Submission Guidelines
You want all the fame, fortune, and accolades that come with having your work published at Henry’s. Here are a few notes, suggestions, and helpful hints to get you on the bus.
READ ME FIRST—and believe us, too many people don’t—we are a creative nonfiction publication. You are welcome to send us your couplets, your sonnets, your villanelles, your version of the Great American Novel or a short story. But we only publish creative nonfiction. If you are unclear about what is meant by the term “creative nonfiction,” consult the many other resources on the web bound to confuse you even more.
We publish creative nonfiction that raises questions about our life on this world. Write about your observations, be they personal, political, romantic, scientific, philosophic, or spiritual. We look down our long noses at rants and unpersuasive blathering; yet we have high regard for well-structured arguments and rhetorical prowess.
We will consider personal essays, nature essays, memoir, lyric essays, travel essays, and literary journalism. We look favorably upon work that is personal. What moves you? We want to feel what you feel, see what you see, and taste what you taste. Surprise us.
Don’t send us book reviews. If we want one from you, we’ll ask.
As to the matter of length, a piece should be as long as it needs to be and no longer. We're an online publication, so if your work tends to meander, you may want to reign it in for us. Remember, “as long as it needs to be” means just that. If your 1200-word essay is working hard, we’ll know it; if your 700-word piece is bloated, we’ll know that too, and we’ll respond accordingly. In any event, we won't publish anything longer than 1200 words. It’s not the length, but how you use it.
A few words on getting your work to us: Do not send us your work via snail-mail. We live in the digital age, and frankly we don’t like killing trees unnecessarily. Send us your work with the full text of your piece pasted into the e-mail itself. Include your name and the title in the subject line like this: (Name: Storyname). Please do not attach your work to the e-mail in any format, period. All e-mail with attachments are immediately trashed unopened. No telling what kind of nasty things can hitch along for the ride.
Your contact information must be included as the first four lines of your e-mail. We need your name, the title of your work, your phone number (in case we have a question) and your e-mail address. Yes, we know it’s at the top of the e-mail, but humor us and include it anyway. It should look like this:
Name
Title of work
Phone number (including country code if outside U.S.)
E-mail address (for correspondence)
You can include a cover letter if you want, but frankly we’re more interested in what your writing has to say than where you received your MFA.
E-mail your submission to:
submissions (at) henrysonline (dot) org.
We can only publish work that is previously unpublished, so please don't send us work you posted to your personal website, on any of the number of social networking sites, in books, magazines, newsletters, journals, tattooed on body parts or anywhere else within public view.
Regarding payment, we regret that all we can do at this time is get your work in front of large crowds of adoring fans.
We do our best to respond promptly to your submission. Depending on the weather, this communication can take between a day or so, to several weeks. If you haven’t heard back from us within a month, Igor, our junk mail filter, probably devoured your submission. Please resubmit it instead of sending us a flaming e-mail about how callous and uncaring we are. We all know how callous and uncaring volunteers working for a non-profit literary journal can be, no need to remind us.
If you have other questions or you’re looking for a good barber you can e-mail us at:
questions (at) henrysonline (dot) org.
