Sports are a huge part of the lives of those all around the world, whether playing, watching, or working for. Fans of sports teams are some of the most enthusiastic people you will find.
How different would it be to play these sports with claws, hooves, and heightened senses?
What we’re looking for:
[ul][li]Stories that highlight the aspects of a sport (we will only allow one story for each type of sport) that would be different with an anthropomorphic character. For example (to borrow from Kyell Gold’s OoP series): tackling rules would be a bit different for those with horns in American football. They would need to be capped off in order to not possibly skewer the ones they are tackling. For another example: pachyderms/bovines in boxing may need to wear thicker gloves, since several writers/artist place these characters with hand/hoof combinations. Hooves hurt quite a bit more than fists would.[/li]
[li]Adult and sexual themes are allowed, but no descriptive sex. (You can tell Johnny how good he looks in those tight shorts, but I don’t want to see what’s actually in there.) We will also say no if your story reads out like it may have had a sex scene at one time, but was removed to fit it into this anthology (a story that has all of the lead-up, but none of the sex). Blood and injuries are okay (these are sports, after all), but no descriptive gore. We don’t need to know the exact degree that a character’s shoulder was bent in from an injury.[/li]
[li]The definition of ‘sport’ is debatable. I’m pretty lenient with this. In my view, any game played competitively can be considered a sport. I’m going to exclude competitive video-game playing, though. Sorry guys. If you have a question about something you may consider to be a sport, send an email.[/li]
[li]The sports do not have to be real sports. If you can make up an awesome-sounding sport that would be realistic and fun in an anthropomorphic animal world, go for it. However, if you’re going to make up a sport, I want to be immersed in it.[/li][/ul]
Guidelines:
[ul][li]Stories can have a G – R rating. Anything PG and lower I ask not be TOO childish. It’s fine if you want it to be safe enough for you 10-year-old sibling to read, but make sure it’ll be enjoyable for adult readers too. Anything higher-rated probably has too much sex and/or gore for this anthology.[/li]
[li]We’re looking for a range of 5k-11k words. I feel that for a category such as this, a bit more word count is required than usual. If your story falls out of this range, please send an email before submitting.[/li]
[li]We’re asking for first rights on this anthology. However, we are not counting self-publishing. As long as the story is taken down once it is accepted, we will accept a story that has been posted online. The story must stay down for the duration of time that it is in circulation with the publisher (whether Jaffa Books and/or another publisher that may publish this anthology outside of Australia), which will most likely be for eighteen months once the anthology is released into publication. [/li]
[li]This is a furry anthology, and with what we’re looking for, a fair number of the characters presented must be anthros. Human characters are allowed, but the anthros and the world they live in must be the focus.[/li]
[li]We will accept no more than 2 stories per person. Collaberated stories count as one story for each person involved.[/ul]
Preferred formatting:
[ul][li].doc or .rtf file (nothing else)[/li]
[li]Include a header on the upper-right corner of the first page with your name, title, and email.[/li]
[li]Pages numbered (bottom left-hand corner, please)[/li]
[li]Times New Roman (or any basic font), 12pt, double-spaced[/li][/ul]
Submission details:
[ul][li]Please send your work to sports@anthroaquatic.com[/li]
[li]Please format your subject line as: Submission - - [/li]
[li]Please include a cover letter with the following details:
[list]
[li]Your name (real name and, if applicable, pen/furry name)[/li]
[li]Story title[/li]
[li]Word count[/li]
[li]Summary of the story (I want no more than 3 well-developed sentences). If you need more than that, there’s probably too much going on in your story to be a short story.[/li]
[li]Submissions were due by May 1st, 2015[/li][/list][/li]
[li]Payment for accepted stories will be at a 1/2 cent (USD) per word rate.[/li][/ul]
For updates, please follow AnthroAquatic on twitter (@AnthroAquatic)
Sports that have been taken and accepted:
[ul][li]Discus (Frisbee would be too close to this as well, and thus is also considered taken)[/li]
[li]Boxing[/li]
[li]Baseball[/li]
[li]Rodeo[/li]
[li]Ping-Pong[/li]
[li]Sumo Wrestling[/li]
[li]Parkour[/li]
[li]Basketball[/li]
[li]Hang Gliding[/li]
[li]Figure Skating[/li]
[li]Fencing[/li][/ul]
