Thank you for your interest in submitting to Bellevue Literary Review. We will reopen to submissions on September 1.

Behind the scenes, we continue to review all of the submissions that came in during the previous cycle. A bit of info:

• We typically announce the results of the contest in late November/early December. (We realize this is quite a long timeframe and appreciate your patience.) As a reminder, all contest submissions are also considered for general publication.
• If you've submitted to the general submissions category and haven’t heard from us in five months, please feel free to reach out for an update. 
• To all submitters: kindly let us know ASAP if your piece is accepted elsewhere.

~~~~~~

Genres

Fiction and Nonfiction:

• Word max is 5,000 words (though most of our published prose is in the range of 2,000-4,000 words)
• Fiction: We seek character-driven fiction with original voices and strong settings. We do not publish genre fiction (romance, sci-fi, horror). We have only occasionally published flash fiction. While we are always interested in creative explorations in style, we do lean toward classic short stories.
• Nonfiction: We are looking for essays that reach beyond the standard ‘illness narrative’ to develop a topic in an engaging and original manner. (Please, no academic discourses or works with footnotes.)

Poetry:

• You may submit up to three poems as one submission. Each poem should be on a separate page within a single document. Poems can be of any length, though shorter poems allow us to include more poets in our pages.
• We encourage poems that are accessible to a wide audience. Characteristics we look for are vivid writing, compelling voice, and rendering the familiar new.

Eligibility

• All submissions must be previously unpublished. For BLR, “published work” means published in print in North America, or published on the Internet in electronic journals, e-zines, academic websites, and other “public” or “official” websites. Works posted on personal blogs or websites will be considered on a case-by-case basis. We ask that authors be honest about web postings. If a work is discovered to have been posted or published elsewhere—and not openly acknowledged by the author in advance—we will remove it from consideration.
• We happily consider simultaneous submissions, but please inform us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere.
• We strive to evaluate each submission on its own terms; kindly omit identifying information on your manuscript.
• By submitting, authors affirm that the work submitted is their own original writing, has not been previously published, and was not created or materially shaped by generative artificial intelligence tools.
• BLR acquires First North American rights, and the right to reprint in anthologies and online. After publication, all other rights revert to the author and the work may be reprinted as long as appropriate acknowledgement to BLR is made.

Dates & Deadlines

• During the Fall reading period (September 1 to December 31), we will be accepting submissions for a theme issue on "migrations" (more info here), as well as for our general themes of health, illness, and healing. 
• The annual BLR Prizes are open during the Spring reading period (March - July). More info about the Prizes will be posted ahead of that reading period. 
• We strive to provide several reviewers for each manuscript and kindly ask your patience in this necessarily slow process. But if you have not heard from us within five months, feel free to inquire about your manuscript by emailing info@BLReview.org.

Fees & Payments

• There is a $5 fee per general submission, which is waived for current subscribers. If you are not a current subscriber, you can subscribe when you submit your work and take advantage of free submission.
• These fees help BLR fund publication and programming, including our commitment to paying contributors and providing a wide range of free events. If the submission fee is a hardship for you, please contact us to inquire about a fee waiver for general submissions or a discounted contest entry fee.
• BLR pays our published authors $75 for poetry and $150 for prose. Authors will receive two of the issue in which their work appears, plus an additional 1-year subscription to BLR. There is an author discount for purchasing extra copies. 

~~~~~~

If you have any questions, please email us at info@BLReview.org

We hope you'll also consider ordering a copy or a subscription (that's how literary journals stay alive and provide publishing opportunities for the writing community!)