Welcome to our latest newsletter. We have news, submission stuffs, Trash Family publications, Quick Reads from award nominees and a seasonal ekphrastic writing prompt.
News
Our very first print anthology is on schedule for release at the end of this month! 27 fantastic short fictions are packed into the book which will raise funds for The Wildlife Trusts, a UK charity. Watch our socials for links to purchase.
We will also have some story teases and author bios on this page soon.
Submission Stuffs
Our second Prompted Stories submission call was considerably more popular than last year – we had 150 requests for prompts and almost 70 submissions. Our Ed was so blown away by the quality and imagination, she selected a whopping 25 flash to publish. Suffice it to say, we’re excited to do that one again next year…
Click HERE and HERE to read the prompted stories.
Our final submission call of the year opens 1st December and has a theme of CATS. Those pesky feline overlords are side-lining the trash cats for a whole month. With a generous 1000 word limit, we’re excited to read lots of cat flash and will publish our favourites in January.
Flash between 100 and 1000 words.
Click on the image for all the Pop-Up details and lots of image prompts and get writing all things cat.
Here are some other submission opportunities in fellow lit mags if you have treasures to send out into the world.
- Frazzled Lit are open for subs between 1st and 31st of October. They are looking for flash and short stories, as well as poetry and CNF. They say “We want the most creative and resonant pieces of writing you have, the pieces that fizz on the page, the ones that you can’t stop thinking about. We love stories that hum with life. Fiction that resonates with relatable content. We want real experiences with the honesty and truth that only you can write.” Get informed HERE
- GossamerWight is a new UK-based lit mag showcasing horror, weird, folky, dystopian, supernatural and speculative work. Their first call is themed “Everyday Eerie” and is open until 31st October. Flash up to 1000 and shorts to 3000. Find everything HERE
- Fahmidan Journal are a paying lit mag reading for the Spring issue until 15th December. They say “Send us your thought-provoking existentialism, your phobias, your darkest moments. Entrance us with your whimsical fantasy. Move us to tears with your truth in a world of suffering. Captivate and intrigue us with your hopes and dreams.” Flash up to 800, shorts 1000-2500. All the info is HERE
As with all literary publications, including Trash Cat Lit, you should always read a number of the published works before submitting yourself. Get to know what they like and decide if it’s the right home for your treasured words.
Trash Family
We love to celebrate our contributors beyond Trash Cat Lit by sharing the cool stuffs our Trash Family members have going on:
As always, we’ve spotted so many Trash Family successes on the socials – here are just a few…
Coleman Bigelow
Read Divine Intervention from our Summer 2025 issue.
Coleman has a piece in Ekphrastic Review using this Edward Hopper painting as inspiration. It’s part description of the painting and part story – a delightful meld. Click the image below to read.
“But, look here at the light… that wondrous New York light that brightens up this duo’s dining spot. Well, this is exactly how you can tell Hopper hails from a different age.”
M.E Proctor
Read Mirror on the Wall from our Summer 2025 issue.
She brought crime and noir to Trash Cat’s pages and now M.E has published her second novel in a series featuring private detective Declan Shaw with Shotgun Honey. Go read the incredible blurb and reviews and get delving into this. Click image below for more.
“In “Catch Me on a Blue Day”, Declan is far from his regular Texas stomping grounds. He’s off balance in more ways than one, and the crimes he uncovers are of a magnitude he could not foresee.
Between the sins of an old New England town and the violence of 1980s El Salvador. And the links between the two.”
Mathew Gostelow
You can read For a While There, We Were Weightless in our upcoming print anthology.
Mathew is a master of quiet horror writing and earlier this year set out on a project to curate and publish an anthology of quiet horror from other writers. Silent Screams is now almost upon us – you can preorder the EBook and the paperback will be out on 1st October.
It’s a stunning collection of horror writing with contributors including Lindz McLeod, Zary Fekete and Sonia Overall, as well as Trash Family: Heather Haigh, Sarah Royston and Terry Holland. The incredible cover art is from Eric W Brenner.
Oh, and yeah, our Ed also has a story in there! Click the image below to find out more and get yourself a copy in time for spooky season.
“The most terrifying horror stories don’t churn your stomach. They creep like shadows, chilling with a touch. They build dread through atmosphere and emotion, rather than splatter and gore.
Within these pages, you will face strange and twisted scenes, dark and demonic characters, nightmares great and small, written by a host of talented authors from around the world.
These are shattering tales of grief and loss, visitations from strange folk, troubled dreams, and cursed artefacts.
These are whispers to make your skin crawl and your toes curl. Words to catch your breath and smother screams.
Emily Rinkema
Read Grace in our Spring 2025 issue.
Emily has an absolute stunner of a story in Okay Donkey magazine. 13.1 Septillion Pounds is an imaginative take on new parenthood and has a remarkable baby at its core. Click the image to read.
“When I check on her before I go to bed, she’s still awake with one tiny hand on the ball. She’s never been a good sleeper, but the last month has been significantly worse. She just stares at the slowly spinning mobile of the galaxy above her head, sometimes reaches for it with her fists.”
A Trash Trio of Quick Reads
Whether you’re on your lunch break, the train, the couch while the kids are out, or in bed with that sublime hour to devote to reading – here are three stories from the Trash Cat bin archive for you to savour.
Click on the images to read three stories from contributors we have nominated for Genrepunk Awards (the others are Heather Haigh, Jude Potts, Linda M. Bayley, Dan Weaver and Andrew Monge.)
Allan Miller from Out of Place Animals Pop-Up 2024
Gavin Turner from Winter 2024
Sophia Adamowicz from Summer 2025
Baboon
Wixton Fen
Flocks
Writing Prompt
We’ll end this newsletter with a prompt to help you get writing.
We are taking inspiration from Coleman Bigelow above and asking you to write ekphrastic flash. For the purpose of fiction, this means using an image to inspire a story – rather than simply describing the image, however vividly.
So, choose one of these autumnal paintings and use it to inspire your setting, characters, tone or theme, and inform the story you want to tell.
Thank you for reading our newsletter.
We hope we have inspired you with the amazing writing and readings.
We’ll see you next month.
Happy writing and reading.
TRASH CAT LIT 