All My Relations Submission Guidelines

All My Relations Volume 8 is an art and lit, online and printed magazine, exploring the theme of “honoring our lost.” This volume is open to racially and ethnically marginalized, gender variant, and disabled creatives only. Own voices only, please.

Each of our journeys through loss is individual, but we don’t need to experience that journey alone. The acts of storytelling and story receiving create a communal experience and acts a catalyst for us to heal together.
Chris Talbot-Heindl

We are not looking for graphic or traumatic stories or dark fictional pieces written for shock value. We do not require that you center your or your relations’ traumas. And we are not interested in the single story of harm and suffering.

We are looking for honest pieces honoring your lost loved ones, commemorating memories and imaginations of ancestors you never met, explaining rituals and coping mechanisms, and envisioning a future where we accept and honor death rather than fear it. We are looking for pieces that honor your experience, honor your journey, honor your imaginations, and/or aid in communal healing.

We have a set of guidelines for what we will or will not read or publish for the emotional well-being of our readers (internally and externally). Please review those guidelines (below) and only send us authentic, own voices (if applicable) pieces that follow them. (The principle of own voices means that pieces that refer to marginalized groups and their experiences are created by people who share that identity. Pieces that follow the principle of own voices reflect the contributors’ own lived experiences and perspectives. Proximity to people with a lived experience is not a proxy for having that lived experience and will not be considered adhering to the own voices guideline.)

We do not accept pieces that use AI content creation, including ChatGPT. AI content is plagiarism, even though the systems have been formulated to modify the end result from the stolen materials just enough to be indetectable and circumvent copyright laws. AI copies existing works by existing creatives without their knowledge or consent. It is an inappropriate and inequitable tool for content submitted to All My Relations, especially as, at this time, the person using it can’t track down and fairly compensate the original creators for their work.

We are committed to editing with an equity lens, ensuring any edits are for clarity and not stylistic in nature. We are committed to never alter a writing style, the intention of a piece, or change the voice in any way. If we ever fail or come up short in this attempt, please do let us know.

We are free to submit to and free to read. We will accept one written piece and/or piece of artwork per person.

Submissions are open and will close when we have reached 100 pages of content or January 5, whichever comes first. To submit, fill out our submission form (one piece per entry in the form). Be sure to read all of our guidelines below before submitting.

Because our issues often deal with mature topics, our publication is open to creatives aged 16+ only.

Volume 1 explored the theme of familial (blood, adopted, affirming, community, or other “family”) loss or ancestry. Volume 2 explored the themes of colonization and decolonization. Volume 3 explored the theme of belonging. Volume 4 explored the themes of disability and accessibility. Volume 5 explored the theme of overcoming. Volume 6 explored the theme of resistance. Volume 7 explored the theme of rest. Read all the past volumes here.

The Editor

Who will be reviewing your work:

Chris Talbot-Heindl

Chris wearing kabuki-style red eye makeup and draped in a rainbow colored sequin blanket

Chris Talbot-Heindl (they/them) is a neurodivergent, trans nonbinary, queer, mixed-race artist and writer who has been writing mostly creative nonfiction and creating educomics for nearly 20 years although their favorite media to consume is fiction.

They are the co-creator and editor of The B’K, the creator and editor of All My Relations, and the editor of the Community-Centric Fundraising Hub.

They are currently working on a nonfiction book, Why must the white cis nonprofit workers angry react to all my posts? A compilation of essays, posts, and thoughts by a queer, trans, mixed-race professional surviving predominantly white cisgender heterosexual institutions.

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Requirements for Submissions

What we expect from submissions:

We expect submissions to be on the theme of overcoming and submitted by BIPOC, gender variant, and/or disabled creatives only.

We require written submissions to be under 5,000 words for fiction and nonfiction and under 5 pages for poetry, submitted in a Word Document or text file. PDFs will not be considered and will be rejected outright. Submissions must be in English as, unfortunately, that is the only language we can read. Do feel free to add words in a language other than English and we will consult Google or other resources, but the submission must be primarily in English.

We require that image submissions be sent at least 300 dpi and at least 3 inches by 3 inches. To be considered for cover art, the image must be at least either 11.25 inches tall or 8.65 inches wide. We do not accept AI-generated work as it doesn’t fit in our definition of own voices. By submitting your work, you confirm that the artwork is yours and yours alone, does not make use of images that are not your own (or if you do use images that are not your own, they are royalty-free and do not constitute the bulk of the submission), and was not AI-generated.

We will accept simultaneous submissions. Please let us know if it is a simultaneous submission (in the “Anything you want our editors to know about your piece” section of the form) and let us know as soon as you do if it has been accepted elsewhere and if you have permissions for it to appear as a reprint in this publication.

Our form requires the following information: your name as you’d like it to appear, the name of the piece as you’d like it to appear, trigger warnings if necessary, and answers to our identity questions.

We aim to have a diverse publication from a diverse set of voices. In order to make sure we do that, we need to know who you are. We will not deny someone based on identity unless it is deemed that the submission becomes inappropriate or appropriation due to the submitter’s identity. Things that we would consider inappropriate or appropriation would include writing about what it’s like to be part of a historically marginalized community you do not belong to. We encourage people outside of the community to include people from historically marginalized communities, but we won’t publish pieces that explain what it’s like to be part of those communities. We value inclusivity and believe the only way to do it right is with #OwnVoices.

We don’t want to read something that might be triggering without being in the right head space. We would hate to deny something because it caught us off guard at a bad time. If appropriate, please include a trigger warning. Before you submit, make sure that it will not violate our submission guidelines (see the full list below).

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Safety

Recently, there’s been a few people in the lit community who have been exposed as predators and abusers. We want our publication to be a safe space:

If you are a survivor and we have published the work of someone who has harmed you, please let us know who and what would feel like a just response to you. We’ve created a report form (with suggested actions) if you do not feel comfortable reaching out via email.

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What You Can Expect From Us

Rights, publication, copies, and payment information:

You retain the rights to your pieces after publication in our zine. We encourage you to submit your piece to other publications after it has appeared in ours (if their submissions allow it), we just ask that you acknowledge that it was previously published in ours first. We fully accept pieces that have been published elsewhere (if their submissions allow it) and will be happy to acknowledge that it was published elsewhere first. We want to get your creations in front of as many people as possible and are happy to do it!

Once the piece has been published, it is done. If we made a typo, we’d be happy to fix it, but we will not pull the piece or make any large edits. You have until the piece goes to print to make any changes to the piece. If there are large changes that change the tone, feeling, or reading of the piece, it will have to go back to our readers and may not be accepted with the changes.

Submitter copies. We can’t afford to send submitter copies. We beta tested it, and would have lost our shirts if it hadn’t been for a last-minute angel investor. We will send a PDF of the issue to any submitter who wants one so they can get it printed and we offer copies to our submitters at cost (estimated around $6-8 per issue, depending largely on the number of color pages and how many copies).

Who and how we pay. We wish we could pay everyone for their work, but we don’t make enough cash for that to be a possibility at this time. So, we will pay a modest amount ($10) for unpublished written works and any artworks through PayPal or Venmo to our racially or ethnically marginalized submitters, gender variant (agender/greygender, bigender/polygender, intergender/intersex, nonbinary/gender non-conforming, transgender) submitters, and disabled submitters. We pay a bonus to our cover artist (provided they are racially or ethnically marginalized, gender variant, or disabled), who will receive $50.

Why these creatives specifically? Because these creatives are the least likely to be paid for their published works or equitably paid in their day jobs. Our publication has committed to prioritizing traditionally marginalized creators, and this is another way we can do that.

Thanks to a suggestion from Zoa Coudret, we will also be posting peoples’ PayPal, Cash App, Venmo, Ko-fi, or another payment platform so that readers can tip our creatives as well.

I apologize to anyone who came to us thinking we paid “Semi-Pro” rates due to the Duotrope listing. We asked them to change it to “Token Payment,” but, unfortunately, they said that in some circumstances (pieces that are 1,000 words or less) our $10 token payment would be considered “Semi-Pro.” While we wish we could pay “Semi-Pro” rates as listed on their definitions page, we make these payments out of our own pockets and can’t afford those rates. We apologize for any confusion or inconvenience.

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Things that will be rejected outright and could get you temporarily or permanently banned from All My Relations and The B’K:

If your submission violates any of the guidelines below, you will be informed and temporarily banned from submitting to any Talbot-Heindl publication for one month’s time. A rejection for violating a guideline is not the start of an argument. You have submitted to our publication, so follow our rules.

If it is a flagrant violation or you argue with us or respond aggressively to a rejection for any reason, you will be permanently banned.

Likewise, even if your submissions to us are not problematic, but we are informed of problematic behavior outside of our publication against people from marginalized communities and can verify it, you will not be welcome to our publication and we reserve the right to remove your work from past issues.

Here is our list of violations:

The piece implicates you in a crime.
The piece is partially or fully plagiarized. This includes work that is AI-generated (AI is plagiarism — it copies existing works from existing creatives without their permission.) or the majority/focus of the piece makes use of images that were not created by you (examples: photographs of murals — yes, you took the photograph, but the focus is on someone else’s mural; collages where the collage pieces have not been radically altered and are therefore someone else’s work).
The piece uses fridging of marginalized people or children (the trope where a marginalized person is injured, killed, or demoralized in some way to move a privileged person’s story or character development forward).
The piece reduces people from marginalized genders or races to body parts, objects, or in another way dehumanizes them.
The piece’s main focus is sexual attraction or exploitation.
The piece is erotica or is sexually explicit.
The piece sexualizes a child. This means anyone under 18 years old, no matter what.
The piece glorifies or sexualizes violence against marginalized genders.
The piece mentions or implies molestation, sexual assault, or r*pe. There is NO wiggle room on this. Our editor is a survivor and will not subject themself to the pain of reading this. Any violation of this guideline will result in an instant permanent ban from our publication. The trauma is too great and therapy is too expensive to deal with this.
The piece includes content or slurs that could be considered racist, xenophobic, queerphobic, transphobic, sexist, misogynistic, fetishist, antisemitic, Islamophobic, ableist, audistic, or in any other way offensive to a protected class or minority. Your piece will be rejected unless it is made clear within the piece or in an artist statement at the end that the behavior/language is unacceptable, proper content warnings are provided, and the word is in some way censored in the piece (vowels replaced with * as an example we’ve accepted). While I understand that some people are reclaiming words that have been used to disparage people that share an identity, not all our readers from that identity will be reclaiming that word and we need to think of their well-being as well.