Writing Opportunities

I've scoured the web and hard copy editions in the UK and elsewhere to find writing prospects so you don't have to do any of the hard work. Check out these writing opportunities I've found for you. Subscribe to this blog to keep updated with this page. I'll be adding new writing/publishing opportunities every 2 months or so. 


Keep in mind that most of these prospects may be tiny, one-off writing jobs, but each small break is a chance to get your foot on the ladder. Each piece accepted is another chance to add 'published' work on your CV.

The writing opportunities below are grouped by countries, but you can email submissions to any of them regardless of where you live.

WRITING OPPORTUNITIES IN THE UK

PAID
Reader's Digest
Pays £100.00
For - short stories, jokes, anecdotes, It's Your Time You're Wasting, Laughter Is The Best Medicine, My Story etc.
email; excerpts@readersdigest.co.uk
Or post
Excerpts, Reader's Digest, 11 Westferry Circus, Canary Wharf, London, E14 4HE
Pays £200.00 for cartoons with captions
email: captions@readersdigest.co.uk
Or post 'Captions' to the above address.
The reader's digest also pays for letters. I've been paid for letters by them in the past.

The New Writer
http://www.thenewwriter.com/guidelines.htm
Pays for articles, features, short stories and poetry.

Knit Today
http://www.originpublishing.com/vacancylist.asp
A monthly magazine which is interested in work from freelance writers. If you can write about, create, or instruct in knitting and crochet, they want to hear from you. Great rates of pay: £250.00 for 1,500 words article with pictures.

Kiki Magazine
http://www.kikimag.com/submit/submitWriting.php
This is another craft magazine site that pays well for submissions. Approach them with your ideas.

Heat Magazine
Heat magazine pays £200.00 for unposed snapshots of readers with celebrities. Text your picture to snapped pictures 0784 350 0911. Or email them to (write 'heat snapped' in your subject line) snapped@heatmag.com with your name, address and daytime telephone number.

Full House
Earn £100.00 for your holiday stories. Send your story and photos to: features@fullhousemagazine.co.uk 

Smallholder
If you write about farming, agriculture or have a smallholding, you can submit work to Smallholder. You will be paid extra for pictures or for technical livestock-type articles. Contact them first for details of submission. 

Your Dog
A monthly magazine covering topics about caring for dogs. Send queries first if you have stories or articles you want to share. Payment is negotiable. 


New Scientist
This is a weekly magazine covering up-to-date science and technological developments. You can check out their guide for freelancers here: They pay well, but have strict guidelines on the linked page. I suggest you go through this with a fine toothed comb to get them to accept your idea.

Pilot
Are you interested in aviation? Do you have interesting information (or a travel story) to share in this niche? Pilot is a monthly aviation magazine which welcomes contributions from freelance writers. They pay about £300.00 for a travel story and you can expect to be paid for pictures too. Here are the details

UNPAID WRITING OPPORTUNITIES

The London Magazine
http://www.thelondonmagazine.net/default.aspx

Rough Guide To Presentation
Short stories, features, memoirs, critical articles No more than 2,500 words
Reviews Generally no longer than 1,800 words
Poetry No longer than 40 lines

Short stories, features, memoirs, critical articles No more than 2,500 words
Reviews Generally no longer than 1,800 words
Poetry No longer than 40 lines
Form of submission
They accept ideas for art reviews, memoir pieces, fiction, poetry and poetry reviews. They prefer e-mail, with the poems or stories to be sent in the body of the email, as well as in attachment.
Send submissions to admin@thelondonmagazine.net.  
All postal submissions must be accompanied by a stamped and addressed envelope.
The London Magazine, Flat 5, 11 Queen's Gate, London, SW7 5EL.


Pick Me Up Magazine
http://www.pickmeupmagazine.co.uk/tip_offs/
Pays £25.00 for every tip, hint, how-to you send in.

WRITING OPPORTUNITIES ELSEWHERE

PAID WRITING OPPORTUNITIES

Wet Ink (Australia)
http://www.wetink.com.au/about.htm
They accept fiction, poetry and creative non-fiction, interviews, photography, book reviews and more, from new and established authors.
They publish:
• short fiction (including genre fiction)
• creative non-fiction
• poetry
• memoir
• essays
• opinion pieces

Australia and New Zealand

They accept informative articles for travellers and migrants. Payment is £180.00 per 1,000 words.

Contact: leanne.voisey@edpltd.co.uk

Women On Writing (USA)
http://www.wow-womenonwriting.com/contact.php
WOW! Writer's Guidelines
WOW! welcomes queries and submissions from its readers. Remember each issue focuses on Women, Writing and the monthly Theme.
Columns, Word Counts and Pay Rates:
Twenty Questions: $50
How 2 (1,500 - 2,000 Words): $75
Inspiration (1,500 - 2,000 Words): $75
Feature Interviews (up to 3,000 Words): $75
Feature Articles (up to 3,000 Words): $150

Apex (USA)
http://www.apexbookcompany.com/submissions/
A book company looking for dark/SF/fantasy/horror novels, short stories and poetry.
They pay a substantial advance and high royalty rates for novels. Best of all, they accept unsolicited material.

Blue Mountain Arts
http://www.sps.com/help/contact.html
Think you can write smart, funny, thoughtful greeting cards and get paid for them?

Poetry Magazine (USA)
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/submissions.html
They say on their website: 
'Payment is made on publication at the rate of $10.00 per line (with a minimum payment of $300), and $150 per page of prose, for first serial rights. All rights will revert to the author upon publication. Authors will also receive two contributor copies of the issue in which their work appears.'

Riddle Fence (Canada)
http://riddlefence.com/submissions/
Get paid for your poems.

Thriving Family (Canada + USA)
This is a bi-monthly magazine which focuses on the family. They invite writers to submit articles about parenting and marriage relationships. They pay well and have a good ethos. 
The website is here: http://go.family.org/thrivingfamily/

The PDF writers' guidelines document is here:
http://www.family.org/sharedassets/correspondence/pdfs/GeneralInformation/TF_Writers_Guidelines.pdf

Horizon Air Magazine (Canada and the USA)
http://www.horizonairmagazine.com/contributor/writers.php

Have a look at their writers' guidelines before sending anything in. This is a monthly in-flight magazine for travellers in parts of the U.S and Canada. They pay $100.00 for short news articles (200 to 500 words) and $450.00 for features of up to 2,500 words. 
They ask to see a sample of your writing work.

MAD (USA)
http://www.dccomics.com/mad/?action=submissions
Their writers' guidelines page (above) tells you everything you need to know about submitting to MAD. They're a comedy magazine and are actively looking for new writers for their writing pool. They pay $500.00 per page. 
The link above tells you in detail what kind of material they publish and gives you the email link to send them to. 

JQ Greetings (USA)
http://www.jqgreetings.com/artists.php
They pay for art and verse submissions. You can find the guidelines on their site. Payment is by negotiation. 

Poetry (USA)
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/submissions.html

This is a poetry magazine. You're able to sign up and create an account which allows you to track your submissions online. They pay $10.00 per line, ($150.00 per page) so not a bad investment for something you like doing. Their submissions' page is pretty comprehensive so read it thoroughly before submitting anything to them.

Cats and Kittens (USA)
http://www.petpublishing.com/catkit/
They accept submissions of educational and informative articles and stories about cats and how to care for them. They pay 10 cents per published word. Contact for details. 

Constant Content
Sell your original content on Constant Content. Get paid by PayPal. You need to read up their terms and conditions on the website to see if this is for you.

Lightspeed 
This is an online magazine which publishes science fiction. They mainly deal with fiction, but also publish a few non-fiction pieces every month. They pay very well at 5 cents a word (on acceptance). They accept pieces of up to 7,500 words! 
See the complete submission guidelines at this link.

The First Line (USA)
Another chance to be published in a American (hard copy) magazine. The First Line accepts short stories and poems. They pay $20.00 on publication and you can submit material by email. See their submissions page for full details.

Naval History Magazine
This is a monthly, American hard-copy magazine which accepts submissions from all over the world, based on naval and maritime history. If this is your speciality or if you know any stories related to this, you can submit your material to them. They also publish book reviews. Their payment (which is quite good) is tiered to suit your submission, so you'll have to look at their writers' page submissions guidelines to see the details.

If you have other paid writing opportunities you'd like me to add here, please send me a message or leave a comment below. Thank you.