How Can We Help?
All submissions should be sent through the submissions engine.
Your piece should be sent as an attached RTF file
Do:
- use a fixed width font (ie Courier New)
- size 12.indent the first line of each paragraph by 1cm
- double-space lines (except in poetry)
- indicate section breaks with a centered * * *
- use Australian spelling (ie “s” instead of “z”)
- use italics for character thoughts.
Do NOT:
- centre justify your paragraphs
- use strange fonts
- include your name (including pen-name) in the document header
- put anything in the document footer.
You CAN:
- add page numbers.
Why do we do things this way?
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- The editorial team of ASM is scattered over most of Australia, and since nearly all our communications are electronic, printed submissions are less useful than they might otherwise be. While we will accept printed submissions for people who for some reason or another can’t manage email, it will get scanned into electronic format and emailed to the various readers and editors anyway. So sending electronically saves the editors a labour-intensive step and saves you postage.
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- The reason for an attached RTF rather than plain text is the submissions editor finds them easier to manipulate, and prefers to see the things like italics presented as the author intended, rather than the makeshifts required by plain text.
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- All stories submitted go through an initial blind reading process. That means that the stories are sent to our panel of readers with no author information attached. This is why we want the author information in one place where it is easily removed.
- Since this is an Australian publication, we’d like all of our stories to be written with Aussie spelling for the sake of consistency.