Keep track of one less thing. Get monthly emails to get newly published pieces, upcoming event info., and miscellaneous Pool Party news and musings delivered right to your inbox.
Please read our submission guidelines below before sending your gripping work to:
Include a subject line that follows this format: [type] submission [date].
EX: Essay Submission 2.14.2025. Please confirm your submission has met the below requirements before sending.
Submit only previously unpublished work (this includes publishing online via social media, substack, etc.).
Send only one submission within a 90-day period.
Simultaneous submissions are totally fine, but please withdraw if you get accepted elsewhere. And if so, congrats!
Submissions should be no more than 2,500 words, and should be submitted as a Word Doc/Pages email attachment. No PDFs, please.
Submissions should be double-spaced, and your header info. should include your name, email, phone number, word count, title, and should include page numbers.
In body of email, please include a brief, casual cover letter, a bio, and a headshot. Having all this info. up front cuts down significantly on administrative time. If you don’t know who to address in the email, you can find the appropriate editor on our masthead page. Please do take the time to get our names right—it’s kind of bare minimum and our masthead is spare.
Do not submit anything generated by A.I. or edited using A.I. Although we know that writers and artists are doing interesting work that is in dialogue with A.I., we choose not to contribute to the ecologically disastrous impacts caused by utilizing this technology. We also feel strongly against publishing work containing crowdsourced language and phrases created by A.I. tools that have been ‘trained’ by subsuming existing authors’ and artists’ work without consent, credit, or compensation. Should we unwittingly publish work created using A.I., it will be removed, and the author will be banned from future submissions.
Once your work has been accepted, Pool Party reserves first publication rights which return to the author upon publication. We kindly ask that, should you reprint your work in future publications, you mention that it found its original home with Pool Party.
Submissions are and always will be free. Although no payment is provided for accepted works at this time, we hope to change that ASAP!
We aim to respond to submissions within a month but response times can vary. Please do not follow up unless 90 days have passed since you submitted.
Questions? Email [email protected]
Please send all submissions to [email protected] with a subject line that follows this format: Reading Submission [date].
Ex: Reading Submission 2.14.2025.
Please confirm your submission has met the below requirements before sending.
GUIDELINES
Ensure your submission fits into an upcoming theme. Near future themes include:
Excerpts from longer works and standalone pieces are all welcome!
In your email, please include a casual cover letter and short bio so we can get to know you. If you don’t know who to address, you can find the appropriate editor on our masthead page. Please do take the time to get our names right—it’s kind of bare minimum and our masthead is spare.
Attach something you’ve written that’s in the vein of our theme. It doesn’t have to be the exact piece(s) you would read at an event, but should reflect a similar tone, style, and topic.
Written submissions should be no more than 2500 words, and should be submitted as a Word Doc/Pages email attachment.
Submissions should be double-spaced, and your header info. should include your name, address, email, phone number, word count, and title.
Submissions should include page numbers.
Do not submit anything generated by A.I. or edited using A.I. Although we know that writers and artists are doing interesting work that is in dialogue with A.I., we choose not to contribute to the ecologically disastrous impacts caused by utilizing this technology. We also feel strongly against publishing work containing crowdsourced language and phrases created by A.I. tools that have been ‘trained’ by subsuming existing authors’ and artists’ work without consent, credit, or compensation. Should we unwittingly feature work created using A.I., the participant will be banned from future submissions to our series and journal.
If you’re a storyteller rather than a writer, please attach a video or audio recording of work like what you would be reading for us. And since you won’t be attaching a doc, please do include all the contact information mentioned above in the body of your email.
We aim to respond to submissions within a month but response times can vary. Please do not follow up unless 90 days have passed since you submitted.
Questions? Email [email protected]
If you would like us to review your book, exhibition, or creative project, please send a summary or exhibition statement to [email protected] for our consideration. Publishers can send ARC catalogues to this address as well.
To submit a pitch for a review or interview that you would like to write, please email your pitch to the above email.
GUIDELINES
Please send all submissions to [email protected] with a subject line that follows this format: Review (or Interview) Submission [date]. Ex: “Interview Submission 2.14.2025”
In the body of the email, please include summary of the book or art show you plan to review (or details about the thrust of the conversation in the case of an interview).
If you don’t know who to address in the email, you can find the appropriate editor on our masthead page. Please do take the time to get our names right—it’s kind of bare minimum and our masthead is spare.
Please include a bio for yourself and the person whose work you are covering along with links to both yours and their website and social accounts.
Attach something you’ve written that’s in the vein of your pitch.
Do not submit anything generated by A.I. or edited using A.I. Although we know that writers and artists are doing interesting work that is in dialogue with A.I., we choose not to contribute to the ecologically disastrous impacts caused by utilizing this technology. We also feel strongly against publishing work containing crowdsourced language and phrases created by A.I. tools that have been ‘trained’ by subsuming existing authors’ and artists’ work without consent, credit, or compensation. Should we unwittingly publish work created using A.I., it will be removed, and the author will be banned from future submissions.
We aim to respond to submissions within a month but response times can vary. Please do not follow up unless 90 days have passed since you submitted.
Questions? Email [email protected]
Pool Party is open for book submissions!!! We will have two reading periods and publish two books/year. The first reading period runs from now until December 15th, 2025.
Please read the below information, then send your gripping manuscript to [email protected]
Like our magazine, we are genre-agnostic, open to (and encouraging of) cross-genre hybrids and experimental forms. Most important to us is that even the most hilarious work interrogates something. For a sense of our aesthetic, take a look at a non-exhaustive list of some recent reads we love and would have loved to publish:
Girl on Girl, by Emily Costa
The Book of X, by Sara Rose Etter
Out There in the Dark, by Katherine Coldiron
Pathemata, by Maggie Nelson
Bad Foundations, by Brian Allen Carr
I’m a Fan, by Sheena Patel
The Burden of Joy, by Lexi Kent-Monning
Please send all manuscript submissions to [email protected] with a subject line that follows this format: [genre i.e. Novel, Memoir, Poetry Collection, Hybrid, etc.] Submission [date].
Ex: Novel Submission 2.14.2025.
Please submit only completed manuscripts—no samples, excerpts, or proposals.
Simultaneous submissions are totally fine, but please withdraw if you get accepted elsewhere (if so, congrats!).
Submissions should be submitted as a Word Doc/Pages email attachment–i.e., not a Google Drive link and not a PDF.
Submissions must be: double-spaced, include word count, title, page numbers, and should include your name, address, email, phone number. Add title and your name to a header which populates on every page.
Include a cover letter in the body of the email so we know who you are. If you don’t know who to address in the email, you can find the appropriate editor on our masthead page. Please do take the time to get our names right—it’s kind of bare minimum and our masthead is spare.
Do not submit anything generated by A.I. or edited using A.I. Although we know that writers and artists are doing interesting work that is in dialogue with A.I., we choose not to contribute to the ecologically disastrous impacts caused by utilizing this technology. We also feel strongly against publishing work containing crowdsourced language and phrases created by A.I. tools that have been ‘trained’ by subsuming existing authors’ and artists’ work without consent, credit, or compensation. Should we unwittingly agree to publish work created using A.I., we will cease publication plans and/or remove the book from our catalogue and marketing plans as well as ban the author will be banned from future submissions. And yes, this includes any pitch statements, as these are often used in the creation of book-jacket and promo material copy.
Ryan-Ashley (Anderson) Maloney – Managing Editor, Creative Director
Kevin Maloney – Assistant Editor
At Pool Party, we believe in full economic transparency for our authors. Too often, small/micro presses operate in the shadows. Author payments are infrequent and confusing. We aim to do the opposite. In addition to paying author royalties on a regular schedule, we will also provide a complete breakdown of the costs involved in producing and distributing our books, so our authors understand exactly how we calculate their royalty payment. We feel this is the bare minimum publishers owe their authors for entrusting them with their words.
Questions? Email [email protected]
Sign up for our newsletter and we’ll let you know as soon as our first call drops. Don’t worry, we will literally only email you when we have a rare event, when a call drops, and when new editions go live. And you can opt out any time.
