Our Manuscript Reviews are currently open. Thank you to those who submitted during our last call for submissions. This category will be open on a rolling basis during the year of 2023, though we may close periodically, depending on volume. We want to hear from you. Submit here.
We welcome full-length poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction manuscripts for review. If you have a chapbook ready, we also review these on occasion (please query via email). To those who submit, we provide thoroughly detailed margin notes, substantial suggested edits, and a personalized letter, generally within three months. Writers who trust us with their manuscripts (for which we are grateful!) can email directly with their reviewers, offering a rare opportunity for mentorship—plus the ability to make sure we answer all your questions. Many writers whose work we’ve reviewed have gone on to be offered impressive publishing contracts. For questions about manuscript reviews, please contact us at editor@mudseasonreview.com.
“I’ve long read [your] journal and I was very pleased by the manuscript feedback I paid for two summers ago. You all do a great job.” —Caitlin Jans, editor of Authors Publish
As writers ourselves, we care deeply about giving you the best chance of success with your journey of writing and revising, so each manuscript we receive is assigned to the best reviewer available on our team as we consider the type of feedback you’re interested in, which we ask that you include in your cover letter. Topics covered by our reviewers involve those of creative development, including characters, plot, dialogue, theme, style, rhythm, line breaks, word choice, and more, as well as marketability and overall guidance.
Our highly qualified reviewer team consists of award-winning, published, and experienced authors and creative educators, many of whom have been writing and editing for decades. These reviewers are paid a small stipend for their time, which, while nominal, we hope offers some gratitude for helping us maintain our mission of supporting emerging writers.
Proceeds raised from these manuscript reviews will help us continue to pay our contributing writers and artists, cover Submittable fees, maintain our website (where we publish our issues), and support other administrative costs. Mud Season Review is affiliated with Burlington Writers Workshop, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that brings free workshops to writers.
Send us your work-in-progress at mudseasonreview.com/submit.