Submission Guidelines

Waccamaw currently accepts unsolicited submissions of poems, stories, and essays during one submission period annually: August 1-September 8. Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, we published twice a year and included an additional call for submissions during January 15-February 15. We did not call for submissions in early 2021 and did not publish a Spring issue because of budget cuts made in response to the pandemic. We hope to resume our Spring issues very soon.

Submissions are accepted only via our online Submission Manager system. Unsolicited submissions received through other channels cannot be accepted or acknowledged. We accept files in Word, Rich Text, or Adobe formats (.doc, .docx, .rtf, or .pdf).

The editors encourage interested authors to read previous issues of Waccamaw before submitting. We recently published our Tenth Anniversary Print Edition, available for purchase here.

Here are a few more notes:

Authors should limit submissions to 3-5 poems, one story, or one essay (prose submissions preferably under 6,000 words). Please make only one submission in a single genre per reading period. Response time is approximately 2-4 months.

Simultaneous submissions are accepted. Please inform us if submitted work is accepted elsewhere before you receive our response. We do not consider submissions of previously published work in any form (including prior internet publication).

Waccamaw acquires only the first serial publication rights of accepted work. We are not accepting reprints at this time. Copyright is asserted on behalf of the author, and all reprint rights revert to the author upon publication.