welcome, feral storyteller!

Magpie Zine, formerly called The Howler Project, is a quarterly online publication. Each issue is a themed collection of somewhat unusual, possibly urgent, and slightly unhinged human expressions, teetering between a rock and a highbrow. The mag was born from an affinity for early underground zines—subversive, intelligent, uniquely collaborative, and vigorously imaginative. We are devoted to the spirit of that counterculture and the heart and soul of originality. We support writers and artists whose aesthetic is an experience. We exist for the story that has to be told, the story that will only appear once in the world, singular in voice, tone, and approach. 

we seek the following:

Fiction, nonfiction, poetry, visual art—artwork, photography, collage—humor, and the wildly unclassifiable. The prose word limit is 1500. For poetry, submit 1-3 pieces. For visual art, submit 2-4 pieces. We strongly favor work with depth and unique insight. Life is absurd, and we like being moved in unexpected ways by its absurdity. More on literature and art subs →

Humor is all about humor. We’re looking for terrible elevator pitches, delightful fangirl 4th-grade book reports, and hand-drawn pie charts. More on humor subs →

the basics:

Your submission must connect with the issue's theme in some way. 

Submissions must be previously unpublished, original, and from the original creator. (Shared on your personal social media or personal blog is fine. We don’t consider this as a publication.) We only accept stories written by corporeal humans. We don’t consider AI-written stories. For artwork, we just ask that it not be previously published online or in a major print publication.

We cannot offer payment at this time, but we never charge a fee. Only submit to one category per reading period. 

If we have already published your work, please wait three issues before sending us more.

If a piece was previously declined, please do not resubmit it unless encouraged to do so. 

SPECIAL REQUEST: Because we have such a short response time (two months max), we respectfully request that you do not send us simultaneous submissions. If you choose to do so, we understand, but please include this information in your cover letter and contact us or withdraw your piece ASAP if it is accepted elsewhere. (And congrats on the acceptance!)

**We're currently building our fall issue. Subs will open again in early October for our winter issue.**