Submit to Alternating Current Press
This page is currently undergoing an overhaul, and submission details and dates are changing. If something isn’t open, please don’t email us; just come back and check at a later date. We’ll be back on track with submission changes by the end of the year.
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➤ Book-Length Manuscript Contests & Prizes
Front Range Book Prize 🔗 | Futurist Debut Book Award 🔗
➤ Book-Length & Chapbook Open-Reading Submissions
Book-Length Fiction 🔗 | Book-Length Nonfiction 🔗 | Book-Length Poetry 🔗 | Book-Length Translations 🔗 | Little Pigeon Chapbook Series 🔗
➤ Literary Journal Submissions 🔗
Footnote: A Literary Journal of History 🔗 | The Coil: An Independent Online Literary Magazine 🔗 | Individual Poems 🔗 | Individual Stories/Fiction 🔗 | Individual Nonfiction 🔗
➤ Annual Editorial Prizes
Charter Oak Award 🔗 | Electric Book Award 🔗 | Spark Translation Prize 🔗 | Luminaire Poetry Award 🔗 | Luminaire Prose Award 🔗
➤ Special Projects & Open Calls for Single-Edition Anthologies 🔗
Best Small Fictions 🔗 | How to Hang the Hat: Storytellers on Sondheim 🔗 | Hear & Now: An Anthology on Deafness 🔗 | We’ve Always Done It!: Poems About Wartime Women 🔗
Manuscript Contests & Prizes
Front Range Book Prize
Book-length manuscripts of literary fiction, short stories, poetry, plays, novels, long novellas, creative nonfiction, literary memoir, essay collections, or hybrid by Colorado authors or on the theme of Colorado. Open January 1-June 30 annually. (Please note that we’ve recently changed the dates for this prize, so it is currently open NOW through June 30, 2026, for this current 2026 cycle only, to make sure no one misses the date change.) FIND OUT MORE ➤
Futurist Debut Book Award
Book-length manuscripts of literary fiction, short stories, poetry, plays, novels, long novellas, creative nonfiction, literary memoir, essay collections, or hybrid written by a debut author who has not yet published a full-length book in the submitted genre. Open July 1-December 31 annually. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Book-Length & Chapbook Open-Reading Submissions
Book-Length Fiction
Book-length manuscripts of literary fiction, short stories, plays, novels, long novellas, flash collections, or hybrid. Please note that we do not publish children’s, middle-grade, NA, YA, or picture books, and our focus is not on commercial titles. Manuscripts submitted through this portal qualify for the Electric Book Award. Open year-round. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Book-Length Nonfiction
Book-length manuscripts of creative nonfiction, literary memoir, essay collections, or hybrid. Please note that we do not publish children’s, middle-grade, NA, YA, or picture books, and our focus is not on commercial or scholarly titles. Manuscripts submitted through this portal qualify for the Electric Book Award. Open year-round. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Book-Length Poetry
Book-length manuscripts of poetry, experimental, prose poems, or hybrid poetry. Please note that we do not publish children’s, middle-grade, NA, YA, or picture books, and our focus is not on commercial titles. Manuscripts submitted through this portal qualify for the Electric Book Award. Open year-round. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Book-Length Translations
Book-length translations in any style or genre, preferably on important social justice topics and themes that impact the world around us. We especially want to hear from marginalized and underrepresented people and languages. Manuscripts submitted through this portal qualify for the Spark Translation Prize. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Little Pigeon Chapbook Series
Chapbook-length manuscripts in any style of themed or linked pieces with a hook, and we are especially interested in themes with a historical or science bent. Chapbooks for the series should be about 10 to 40 pages of material and must have a single theme of some sort. Manuscripts submitted through this portal qualify for the Electric Book Award. Open year-round. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Literary Journal Submissions
Footnote: A Literary Journal of History
Individual pieces of historical writing in poetry, fiction, nonfiction, or hybrid that give an author’s intimate or emotional take on historical places, people, events, or ideas. Pieces must noticeably have something to do with history in their topics, although there’s no set theme other than “history” in general. Pieces submitted through this portal qualify for the Charter Oak Award. FIND OUT MORE ➤
The Coil: An Online Independent Literary Magazine
Individual pieces of nonfiction with a literary bent, including essays, book reviews, interviews, shelfies, columns, articles, artwork, historical writing, literary recipes, book lists, soundbites, spotlights, blog tours, and more for a weekday online literary magazine that runs new content every Monday through Friday. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Individual Poems
Individual poems and standalone poetry only. Individual poems, small groups of linked poems, experimental, prose poems, and hybrid poetry considered for publication on The Coil. (Note that historical poems should be submitted to Footnote.) Poems submitted through this portal qualify for the Luminaire Poetry Award. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Individual Stories/Fiction
Individual stories and standalone fiction pieces only. Experimental, flash, short novelettes, long stories, short plays, and hybrid prose considered for publication on The Coil. (Note that historical stories should be submitted to Footnote; and nonfiction of all types should be submitted through The Coil categories above.) Stories submitted through this portal qualify for the Luminaire Prose Award. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Annual Editorial Prizes
Charter Oak Award
An editorial prize for the best individual pieces of historical writing in poetry, fiction, nonfiction, or hybrid accepted by Footnote: A Literary Journal of History. There is no separate submission process; all pieces submitted to Footnote are considered for the annual Charter Oak Award, which coincides with the publication of each annual journal issue. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Electric Book Award
An editorial prize for the best book-length or chapbook manuscript of literary fiction, short stories, poetry, plays, novels, long novellas, creative nonfiction, literary memoir, essay collections, or hybrid accepted by the press during the calendar year. There is no separate submission process; all manuscripts submitted through our open-reading fiction, nonfiction, and poetry portals and our Little Pigeon Chapbook Series portal are considered for the annual prize. Open year-round. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Spark Translation Prize
An editorial prize for the best book-length manuscript of translation accepted by the press during the calendar year. There is no separate submission process; all manuscripts submitted through our open-reading translation portal are considered for the annual prize. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Luminaire Poetry Award
An editorial prize for the best single poems accepted by the press for The Coil during the calendar year. There is no separate submission process; all individual poems submitted through our individual-poems portal are considered for the annual prize. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Luminaire Prose Award
An editorial prize for the best single stories accepted by the press for The Coil during the calendar year. There is no separate submission process; all individual fiction submitted through our individual-stories/fiction portal are considered for the annual prize. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Special Projects & Anthologies
Best Small Fictions
We’re thrilled to be the publisher for this renowned annual compilation of the best microfiction, flash fiction, haibun stories, and prose poetry from around the world, nominated by indie presses that published the pieces. Publishers may nominate small fictions from their presses at the end of each year. FIND OUT MORE ➤
How to Hang the Hat: Storytellers on Sondheim
An anthology of mixed styles ABOUT STEPHEN SONDHEIM. The theater world lost a titan on November 26, 2021, and we’re coping the only way we know how: an anthology of tributes and words about the legend that was the incomparable, irreplaceable Stephen Sondheim. If you were formed into a human by the man who changed American Broadway musical theater forever, then we want to read your words. All styles welcome. Submissions open. FIND OUT MORE ➤
Hear & Now: An Anthology on Deafness
Poetry, fiction, hybrid, and nonfiction that touches on d/Deafness in some way (however slight) that is WRITTEN BY d/Deaf and hard-of-hearing writers. The genre and style is purposely left very open, so d/Deaf and hard-of-hearing writers can bend the theme to mean what they want it to mean for their own purposes. This anthology is almost filled, so submit right away. Submissions will close on December 31, 2025, to assess where we are with anthology selections. FIND OUT MORE ➤
We’ve Always Done It!: Poems About Wartime Women
Individual poetry about women during times of war, from ancient wars to the War of the Roses to every war of independence to Rosie the Riveter to Afghanistan, for a one-time single-edition poetry anthology with 50+ authors. This anthology is almost filled, so submit right away. Submissions will close on December 31, 2025, to assess where we are with anthology selections. FIND OUT MORE ➤
