Submissions

Submission Guidelines

El Chapo Review never charges submission/reading fees.

From the third world to the first, the highest paying online literary journal on Earth.

Currently seeking: Fiction, Creative Nonfiction, Poetry

Deadline: March 15th, 2020

Payment: El Chapo will pay $100 per piece. Word limit is 1,000. So we always pay at least 10¢ per word. If your piece is five words, that is $20 per word. (We doubt we will publish something with only five words. Perhaps poetry. Probably not though.)

Content: Our name does not imply we want your pieces about drugs, cartels, kingpins, short people, nicknames, Mexico, et cetera. (We will publish that material if we love it though.) No reprints. We will read anything. Any genre for fiction: sci-fi, fantasy, crime, neo-noir, literary, historical, absurdist, surrealist, magic realism, romance, horror, mystery, bizarro, gonzo, fairy tale, et cetera. It makes no difference. We love great writing above all else. As Truman Capote said, “To me, the greatest pleasure of writing is not what it’s about, but the inner music that words make.”

Terms and Conditions: We pay via PayPal. (Perhaps Venmo soon.) Payment will be made within 90 days of acceptance. For poetry, please send no more than five poems. We will pay you $100 in total for poetry. So $100 whether we accept one poem or five. For fiction, creative nonfiction, and essays: only one submission at a time. We purchase first North American serial rights and exclusive online publishing rights for six months. All other rights are reserved by the author. If you choose to re-publish your piece, we would appreciate acknowledgment as the first market to publish your work. Simultaneous submissions are fine, but please withdraw your piece immediately if accepted elsewhere so we can remove it from our queue. No need to include a bio, but you can (if you prefer). We will request your bio upon acceptance. We do everything to reply within two months…we aim for three weeks. We will probably publish all our work in a print anthology (when we have enough issues). We will ask for your permission first. Please don’t fret this fledgling site. We own the domain for elchaporeview.com, so will be linking there soon. A few people had a conniption when they saw this site. They wanted the site to look perfect instead of using our limited funds to pay writers. Some said it was a hoax. As if we are a Nigerian prince. We publish great work. We’re paying professional rates in excess. We shall pay authors at least $300,000. We shall NEVER charge submission fees. We shall neither crowdfund, nor ask for funds. Many online literary journals go defunct. Even great ones. Some of the best vanished with no archives. WordPress sites (though pathetic) almost never die. 

Submit: submissionselchaporeview@gmail.com

Please include in subject line what you are submitting: Fiction, Creative Nonfiction, Poetry, Essay. Attach as an MS Word file or paste in the body of your email. Whatever floats your boat.