Saudade

Have you burned the General Submission Guidelines into your brain?  No?  Do that first then come back and we’ll tell you what we need from the stories for this book.

The Heart Stuff:

What is saudade?  It’s a tough word to understand, so here’s a few examples:

• Batman.  His parents were killed in front of him when he was a child.  (spoiler alert?)  He longs to have them back, but it’s something that can never happen.
• Superman.  He longs for Krypton, but (he thinks–spoiler alert?) that it’s destroyed and his parents are dead, so it’s something that can never really happen.
• Harry Potter.  There’s two examples here, actually.  One is a broad example, but it’s one that we will accept for this anthology.  In the first example, Harry longs to have a happy home that he doesn’t think he can get.  He longs to be back at Hogwarts all the time when he’s in the Muggle world.  At the same time, we, us, the people reading Harry Potter long to be in that world.  We want to be in a world where magic is real and we can have butterbeer and go to a school where you just eat all day.
• Avatar.  Another with two examples.  Jake longs for being whole again in a physical sense.  Again, people in our world longed so bad to be in Avatar that there was a report of folks having suicidal thoughts after they watched it.  That there is some major saudade.
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer has saudade for being a regular teenage girl.
• Angel, the vampire, has saudade for being human.
• In Bioshock, the whole game is just kind of saudade.  A longing for the way the world used to be.
• In the Halo universe, the Master Chief has some saudade for being treated like a person instead of a robotic monster.

You can also read up on saudade here and don’t be shy to do more research on the subject.  All definitions of saudade can be used when writing.  Just make sure we get a clear sense of what the main character is yearning for.  We want to be able to ask, “What do they long for?” and know the answer without any doubt.

All stories for Saudade will be speculative fiction in nature (a fantastical element will be a must) and embody longing in a way that is emotionally impactful, clear, and complex.  The goal for Saudade is to leave  readers feeling like they just had an empathic experience.  For a brief moment, they were Saudade and they were feeling everything the characters in the story felt.  We want them to come away breathless and wanting more.  We want them to forget they’re reading a story on the ride home and miss their stop.  When they look up from the end, they should be a little disoriented and wonder where they just went.

 

The writing should be fearless and raw.  Our goal at Critical Mass Rocketworks is to bring people new places and show them things they’ve forgotten all about.  Our writers will embody that sentiment.

The Head Stuff:

We will pay $40 per story appearing in Saudade.  If your story will not be appearing in Saudade, you will not be paid.

We will keep all rights for two years for stories that we publish.  After two years, if we find that we still need to use your work because of other projects and tie-ins, we will revisit our ownership of your rights and either re-purchase them or work out some other sort of agreement with you depending on what everyone wants to do.

If we have you write something that is Critical Mass Rocketworks specific, that will become property of Critical Mass Rocketworks.

What happens if you are a backup writer who did all the work but didn’t end up in the book? Well, you will still have a manuscript in your hands that was professionally edited for free that you can shop around.

If all of that sounds fine and you still want to write a story for Saudade:

New Writers:

All writers must follow “The Heart Stuff” guidelines above as well as our general submission guidelines.

Each story will be no more than 4000 words.

All plots and subplots must be tied up by the end of the story.

  

All stories must be completely 100% original with no mention of any other works or trademarks.  

No fanfiction.

We will be opening submissions for New Writers and Known Authors on September 1, 2013 and will accept submissions through November 1, 2013.  If anything is submitted after November 1, 2013, it will be automatically rejected.

  

Known Authors:

Follow all of the guidelines above as well as the general guidelines.  You can email your submission to the email provided you in your Known Author welcome email.

Rocket Surgeons:

We will be selecting one story that contains the Critical Mass Rocketworks rocket imagery in a subtle way and that story will become part of a much larger project and we may want/need to work with the author of that story again in the future.

We will also need a story that will not be in the book to use as a freebie to readers for promotional stuff.

All writers must follow “The Heart Stuff” guidelines above as well as our general submission guidelines.

All Rocket Surgeon stories also need to be no more than 4000 words.

All plots and subplots must be tied up by the end of the story.  

All stories must be completely 100% original with no mention of any other works or trademarks.  

No fanfiction.

Rocket Surgeons can begin submitting at any time to the email provided you in your Rocket Surgeon welcome email.  If anything is submitted after November 1, 2013, it will be automatically rejected.

One aside: A lot of people will be led here via Thursday Tales and the io9 boards.  This anthology will have no affiliation with Thursday Tales or io9 (excepting some of the writers being io9 regulars). This anthology is entirely 100% Critical Mass Rocketworks.

Email submission and cover letter to submissions.cmrocketworks@gmail.com.