Guidelines
Shred is currently closed to all types of submissions.
Mystery, crime, suspense fiction. This includes all the various subgenres as well as cross-genre stories.
Publishing schedule: A new original story will be published every other week. Something else may be published during the off week.
Payment is $10 US for original short fiction. Payment for flash stories and reprints is $5 US. Payment for serials will vary, but will most likely hover in the $30 - $50 range.
PayPal preferred, but personal checks or other arrangements can be made. Shred buys exclusive first worldwide electronic rights for three months. After that, stories remain archived on the site, but may be removed at the editor’s discretion or the author’s request.
Original short fiction: 1,000 to 22,000 words; 2,000 to 6,000 is the ideal range.
Flash fiction: Under 1,000 words.
Serial fiction: Over 22,000 words, to run over the course of several weeks; I’ll also consider serializing pieces that don’t quite hit the 22,000 mark, if they lend themselves especially well.
Reprints: Any length; I am most interested in stories that originally appeared in print.
Special: Non-prose formats (comics, yes; scripts, yes; poetry, no; something else, possibly), stories written on a special theme, etc.
Electronic submissions only. RTF attachments preferred, DOC and TXT are also okay. No multiple or simultaneous submissions, please. (Unless I sit on a story for over three months; at that point, please feel free to send it elsewhere; and of course you can withdraw a submission at any time.) If submitting a reprint, please include information regarding the original publication.
E-mail submissions to editor@shredofevidence.com. The subject line must include the following text as appropriate, along with the story title: “Submission: Original”, “Submission: Flash”, “Submission: Serial”, “Submission: Reprint” or “Submission: Special”
If you wish to send a query regarding story status or withdraw a submitted story, include “Shred Query” in the subject line of your e-mail. If you are a Shred author with an e-mail about webzine business, include “Shred Contributors” in the subject line.
My e-mail filters are based upon subject line content. I skim through my inbox before consigning messages to the spam filter, but human errors happen so I urge you to use the schemes above.