CRWROPPS Post: Orca
Beginning with our fourth issue (June, 2020), Orca will dedicate one issue per year to publishing Literary Speculative fiction.
Be imaginative. Be artful. Guidelines here: https://orcalit.com/literary-speculative-issue-guidelines/
Before you submit, it's important to understand what we mean by each of those terms.
Literary: A style of writing in which the focus is on language and character, and plot is often secondary. A literary story is about ideas. It has an overarching theme distinct from the narrative and a leitmotif running through it. It treats its characters as real human beings and not as props to move espouse an author's opinion or to simply move the plot forward. It approaches language as art: a literary writer pays attention to every sentence, every word.
Speculative: The term "speculative" has been employed by writers and editors to connote works from a variety of genres, such as science fiction, fantasy, horror, dystopian, space opera, and similar subjects. All of those genres are welcome, but for Orca we want submissions that adhere more closely to the original sense of the word, which is to consider what might be, instead of what is. Therefore speculative writing could concern an alternative political structure, an ecological future, certainly alternate history, and maybe even a romance. Think "Black Mirror." Think what if…
As we hope you can see, both definitions pay particular attention to the idea behind the story. Good literary speculative fiction has its basis in concepts that are larger (often much larger) than the story itself, and seeks to examine one aspect of it, and how that aspect affects the story's characters.
Important: We are not looking for writing that relies on traditional genre tropes. We do not consider that imaginative.
For examples of this type of writing see work by Ted Chiang, Kelly Link, Jorge Luis Borges, Ursula K. LeGuin, Julio Cortázar, and Margaret Atwood.
It's our hope that the short stories and flash fiction in our Lit-Spec issue will combine the best of both styles of writing.
Be imaginative. Be artful. Guidelines here: https://orcalit.com/literary-speculative-issue-guidelines/
Before you submit, it's important to understand what we mean by each of those terms.
Literary: A style of writing in which the focus is on language and character, and plot is often secondary. A literary story is about ideas. It has an overarching theme distinct from the narrative and a leitmotif running through it. It treats its characters as real human beings and not as props to move espouse an author's opinion or to simply move the plot forward. It approaches language as art: a literary writer pays attention to every sentence, every word.
Speculative: The term "speculative" has been employed by writers and editors to connote works from a variety of genres, such as science fiction, fantasy, horror, dystopian, space opera, and similar subjects. All of those genres are welcome, but for Orca we want submissions that adhere more closely to the original sense of the word, which is to consider what might be, instead of what is. Therefore speculative writing could concern an alternative political structure, an ecological future, certainly alternate history, and maybe even a romance. Think "Black Mirror." Think what if…
As we hope you can see, both definitions pay particular attention to the idea behind the story. Good literary speculative fiction has its basis in concepts that are larger (often much larger) than the story itself, and seeks to examine one aspect of it, and how that aspect affects the story's characters.
Important: We are not looking for writing that relies on traditional genre tropes. We do not consider that imaginative.
For examples of this type of writing see work by Ted Chiang, Kelly Link, Jorge Luis Borges, Ursula K. LeGuin, Julio Cortázar, and Margaret Atwood.
It's our hope that the short stories and flash fiction in our Lit-Spec issue will combine the best of both styles of writing.
Joe
Joe Ponepinto
Publisher, Orca, A Literary Journal
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