Writing Guidelines

Overdue Karma wants you!  We are now accepting submissions.

Who We Are:
Overdue Karma is a monthly e-zine that publishes original, funny, and thought-provoking materiel.  Our aim is to entertain and enlighten our readers, with articles ranging from light-hearted anecdotes to serious political pieces.  Read more at our About Us page.

What We Are Looking For:
Submissions should be between 500 and 2000 words.  Keep in mind that if your submission is too long, we won't even read it all.  Our editors get bored quickly, so keep it witty and entertaining (and brief, is possible).  We accept fiction, but we prefer non-fiction.  Fictional pieces, in addition to having a plot, should have relevance to the world today.  We are not looking for "Lord of the Rings" style short-stories.  For all pieces, humor is a must.  Morals or lessons are optional.  Politically oriented pieces will be accepted, but you must have evidence (and references) to back up your argument.  Here are some of the Editors' favorite pieces:
Personal Anecdote: The Science of Spit;
Travel: Grease Frightening; A Very Long Night in Terminal B;
Political: Husky Business: Ethanol; Kahlua and the Konstitution

Formatting:
We prefer to receive submissions as text in the body of an e-mail, but we will also except documents of the .doc, .txt, or .rtf varieties.  If you must use Microsoft Word, please for the love of all that is good, turn off auto-quotes.  The paragraph formatting is not mandatory, but our editors would be eternally grateful if you could format your submission as follow:  Two carriage-returns and no-tabs for each new paragraph, and two spaces after each period.

What You Can Submit:
We will accept previously published materiel, and simultaneous submissions, but we prefer to publish original works.

Terms:
You agree that you are the owner of any and all submitted work, or that you have permission from the owner to submit it.
You retain ownership of submitted work, and all rights.
You grant Overdue Karma the rights to publish your submission online (within our domain name, overduekarma.com) and in print.
We reserve the right to correct typos and grammar in your submission.  We may also change the title.

Compensation:
While we do not offer monetary compensation, you will gain eternal fame and pride from being published in ODK. We can offer you advertising space on your own articles and in our mailing list (which currently has just under 500 subscribers), where you can advertise your books, websites, or anything else. Also, if you submit quality work on a regular basis, we may offer you a weekly column, which is a paying position.

What To Do:
Send submissions -- following the guidelines above -- to Editor@overduekarma.com with the subject line "Submission: 'title of piece'".  You may include credentials, a nice introduction, and compliments to the editors, but in the end we are just looking for good writing.