Submission Guidelines
Current Call
The inaugural issue is now open for submissions!
Seeking art, poetry, fiction, essay, and ephemera on the theme of "The True Cost."
Bring me your stories of survivor's guilt: your final girls, your escaped cultists, kaiju disaster victims. People who have made sacrifices (blood, emotional, spiritual) and now must rationalize and justify them. What happens when the imminent threat is over and they have to live with the consequences of their decisions? Was it worth it? What will they do now to make it worth it?
Deadline: Dec 1, 2026
Length: Up to 4,000 words
Pay: $20 + contributor copies
Reprints welcome. No AI. Submit to tlbodine@gmail.com.
For artwork & unusual artifacts, query first.
General Submission Guidelines
- Please follow Shunn manuscript formatting or similar. I don't need your phone number or address, but I do need an email and a way to Paypal you.
- Email submissions to tlbodine@gmail.com and include "Nightmare Marginalia" and/or "Submission" in the subject line.
- Simultaneous submissions welcome, but please tell me if it's been accepted elsewhere. No multiple submissions.
- Please only submit work you have the legal right to sell. This means no fanworks and no existing IP. If you're submitting a reprint, be sure you're outside of your exclusivity period.
- Absolutely no AI. Anyone found to be submitting AI-generated art or writing will be permanently blacklisted and also make me terribly sad.
What I'm Looking For
Horror and horror-adjacent works (stories, poems, fake job postings, receipts from another world) that fit within the spirit of the theme. I am particularly interested in stories about people, places, and scenarios that you don't often see in fiction: stories from the perspective of "background" characters, protagonists with unusual jobs, lesser-known cryptids, obscure folklore, marginalized voices, etc. Nonfiction dealing with similar topics is also of interest to me, particularly literary analysis and personal essay, but it'll be a harder sell than fiction and poetry. Shorter works may be a little easier to place than longer ones.
For Artwork: Art of any medium is welcome as long as you made it yourself and it can be used in a zine. However, line drawings and simple designs that won't use up too much printer ink are preferred.
How Nightmare Marginalia Works
This is a limited run print zine. This means that each issue is only printed once, with a predetermined number of copies, and each one is hand-numbered -- so any given copy is a unique artifact in its own right. The size of an issue's print run is determined by the number of monthly subscribers + pre-orders + contributor copies, which can be distributed in any way the contributor pleases: sold at conventions, placed in little free libraries, put on consignment at bookstores, given to friends, traded for Pokemon cards. If you find yourself in ownership of a copy, come tell me where you found it!
Contributors receive a token payment + copies. You may sell or give away those copies at your discretion. You are not allowed to reproduce the zine. You do, however, retain the right to reprint your story anywhere you wish (as long as they allow reprints), and I am happy to accept work that has already been published elsewhere (as long as you have the right to sell it).
Each issue is clustered around a theme and may include a mix of features, from fiction and essays to artwork and ephemera. I will generally avoid giving my own work precedent over spotlighting the voices of others, but I reserve the right to include my own writing and/or art as needed to fill space or flesh out the theme. Your inclusion, or rejection, says nothing about the quality of your work or your personhood and everything about my subjective opinions and the needs of a particular issue.
A Parting Note...
This is a tiny one-person show, funded 100% by the generosity of patrons. If you're interested in supporting what I do here, go check out my Patreon.