We love bite-sized stories to brighten the day, which is exactly why we created 50 Give or Take. If you subscribe, you'll receive daily microfiction of fifty words or less straight into your inbox. Despite popular opinion, the name 50 Give or Take doesn't refer to the amount of words in the story. The title is a metaphor for what we, as readers and writers, give and take emotionally from the written word. So if you decide to submit, make sure your story is 50 words or less. Please subscribe to get an idea of what is published, before submitting your work.
All stories will be published in an annual print collection to be released in November every year.
All you have to do is submit* your:
- 50-word story
- one-line bio
- website or social media URL
- a photo of yourself (or something else)
*By submitting to 50 Give or Take, you accept and understand that you are handing over non-exclusive rights for Vine Leaves Press to publish your work electronically and in print. Whatever you submit will be published. We will not edit names or bios once an acceptance has been made.
Submissions written by AI will be automatically rejected. Please do not submit more than once per month.
It's free to submit, and you will receive a 40% net royalty on all eBook and print sales. A copy of the publishing contract for your perusal can be downloaded HERE. Please also take a look at our Author FAQ to make sure we are the right publisher for you before submitting your work.
We are looking for: novels and novellas (all genres accepted, but with a literary bent), memoirs/biographies/autobiographies, creative nonfiction, writing/publishing reference books, short story collections, and poetry and vignette collections. For shorter works, such as poetry and vignettes, we will not accept anything shorter than 60 pages.
If you have a manuscript that you would like us to publish, please answer the following questions (in your head):
- Do you believe this manuscript is in the best possible shape?
- Is it edited and proofread to the best of your ability (or someone else's ability)?
- Will your book description make us NEED to read your book?
- Does your work suit Vine Leaves Press?
Answered 'Yes' to all of the above? Great! Get submitting ...
TIP: MFAs in Creative Writing & essays in The Paris Review won't sell your book to us. In addition to an appealing book proposal, we want to see evidence of a healthy social media presence and an engaging public voice that's going to have readers worship you! You don't need thousands (or even hundreds) of followers, but we need to see that you are willing to be publicly heard.
RESPONSE TIME: We try our best to respond to your query within two months of the submissions cut off date--that means end of March. Worst case scenario, end of April. Please also note that if we request your full manuscript, it's a rather lengthy process. Be prepared for a long wait of up to five to six months. This is because our reading process is very thorough. We’ve recently updated our acquisitions process to ensure that any full manuscripts we request are chosen by our acquisitions team, rather than simply assigned. This means that when a team member starts reading your manuscript, they are already 100% invested in its potential. When members of our acquisitions team mark a manuscript as a YES, it is then passed onto the publisher, Jessica Bell, for further review. Acceptances will not be sent out until ALL submitted manuscripts have been thoroughly read and evaluated. Also, the competition is fierce. Last period we only accepted 13 manuscripts out of over 1000 submissions.
Submissions written by AI will be automatically rejected.