We pay one dollar and one contributor copy for stories, art, and poems. Sometimes we publish more than one item per contributor per issue. The usual guideline is up to three poems, one poem and one story, or one poem or story and up to three pieces of art. For each additional item published we only pay one additional dollar (one contributor copy per contributor, regardless of how many items published). Mount Zion purchases print rights. We are also interested in reprinting previously solicited materials for which the author still has rights, and welcome simultaneous submissions.
All art and fiction submissions should adhere to our theme: Appalchian Horror and Fantasy. That said, a recent issue was about evenly divided between Appalachian themed stroies and other settings.
Fiction is our main interest here in Mount Zion and we like what we like. We tend to be very open-minded about what our definition of horror. Of course folks like Lovecraft, Poe, King, Campbell, Straub, and Barker come to mind, as well as the scary stories we heard as children. But we also like suspense stories, stories of an everyday horror--stories that are more about the dark side of the human soul than any supernatural threat. Which is the long way to say we have a broad definition of horror.
Modern Fantasy is even more difficult to nail down than horror. Charles DeLint has some great modern fantasy. One could argue that Barker is more fantasy than horror (Galilee would be an example). For a definition, we would say that it has fantastic elements which are integral to the story and has for its setting the modern world.
For more information email us at submit_AT_mountzionpress_DOT_com>