Submissions

To submit, please email us at submissions@hopespringscreative.com‍ ‍with the following:

  • A query letter (please include your author bio within the query)

  • The first 30 pages of your manuscript

Please note: We do not require synopses.

We look forward to reading your submission!

What you can expect

We aim to respond to every submission as our time allows, but please feel free to nudge us if you don’t hear back from us in 12 weeks.

All submissions will receive one of the following responses:

  • Rejection

  • Revise and resubmit

  • Request for additional time

  • Request for additional materials

Guidelines

Our Manuscript Wish List

We’re looking for Adult and YA speculative fiction that engages with progressive ideas in whatever way the author chooses to explore them. We’d love to see stories that explore or center diversity, social justice, and feminism, as well as community, solidarity, or empathy. We want diverse casts of characters. Queernorm worlds are great. Love, acceptance, and growth are always welcome.

Send us your books that land anywhere along the speculative spectrum, from cozy fantasy to grimdark, urban fantasy to magical realism, space opera to cyberpunk. Genre-bending is great, as well! As long as there is some speculative element, we want to read it.

Hope Springs Creative is open to everyone. Authors from marginalized and underrepresented communities are encouraged to submit.

Some books we love:

  • The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune

  • What Fury Brings by Tricia Levenseller

  • The Light Pirate by Lily Brooks-Dalton

  • The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna

  • The Everlasting by Alix E. Harrow

  • The Floating World by Axie Oh

  • Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse

  • Little Thieves by Margaret Owen

  • Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler

  • Sour Cherry by Natalia Theodoridou

  • Ammonite by Nicola Griffith

  • Butcher of the Forest by Premee Mohamed

  • A Stranger in Olondria by Sofia Samatar

  • The River Has Roots by Amal El-Mohtar

  • Gods of Jade and Shadow by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

  • The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo

  • The Book Eaters by Sunyi Dean

  • Only a Monster by Vanessa Len

.

A Note on AI and Authorship

At Hope Springs Creative, we believe stories are made by people.

We do not accept manuscripts that are written, edited, or revised substantially by generative artificial intelligence.*

While artificial intelligence may appear within the worlds we publish, it does not belong in the role of author.

*You can use spell check, but that’s about it.