JULY 2026: CULTS & TRUE BELIEVERS
Nonfiction Guidelines
Theme Overview
Essays examining why people believe, how groups capture minds, and what cult dynamics reveal about human psychology and social structures.
What We're Looking For
- Analysis of cult narratives in fiction, documentary, and memoir
- Essays on the psychology of high-control groups and charismatic authority
- Profiles of authors writing about cults, radicalization, or true belief
- The "cult" label: who gets it, who doesn't, and why it matters
- Deprogramming, recovery, and life after belief
- Corporate, political, or online spaces that exhibit cult dynamics
Strong Pitches Will
- Avoid both sensationalism and false equivalence
- Examine specific groups or texts rather than "cults in general"
- Grapple with why intelligent people join and stay
- Explore the line between devotion and delusion
We're Not Looking For
- "Why people join cults" explainers that stay surface-level
- Pieces that treat all intense group loyalty as equivalent to cults
- Survivor narratives without analytical framework
- Mockery that refuses to take belief seriously
Specs
- 1,500–3,000 words
- See main Submission Guidelines for formatting and process
- Subject line: FEATURE SUBMISSION – JULY – [Your Title]
AUGUST 2026: FORBIDDEN RELATIONSHIPS
Nonfiction Guidelines
Theme Overview
Essays exploring transgressive desire in fiction and culture—why forbidden love captivates us, what these narratives reveal about social boundaries, and how the "forbidden" shifts across time and place.
What We're Looking For
- Analysis of forbidden love narratives in literature and film
- Essays on how "taboo" is constructed and who benefits from the boundaries
- Profiles of authors who write transgressive romance or erotic fiction
- The evolution of what's "forbidden" (interracial, queer, interfaith—once scandalous, now mainstream)
- Power dynamics in fictional relationships and reader complicity
- The ethics of transgression in fiction (what should be off-limits, if anything?)
Strong Pitches Will
- Engage with specific texts rather than abstract discussions of "forbidden love"
- Examine why certain transgressions appeal to readers and others repel
- Grapple with the erotics of power imbalance without moralizing
- Connect fictional transgressions to real social structures
We're Not Looking For
- Romance genre surveys without critical edge
- Pieces that treat all taboo-breaking as equally subversive
- Moralistic hand-wringing about "problematic" fiction
- Essays that refuse to engage with why transgression is appealing
Specs
- 1,500–3,000 words
- See main Submission Guidelines for formatting and process
- Subject line: FEATURE SUBMISSION – AUGUST – [Your Title]