Writers Needed:

We publish essays, interviews, fiction, and poetry. We tend to favor personal writing, but we're also looking for thoughtful, well-written essays on political, cultural, and philosophical themes. Please, no journalistic features, academic works, or opinion pieces. Other than that, we're open to just about anything. Surprise us; we often don't know what we'll like until we read it.

We pay from $300 to $2,000 for essays and interviews, $300 to $1,500 for fiction, and $100 to $500 for poetry, the amount being determined by length and quality. We may pay less for very short works. We also give contributors a complimentary one-year subscription to The Sun. We purchase one-time rights. All other rights revert to the author upon publication.

We're willing to read previously published works, though for reprints we pay only half our usual fee. We discourage simultaneous submissions. We rarely run anything longer than seven thousand words; there's no minimum word length. Don't bother with a query letter; the subject matter isn't as important to us as what you do with it.

We try to respond within three to six months. With nearly a thousand submissions a month, however, our backlog of unread manuscripts is often substantial. Don’t let a longer wait surprise you.

Send Submissions To: Editorial Department The Sun 107 N. Roberson St. Chapel Hill, NC 27516

Submissions should be typed, double-spaced, and accompanied by a self-addressed, stamped envelope. (Poems may be single-spaced.) Your work will not be returned without sufficient postage, and we cannot respond unless a return envelope is provided. Do not send your only copy. Do not submit work or queries by e-mail or fax. Submissions received this way will not be acknowledged.

Thank you for your interest in The Sun:
http://www.thesunmagazine.org/about/...elines/writing