Furry Writers' Guild Forum

A Glimpse of Anthropomorphic Literature (Quarterly Furry Zine)

Publishing and Marketing
#1

About “GoAL”

This will be run by Goal Publications (the new publishing imprint of AnthroAquatic), and will released on the 15th of December, March, June, and September. The zine will be digital, with a possible move to physical as well in the future. The purpose of this zine is to draw more focus to furry literature by showcasing, in a quick read, some of the highlights of the furry writing community.

Content

There are 5 categories of items were are looking for in this zine. They are as followed: (please note that the pay rate for ALL the items listed below (minus advertisements, of course) will be paid at a rate of $0.01 USD per word)

[ul][li]Short Stories

  • We are look for short stories that are 1000-2000 words. They MUST be within this limit. Stories outside of the limit will not be considered. We are also only allowing one story per author per issue.
  • We are only looking for 3-5 stories per issue, so know that we will have some extremely strict quality limits.
  • The stories must be furry in nature (the main character or theme must be of a predominantly furry nature) and they must not have any sexual or graphically violent content.
  • Reprints will be considered, but we would HIGHLY prefer original stories for this.
  • We are asking for exclusive rights to the story for six months from the publication date. After that, the story will be free for you to do whatever with.

[/li]

[li]Book Reviews

  • We are looking to 1-2 reviews per issue of a furry book. The book does not have to be fandom-published, but the restrictions for what book can be reviewed mirror those of the short stories that can be submitted. The story must be predominantly furry in nature, whether that applies to the main character(s) or theme(s).
  • The reviews must be 750 words or less. Longer reviews will not be considered. The reviews must NOT spoil important plot points or details about the book. For example, you can introduce that Sally is the main character of a story and what her prime objective is (so long as that can be inferred by the blurb or the first few pages), but you can’t talk about the excellent plot twist where she’s actually a he and is really named Sam.
  • The reviews we are looking for will highlight the strengths of the story being reviewed. For this, we are asking that reviews be mostly (75% or more) positive. While we understand that some books do deserve a mostly negative review, and that all books have their flaws, we are trying to highlight the strengths within furry literature, not its weaknesses. Flaws can be touched upon in the reviews, but they should not be the main focus.
  • Reviews that have been posted elsewhere may be considered, but usually only as a last resort. We are looking for new reviews. Please note, though, that immediately after the issue containing your review is released, you may feel free to post the review elsewhere.

[/li]

[li]Articles on Writing/Blog Posts

  • [li]Those blog posts you see on the guild website? On [adjective][species]? On Dogpatch? Other furry websites? We’re looking for those as well. 1-2 of them per issue.
    The posts must be focused around writing/literature, and should relate to furry writing or the furry fandom in some significant way.[/li]
  • We will not take a duplicate topic within 12-months of the topic’s previous issue. For example, if in the January-March issue, we have an article about the need for more furry zines, we do not want another article about furry zines until at LEAST January-March the following year.
  • Posts must be under 1000 words. Longer articles will not be considered.

[/li]

[li]Advertisements

  • We are looking for three different sizes of advertisements. The prices and sizes are as followed [i](though please note that prices are likely to go up in future issue, if the zine grows in popularity):
    [list]
  • Full-page (8.5”x5.5”) - $20.00 each (2 per issue)
  • Half-page (4.25”x5.5”) - $10.00 each (4 per issue)
  • Quarter-page/banner (2.125”x5.5”) - $5.00 each (4 per issue)
    [/list]
  • The advertisement must be focused around furry literature in some way (though we WILL accept advertisements for conventions, so long as the focus is on the convention as the whole or the writer-track portion of the convention). We will also not accept more than one advertisement (regardless of size) for any particular item. However, different advertisements are allowed. For example, a furry publisher may have a full-page to advertise their publishing company, then one half and quarter page each to promote new books (each ad would need to promote a different book).
  • The ads must not be sexual in nature. For example, you may advertise an adult anthology as long as the cover is something you’d be comfortable showing to your relatives. Also, if your ARE advertising an adult anthology, you must indicate in the ad somewhere that the item is for a mature audience only.
  • Please note: If you’re the author of a book that is published by another company, please make sure that you have the rights, per your contract, to do any of your own marketing.

[/li]

[li]Miscellaneous Content

  • We are not limited to the previous four items here! We’re open to suggestions for new sections to add, such as writer interviews, ‘ask the editor’ segments, etc. If you have segment you would like to see in this zine, please reach out to our team!

[/li][/ul]

Submissions and Inquires

Please send submissions and inquiries to content[at]goalpublications[dot]com. Please format the subject of your email to say: “Inquiry – [Insert the subject of your inquiry]” or “Submission – [Type of submission] – [Name of story/subject of submission]”.
If your email is a submission, please make sure the body of the email includes: your name (legal name and preferred pen name (if different from your legal name)), a more detailed description of what you’re submitting, the number of words, a brief synopsis, and whether or not the item has been featured elsewhere (and if so, where).

All submissions should be formatted as followed:

[ul][li].doc or .rtf format[/li]
[li]12pt, Times New Roman font[/li]
[li]Single-spaced[/li][/ul]

Not following these guidelines will heavily hurt your chances of being accepted, so I’d advise that they are followed as close as feasibly possible.

Timeline

Submissions will open for the first time on September 15th, 2015, will close exactly one month before the release of the issue, and will re-open the day after an issue is released. A post will be made in this thread as a reminder of what is still open.

Pricing

While the final pricing is still in the works, we are pretty sure of prices going as followed:

  • Digital copy (will start as a PDF, and may have MOBI and EPUB options added at a later time) - $0.99 per issue

That’s about it. Simple questions may be posted in this thread, but for longer inquiries, please use the email address provided in the “Submissions and Inquires” section.

#2

As an aside: While the email is up and running, there is nothing on the website yet. I’ll make another post when that is up, and that’ll hopefully happen over the next couple of weeks.

#3

This could be awesome! thanks! I will try to get something ready to submit

#4

Are there, or will there be, any social sites where we can follow this at?
ie twitter/tumbler/pinterest/facebook/etc.

#5

Interesting. I look forward to seeing how this develops.

#6

There are not at the moment. It will have it’s own Twitter page once things get rolling, along with the website, but I can’t imagine much more than that.

#7

So the first window for submissions will be between Sept 15-Nov 15?

#8

This is amazing Sean :smiley: I don’t know if I’ll be able to submit anything for the first round, but I’ll happily advertise and purchase the first issue <3 Really looking forward to seeing how this turns out!

Also, are there going to be running themes for the stories/book reviews of each issue? Or are they going to be random, like Realms of Fantasy used to be?

#9

That is correct!

As far as the short story portion is concerned, we’re looking for the best of furry short fiction. That’s about as close to a theme as it will get.

#10

Definitely looking forward to this :smiley:

#11

This sounds interesting and I’ll look forward to reading it.

Are you the only person working on this or do you have some assistance? A quarterly zine is a ton of work and the biggest challenges are going to be finding enough content to fill it and the time to do the layout.

To that end, I’d like to suggest that you team up with others who might have complimentary skills. I’d love to see you be the driver of getting all the material together with Chipotle’s typography skills, for example.

My reason for suggesting this is the concern that in some cases in our community we have several instances of groups who want to do one better then we end up with multiple attempts which don’t really blossom. An example is the art sites. Everyone wants to take down FA so there have been many sites which started up, went nowhere and shut down. Even now Weasyl and InkBunny struggle for relevance.

I’d also recommend the Alasso, Lightspeed Mag, Apex, etc model of offering the zine for free on the web and having it for sale in other formats for those who like what they see and choose to support. You’ll get a greater audience to shine a spotlight on the best of furry writing and if popular enough then maybe enough people will choose to support.

Just my two cents. It’s an exciting prospect!

#12

At the moment, I am the only person working on this. I’m not terribly worried about the layout challenges at this stage, as I do work on minor layout items at my other jobs. I certainly wouldn’t go looking to tackle a full-length novel, but as far as a 30-or-so-page webzine is considered, I should be able to get the typography done without a terrible about of trouble. I would not be opposed to assistance with this venture, however!

The concern over content is always something that lingers, and something we won’t know until things get going. Part of the thought process of revealing the project now rather than closer to the start of opening submissions is to get this idea in the heads of authors so that they can get some ideas now. If I end up with a solid number of submissions over the first few issues, that’ll be my sign that this is a worthy project that is worth continuing. If the idea doesn’t catch on and I end up lacking in submission, then this will only last a few issues. I’m sure hoping for the more positive of these outcomes, but I’m prepared for the negatives.

My mind has been back and forth on the payment model ever since I initially decided I’d like to do a zine of some sort. My original original idea was essentially to have a zine consisting of mostly reprints and having the finished product be free, though that would have meant that the writers were not being paid, an idea that went over about as well as cooking a meal in a foil pan in the microwave. Sparks flew. If I’m going to be paying writers for content, which I do agree is the route that should be taken, there should probably be some money paid for my hard work as well. My thought is this: it’s $0.99. The public can give up four McDonald’s hash browns a year for a furry lit zine.

Thanks for the input, and I’m glad you’re excited!

#13

So rigid.

#14

For those that didn’t see:

GoAL Publications has a twitter: @goalpublication

The website is up (though still heavily under construction): www.goalpublications.com

And remember, less than a month until submissions open!

#15

Two days until submissions open!

#16

It’s a couple of hours early, but I am officially announcing that submissions for GoAL are open! Again, for submission guidelines, see the first post of this thread or visit http://www.goalpublications.com/submission-guidelines.html

#17

Story submitted!
Knowing your track record, I expect my rejection letter before I awaken in the morn. :slight_smile:

#18

This time, unless I’m definitely rejecting a story, judgments will be withheld until after the deadline.

And I’m not looking at anything until at least next week =)

#19

Mine’s in too.
<sits in a chair for the next week, nervously chewing fingernails>

#20

Are you still in need of reviews?