Submissions

White Winged Doves: A Stevie Nicks Poetry Anthology–deadline extended!

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

Stevie Nicks – the witchy, rock and roll goddess who carved out a 50+ year career with Fleetwood Mac and as a solo artist – continues to delight and intrigue music fans. From her sold-out tours to provocative new music, Nicks remains a vital force and beloved figure in the pantheon of rock and pop culture. As the first woman inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice, she’s set records and broken barriers. Her number one hit “Dreams” helped make “Rumours” one of the best-selling albums of all time, its legacy enduring across generations.

Nicks is also a poet at heart, with many of her most famous songs beginning as handwritten verses in her notebooks, which she occasionally shares with fans. Her music continues to captivate new audiences with ethereal ballads and powerful rock anthems, striking a chord with all ages and becoming the soundtrack for viral videos and memes across social media. Her candid reflections on love, addiction, and the music industry’s ups and downs continue to cement her status as a cultural icon.

Co-editors Collin Kelley and Megan Volpert bring deep expertise in music journalism and literary critique. Collin has interviewed countless musicians – including Nicks herself – while music shapes much of his own poetic narrative. Megan has earned praise for her books on Tom Petty, Bruce Springsteen, and Alanis Morissette, as well as her insightful reviews and interviews with rock luminaries.

OUR CRYSTALLINE VISION

Enchant us with your knowledge of Stevie Nicks. Pay tribute to her music—whether from her early days with Fritz and Buckingham Nicks, when she waited tables and cleaned houses to make ends meet, or her rise to superstardom with Fleetwood Mac. Delve into her mystical persona, seen in “Rhiannon” and her appearances on “American Horror Story: Coven.” Explore her legendary style, memorable interviews, music videos, concerts, or her storied romances. Her power as a female trailblazer in the music industry and her influence on contemporary artists are also rich avenues for inspiration.

We want to see how you envision Nicks as a cultural phenomenon and how your work amplifies her significance as a rock and roll treasure. Poems don’t have to be “full Stevie”—we invite work with cameos, Stevie impersonators and drag queens, or Stevie-adjacent portraits. We want poems that include a well-placed Stevie Nicks reference that strengthens the poem’s intent and impact.

While we love platform boots, swirly shawls and messy affairs, we want to see poems that go beyond the headlines to explore how she has personally influenced you as a poet. Absolutely NO rewrites or reinterpretations of the Stevie Nicks song catalog. There is a reason “Dreams,” “Edge of Seventeen,” and “Stand Back” are iconic—there’s no need to mess with perfection.

Previously published poems will be considered; please provide information on where the poem first appeared and be certain that you retain rights to your work.

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

• All submissions must be uploaded to Submittable. Link below. Poems submitted via email will not be considered. There is no submission fee. Contributors will be awarded pre-ordering of the book at-cost and a significant discount on ordering post-publication.
• Submit no more than 3 poems in one Microsoft Word document.
• Poems should not exceed 3 pages each; submissions should not exceed 9 pages total.
• Poems should be single-spaced and in Times New Roman font.
• The Microsoft Word document should NOT contain any author-identifying information.
• All submissions must be received by 11:59pm (EST) on February 12, 2025.
• Publication with Madville Publishing is set for May 2026.

We are reopening for submissions to the Plain Folk: Notes on American Folk Music

WE ARE EXTENDING THE DEADLINE TO
April 1, 2025

Madville Publishing is looking for personal essays that touch upon the richness of the American folk music experience, from the perspective of those who, in some way, have helped to create it, perform it, and live it. Although American folk music is difficult to define, we embrace the largeness of this tradition, knowing that it might span any number of categories from traditional Appalachian to contemporary Taylor Swiftian. It may also include elements of jazz, gospel, rock, bluegrass, Indigenous drum circle, blues, reggae and beyond. Whatever instrument you play and whatever genre you’ve traveled through to get there, we are interested in stories that capture a poignant element of what American folk music contributes to our lives. You need not be a full-time folkie, road warrior, or even a well-established performer to submit.

We call for essays that engage with the richness of the American folk music experience—how it has shaped us as individuals, as Americans, and how it continues to give expression and meaning to our lives.

Submission guidelines:

● Submissions are open until April 1, 2025.

● A reading fee of $8 must be paid at the time of submission.

● All submissions must be in English.

● We accept previously published essays as long as the author discloses the publication history of the work in the cover letter accompanying the submission and retains publication rights.

● We accept simultaneous submissions, but please notify Madville immediately if the essay is accepted elsewhere and you wish to withdraw it from consideration. NO REFUNDS of the reading fees.

● Writers may submit more than one essay, but each must be submitted separately.

● Submissions should be blind. The author’s name should not appear anywhere on the submitted document.

● Use 12 point, Times New Roman, double-spaced, with pages numbered.

● 4000 word maximum.

● Cash prizes for the two essays the editors like best. $200 for first prize, and $100 for second.

The Editors

Bob Kunzinger is the author of works, including The Iron Scar: A Father and Son in Siberia (2022), A Third Place: Notes in Nature (2019), Blessed Twilight: The Life of Vincent van Gogh (2018), and Penance (2008), still a popular book in Prague, the subject of the narrative. He has taught American Culture in Russia, Prague, Amsterdam, and Norway, and Creative Writing, Art Appreciation, English, and Humanities in the Hampton Roads, Virginia, area for more than thirty years. While he owns several guitars and made a living playing the folk circuit during and after college, his callouses have retreated.

Drew Lopenzina is Professor of English at Old Dominion University who teaches in the intersections of Early American and Native American literatures. He is the author of Through an Indian’s Looking Glass: A Cultural Biography of William Apess, Pequot (2017), described as a “tour de force” by the journal Native American and Indigenous Studies. His other books include Red Ink: Native Americans Picking up the Pen in the Colonial Period (2012) and The Routledge Introduction to Native American Literature (2020). Lopenzina plays guitar and mandolin and is part of the duo Wine Dark Sea, known in the Tidewater area around Norfolk, VA, for their epic acoustic folk and harmonies.

Other Submissions News and Updates

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We have received a long list of selections for the 2024 Arthur Smith Poetry Prize. We are handing off to our final judge for this year, and plan to publish long list, short list, and winners soon! Thank you for your patience!

About the Arthur Smith Poetry Prize

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Downloadable .pdf Call for Submissions for White Winged Doves: Stevie Nicks Poetry Anthology

Submitting Manuscript Queries

All manuscripts published by Madville Publishing undergo a rigorous vetting process before they are accepted for publication. We are turning away queries at present. We have more than we can read. We do not accept any work generated using Artificial Intelligence.

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Formatting

Writers should ensure that their manuscript submitted for editing adheres to the following guidelines. 

Prose should be submitted in 12 pt., Times New Roman, double spaced, one inch margins and pages numbered. If it is not a contest submission, make sure your name and contact information is in the header and on the title page.

Poetry should be 12 pt., Times New Roman, single spaced, one inch margins, one poem per page, and pages numbered. Full manuscripts should include credits for previously published poems and a table of contents.

Style Manual: Madville Publishing generally follows the Chicago Manual of Style and the Merriam-Webster Dictionary and defers to American spellings (e.g., gray, not grey). We use Oxford commas, em dashes with no space on either side, and ellipses with the three dots run together as in APA style (which assures that the ellipsis won’t break at the end of a line). Also, the standard is one space after end punctuation.  

Titles of books, films, albums, plays, art exhibits, television shows, podcast series, radio programs, periodicals, and newspapers should be italicized. Place quotation marks around the titles of short stories, poems, songs, and individual TV/radio/podcast episodes. 

Numbers can be tricky for poems, and we aim for readability and consistency. 

Regarding long lines and line breaks, in the first proof after layout the editor and the poet may decide whether to rewrite the line or break it differently. There should be no further changes in  line breaks after the first proof.