A little bit about The Fabulist Magazine
I’m journalist, a nonfiction editor, and an advocate for independent media and culture— so it is, shall we say, “interesting,” that what’s working for me right now is fantasy and science fiction.
The Fabulist Words & Art (online at www.fabulistmagazine.com) was launched back in 2007 as a personal blog where I posted my own fledgling works of speculative fiction, and any far-out/fantastical stories my pals wanted to share.
Not long after that the website got listed in the Duotrope writer’s market website, and, despite not having a formal submissions system or offering any pay, we started getting submissions from folks I didn’t know.
Lots — and lots — of submissions.
Eventually, I had a stack of hundreds of weird, and often wonderful, stories and poems by folks from all over the United States and the world. From California and New York to England, India, Holland and Hong Kong.
Most of them weren’t a good match for the website, but some were truly great.
Those early Fabulist stories include high-concept science fiction fables, such as Niall Boyce’s “Gleam” and Josh Mulholland’s “With Virgil”; the snappy and macabre quasi-noir of Michael C. Keith’s “Losing His Head”; and the haunting microfictions of Peg Alford Pursell’s dream/life triptych.
Learning how to manage that kind of workflow, and understanding what it takes to be a good literary editor, was more difficult than I expected. I’m still learning — but it seems like I’m finally getting into a bit of a groove with it.
In this I am also lucky to be joined by Adam Myers, The Fab’s art director, who has been with us from the start. Not only does he illustrate almost everything we publish, he also runs our annual open call for visual art, and curates our ongoing gallery program, which collects gorgeous, strange and compelling works of visual art from artists around the world.
The Fabulist has also been shaped by a community of editorial facilitators and slush readers, all talented talented and accomplished authors, poets and educators in their own right, including Jenny Bitner, Elizabeth Gonzalez James, our poetry editor Russell Reza-Khaliq Gonzaga, and slush readers James Hritz and Jessica Wilson.
Over the years The Fabulist has evolved into a weekly digital magazine that publishes original works of fantastical fiction, poetry and art every Friday, as well as reviews, essays, interviews and related nonfiction during the week, when we get it.
We no longer have an open-door submissions policy for fiction, and instead run one annual open call for fiction, which yields hundreds of submissions over the course of a few weeks.
(In fact, our current open call for short fantastical fiction opens on Oct. 8. and runs through Nov. 12; we’ll be selecting stories from this for our 2022 publication cycle — get the details about that on our submissions page.)
Typically, we select about 3 percent of these for publication, and get enough great material for a year’s worth of publishing.
We hope to build on this, and to that end will be debuting a Patreon page and also our first Kickstarter campaign for a book launch.
I’ll be posting details about all that here on Medium when we have the details sorted.
Meanwhile, you can get the latest from The Fabulist on our website, by signing up for our weekly email newsletter, and by following us on Twitter, Facebook, and even RSS.
While I have no intention of turning my back on journalism, media reform, and cultural advocacy at the grassroots (something I will write about at a later date and in more depth), it’s clear that I’m on a journey with The Fabulist, and in good company, that still has a ways yet to go.
