young Adult characters who "grow up" a little by the end of the story. Please do not send works that include graphic sexual, drug related, or gory scenes, as they will immediately be rejected. We target our work for Young Adult audiences. If we feel your work does not suit this particular age group, you may look into one of our other imprints (Black Lantern Publishing or Broomstick Books).

Works should be 5,000 words or less. We seek well-written, polished works that do not speak down to teens.  Please note that we do not currently publish plays, reviews, or essays. We do accept non-fiction pieces, but we are very picky about these submissions, so please be sure that your piece is high-quality before submitting it for consideration.

Include with your submission the following:
  • a cover letter in which you introduce yourself, tell us the genre of your story, and approximate word count, as well as including any previous publishing credits
    your complete manuscript in the form of word documents or .pdf files only.
  • Please submit only one piece at a time for consideration. We do consider simultaneous submissions, however, please inform us immediately if your work has been accepted elsewhere.
  • email your submissions to crowsnestsubmissions@gmail.com. At this time, we do not accept paper submissions.
  • all queries should be directed to Rebecca Huggins, Editor-in-Chief
Poetry

We do accept poetry, and have published some exceptional poets in the past.  For poetry, send at most three poems per submission for consideration.  Do not send additional submissions until your work has been accepted.  We do read each and every submission with the utmost care, so we ask that our writers limit their the number of pieces they submit at a time, so that we may dedicate as much time as possible to each individual piece.

If Your Piece is Accepted

If we decide that your piece is a good fit for Crow's Nest, than we will inform you personally via email within a three months time frame.  If you do not feel that your piece is a good fit for our imprint, but feel that it is a good fit for Black Lantern, we will offer that opportunity to you.  However, please note that we reserve the right to publish your piece where we deem it fits best.  We do this with the utmost intention of achieving the most suitability and most appropriate audience for viewing your work. If you choose to not have your piece published because of this, please notify us immediately and submit your piece elsewhere.

Generally, we will notify you in your acceptance email when your piece will be available for viewing.  Please understand that it takes a great deal of time to review, edit, and prepare each piece for publication.  If you feel that your piece requires additional corrections to the ones that have already been suggested by the Editor-in-Chief after its publication, please note that these requests for changes will not be made.  We expect our writers to submit only the very best, most polished work in their collection, and requests for changes after publication is a very time consuming task, with the amount of new submissions we receive every day. Requests for changes prior to publication should be addressed to the Editor-in-Chief at crowsnestmagazine@gmail.com.  Please do not send requests for changes via our submission page, as these emails will be disregarded.

At this time, we are not accepting paper submissions.

Please send only your very best, most polished work for consideration. 
    Artists

    We are always seeking art that emulates the type of stories we publish. Artwork need not be based on previously published works, but should deal with issues which are appropriate for Young Adults. We don't mind nudity, so long as it is not graphic or indecent, and strongly sexual or overly gory works will be rejected.

    If you are an artist and are interested in submitting your work to Crow's Nest Magazine, please submit the following for consideration:
    • a cover letter in which you introduce yourself and any previous publishing credits
      email your submissions to crowsnestartsubmissions@gmail.com.
    • We prefer electronic submissions, and your work should be in JPEG format. If you have questions concerning submissions, please feel free to query us at crowsnestmagazine@gmail.com.
    Rights

    Contributors retain all publication & serial rights subsequent to those permissions granted to appear here.

    Payment

    At this time, we do not pay our contributors.

    Response Time
    We do our best to respond personally to each submission, however, we are a growing publishing company and must ask that you be patient with response times. Please allow at least three months response time before querying about the status of your submission.
    Please send only your very best, most polished work for consideration.  

    Artists

    We accept art work of all varieties, however we do not publish photography or sequential artwork at this time. Please do not submit art work that is pornographic, as it will immediately be rejected. We seek art that is authentic and elicits a response from its viewer. We eagerly seek works that border on the fantastical, or that demonstrate an original perception of a subject.

    For Online Submissions: Please send an email to blacklanternartsubmissions@gmail.com. In the subject line, please label your work "art submission" and in the body of your email, include a breif biography (50 words max.) about yourself, including any previous publishing experience you may have. Please send your piece as an attachment in JPEG format only.

    For Paper Submissions: Please send a query letter, in which you include a brief biography about yourself including any previous publishing experience you may have, an SASE for our response, and your piece to:

    Attn: Walker Huggins, Art Director
    Black Lantern Publishing
    41 Tulip Grove Cr. #4
    Bristol, TN 37620

    Please do not send originals copies of your work. We can not be held accountable for lost or damaged material.
      
    Rights

    Contributors retain all publication & serial rights subsequent to those permissions granted to appear here.

    Publication

     Crow's Nest Magazine currently publishes four, online issue per year.  Our current publication schedule is as follows:

    Winter Issue (December-February)
    Spring Issue (March-May)
    Summer Issue (June-August)
    Fall Issue (September-November)
    At this time, Crow's Nest Magazine is simply in online format.  We do not publish a print edition of this imprint. Please refer to our Open to Submissions page to see when we are accepting submissions.

    Payment

    At this time, we do not pay our contributors.