Guidelines
We are looking for creative work, but only good creative work. Give us God, give us man, give us people & make us laugh. If you can make us cry, do so, if you want to lament loss of pets & family, do not. We enjoy pleasant nonsense & the deeply profound, the sharp little crack of things we don't speak of in polite company. We want to feel, & we want to want, & we don't want Cheap Trick jokes inserted here, unless they are awesome. We are strict & unbiased; aesthetic & craft are Queen; we want to read a good piece as much as our readers, so write one before submitting.
Wishful future citizens of Ampersand City may find it helpful to peruse a copy. For the paltry sum of $10 (which is, actually, only a Starbucks cappuccino and a pack of cigarettes), an example of the fine work accepted by our genius editorial staff can be purchased in our store.
We read submissions all week, with open minds & eager taste. We will be prompt in responding with the disposition of your piece, but give us a couple months of procrastination time and a lunch buffer. We absolutely do not, under any circumstances, want paper submissions. Only send paper submissions if you enjoy wasting stamps and killing trees.
Rejection should not be taken personally, only because we don't know you, & therefore cannot judge you personally. Get to know us before submitting if you wish to take rejection as personal bias.
The (&) does not enjoy fluffy and cute. Unless it is kittens. Do not send us kittens.
Also do not send material espousing or attempting to confirm your particular spiritual beliefs. The (&) holds all religions in equal contempt. There are no churches in Ampersand City.
You will not be paid, because we are not paid. We have little funding, & we promise we are poorer than you. Do not compete with our poverty. We will take this personally.
Bribery in the form of beer is acceptable, & bribery in the form of coffee is encouraged.
Fiction submissions should be lined up in single file, like frightened little children awaiting the lap of Santa Clause, attached in a .doc file or other widely readable format. Fiction submissions should have no discernible genre. While the fiction editor enjoys writing that plays with form & conventions, and is eagerly awaiting writing that sparkles with surprise, it is widely known that each time a vampire story is written, somewhere an orphan dies. Shame on you.
Note: We are up to our ears in poetry, so won't be reading new poetry submissions for awhile. Follow us on Facebook or subscribe to that newsletter to find out when we're open again.
Nonfiction submissions should not be terrible. They should also be interesting. If you want to tell us about a rewarding personal experience, do not. That is why god invented friends.
The (&) is always open for submissions of cover art, so long as the piece is some representation of the (&) character. Be imaginative, be creative. Surprise us. We are still waiting for a variation of this.
Submit your submission through
Submishmash
Submissions sent to the editor's email will be dispatched, execution style, with one merciless "delete" to the forehead. Next of kin will not be notified.
We will not sell or give your email away. We will, however, email you semi-daily updates on our monumental successes, photos of our children, and periodic musings on the psychological state of our dogs.
The (&) claims First North American Serial rights. We generally do not republish material, unless it is awesome. Blogs are fine, little bitty college-oriented literary reviews nobody reads are fine. All rights revert to the author upon publication, but The (&) reserves the right to publish content online, in future anthologies, and for inscriptions on monuments when domination of the world is achieved. 
