Statement of Purpose

Weird Little Worlds Press is dedicated to creating a more equanimous, thoughtful, kind, and inclusive world through fiction.

What We Publish

Great adventure, terrifying monsters, science that boggles the mind, and fantastical worlds we can’t help but fall in love with.

When reading, we are looking for things that uplift, edify, reveal eternal truths, are spiritually resonant, and leave the reader motivated to action, thought, and change…or are just plain fun.

Adventure: We love fun, family-friendly adventures like The Princess Bride, Adventures in Babysitting, Goonies or Love and Monsters. But we also love gripping nonfiction adventures like 127 Hours, The Perfect Storm, and Into the Wild. In any case, your adventure story should make us care about the characters, feel the exhilaration of their challenges, and resolve in a satisfying conclusion.

Science Fiction: Whether your science fiction is hard or soft, we are excited to travel to new worlds with you and learn about the concepts, technology, and cultures of the past, present, and future. Some of our favorite scifi includes This Is How You Lose the Time War (Amal El-Mohtar, Max Gladstone), How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe (Charles Yu), Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card), Stories of Your Life, and Other Tales (Ted Chiang), and Dark Matter (Blake Crouch).

Fantasy: Great fantasy is all about creating a world and magic system that is believable and compelling. We love fantasy that is all-inclusive, moves quick, and focuses on new perspectives. Some of our favorite fantasy includes long series like Dune (Frank Herbert), The Belgariad (David Eddings), The Mistborn Saga (Brandon Sanderson), though we tend towards acquiring singular fantasy novels like The Night Circus (Erin Morgenstern), American Gods (Neil Gaiman), Watership Down (Richard Adams) and The Book of Lost Things (John Connelly).

Horror: We have a special love of horror, and are always looking for fresh voices and innovative stories. While we especially love horror short fiction like In That Endlessness, Our End (Gemma Files) and Out of Water (Sarah Read), we are looking to acquire novels as well. Some great books that we wish we had published include Through the Woods (Emily Carroll), Needful Things (Stephen King), The Girl with All the Gifts (M. R. Carey), and White is For Witching (Helen Oyeyemi).

What We Don’t Publish

Weird Little Worlds Press is a PG-13 press for Horror, Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Adventure (fiction and nonfiction). We do not publish gratuitous violence, graphic sexuality, excessive profanity, or abuse. We also avoid unnecessary gun violence in our publications.

We don’t believe that all good stories have happy endings. Still, we are not a nihilist press looking to identify the mean, gritty realities of the world and leave readers feeling hopeless.

Our purpose is to bring hope, shine light, and teach new ways to learn and love.

What We Pay

We believe that authors, illustrators, and designers should have a fair compensation for their work. Authors who become part of the Weird Little Worlds Press family have fair, standard contracts offered that respect their work and career goals.

That being said, we are not a conglomerate. We are a small group of dedicated readers and writers who simply want to put great work into the world. Our standard pay for short stories is .03 per word for digital-only publications and .05 per word for publications in our anthologies. Authors and novelists usually see a contract that offers a small advance in addition to an above-average percentage of royalties, after production costs have been met.

What We Do

When an author works with Weird Little Worlds Press, we put our marketing, promotion, and network at your service. Our goal is to make you money and to help your career advance. That may include social media advertising, website services, promotional tour, public speaking and signing events.

Are you ready to submit? See open projects here.