Querencia Press accepts poetry, fiction, non-fiction (including memoir), hybrid work, and occasionally visual art. Please include a short, third-person bio and your pronouns with your submission. *hardsells are listed on our website
- We accept simultaneous submissions and previously published work that has appeared in print or online (this includes blogs and social media). As long as you hold the copyright to the work, we want to see it!
- You keep the rights to your work! Your work belongs to you!
- Querencia Press does not charge a submission fee (though tips are much appreciated). If a manuscript is accepted, you will receive a contract with competitive royalty options, but we are a non-paying market for anthologies. We do not provide physical contributor copies, but we do provide a discount link for contributors.
- We do not tolerate sexism, racism, homophobia, xenophobia, ableism, or any other forms of bigotry. We do accept explicit content, but please provide a trigger warning so we know what we are reading.
- Querencia is a small press. We have only one full time editor and our entire team consists of volunteers. We read and consider each submission carefully in the order that it is received, and we do not believe in silent rejections. You will receive a response. Please try to resist sending follow up emails regarding when your submission will be read. We are currently processing manuscript responses on about a 6-8 month turnaround due to the volume of submissions, sometimes longer for acceptances if we have a large acceptance rate for a particular month.
- All submissions should be in a single .pdf, .doc, or .docx format, however we do not require any specific formatting guidelines. Visual submissions can be sent as PDF, JPG, PNG, or TIFF (please no RAW files) Do not send us Google Docs or Pages—we cannot use them across all of our devices, and if we have to ask for you to resend your submission in a different format, it increases your wait time (if you absolutely have to send Pages because of Apple, please inform us and know we may take a bit longer to get to your submission based on when we have a device available to access Pages). For anthology submissions we ask that you title your document with the genre and the number of pieces and to which anthology callout you are submitting (i.e. Poetry - 5 Pieces - Quarterly Anthology). We do not need a cover letter, but please include a short 3rd person bio and your pronouns with all submissions.
Manuscripts
We are looking for chapbooks and full-lengths in any genre. For poetry and hybrid work, we are seeking work with a minimum of 20 pages. Prose manuscripts should be a minimum of 7,000 words. There is no page or word count limit, but please let us know what genre the work best falls into. We currently publish most manuscripts in a 6x9 softcover format, with a minimum 11pt font, so if you have unique formatting you may want to see what your manuscript will look like in this size.
Visual Art Manuscripts - We are looking for chapbooks and full-lengths in any genre. There is no page limit right now (we reserve the right to change that in the future), but please let us know what genre the work most closely falls into along with if you are submitting a work combining written and visual art or a purely graphic submission. We will be publishing most work in letter size and 6.625 x 10.25, however our goal is to work with the size that is best suited to your work. When sending written/visual hybrids, please send your work as a PDF. If your work is accepted, we may request a .doc/.docx file with just text and images sent individually depending on the nature of the work.
ANTHOLOGIES
Poetry
We accept submissions of up to five (5) pieces per person. There is no page or word count limit, but we will not read additional submissions in the same category unless you have received a response. Please submit your work in a single document.
Fiction, Non-fiction, & Hybrid
We accept submissions of up to three (3) pieces per person. There is no page limit. Please try not to exceed 2,000 words per piece (we may accept higher word counts, but acceptances will be based on available space). We will not read additional submissions in the same category unless you have received a response. Please submit your work in a single document.
Visual Art
When we have openings for visual art, we accept visual art submissions of up to five (5) pieces per person. Please submit your work in one of the following formats: .jpg, .png, .pdf, .tiff *note - if your work is accepted we may request a higher resolution image or for the format to be converted depending on the current project. We cannot use RAW files, as not all devices support them. We do not accept visual art for the quarterly anthologies
Not Ghosts, But Spirits series - OPEN - 100 submission cap - Querencia Press publishes an ongoing project of anthologies surrounding women’s & LGBTQIAP+ issues. Profits from each anthology will be donated to a different organization working to improve rights for women and queer people. These anthologies are open to any trans, enby, woman identifying, queer person, or ally. We are looking for work across all genres, including visual art, about any and all issues that come with being a woman &/or LGBTQIAP+ person. TERF content will not be tolerated under any circumstances. Sales from the current project (Volume VI) will be donated to The Chicago Foundation for Women *Submissions Open May 1st
Poetry
We accept submissions of up to five (5) pieces per person. There is no page or word count limit, but we will not read additional submissions in the same category unless you have received a response. Please submit your work in a single document.
Fiction, Non-fiction, & Hybrid
We accept submissions of up to three (3) pieces per person. There is no page limit. Please try not to exceed 2,000 words per piece (we may accept higher word counts, but acceptances will be based on available space). We will not read additional submissions in the same category unless you have received a response. Please submit your work in a single document.
Visual Art
We accept visual art submissions of up to five (5) pieces per person. Please submit your work in one of the following formats: .jpg, .png, .pdf, .tiff *note - if your work is accepted we may request a higher resolution image or for the format to be converted depending on the current project. We cannot use RAW files, as not all devices support them.
Special Call Out! - OPEN - Submission cap of 50 - Querencia Press is looking for work from kids 12 and under for an anthology for middle grade/YA readers! We will be accepting visual art and writing for this anthology. Parents or guardians will need to submit the work in collaboration with the potential contributor, but work should be created only by kids 12 and under. Querencia will provide one complimentary contributor copy to each featured artist and all artists retain the rights to their work.
We are especially interested in work from individuals writing on the same themes of marginalization/diversity that we explore in the rest of our catalogue, but it is not a requirement.
Poetry
We accept submissions of up to five (5) pieces per person. There is no word count limit.. We will not read additional submissions in the same category unless you have received a response. Please submit your work in a single document.
Fiction, Non-fiction, & Hybrid
We accept submissions of up to three (3) pieces per person. There is no page limit. Please try not to exceed 2,000 words per piece (we may accept higher word counts, but acceptances will be based on available space). We will not read additional submissions in the same category unless you have received a response. Please submit your work in a single document.
Visual Art
We accept visual art submissions of up to five (5) pieces per person. Please submit your work in one of the following formats: .jpg, .png, .pdf, .tiff *note - if your work is accepted we may request a higher resolution image or for the format to be converted depending on the current project. We cannot use RAW files, as not all devices support them.
We do not accept AI creations in any category. If you believe you have an extenuating circumstance that requires AI assistance, please email us first before submitting.