High Desert Journal
There are presently no open calls for submissions.
Thank you for your interest in High Desert Journal.
HDJ is an online and place-based literary journal and accepts only the finest poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, memoirs, books reviews, essays, interviews, and visual arts from those living in or writing specifically about the North American High Desert West. (Map)
HDJ is currently publishes new content on a weekly basis in between open reading periods. As of September 2022, open reading periods have been paused, and will resume in 2023.
High Desert Journal is dedicated to further understanding the diverse people, places, and complex issues of the interior North American West. Our mission is to illuminate the region as it really is: complex, divergent, communal, and complicated; urban, suburban, and rural; wild and ruined; and imbued with a deep Native, immigrant, and migrant history and culture. We seek to publish writing that is as wild, rural, diverse, communal, and culturally imbued as the region.
We pay $50 for accepted fiction and nonfiction, and $50 per poet (up to three poems).
Please submit up to three poems; a maximum of 5,000 words of fiction or nonfiction; up to 5,000 words of interview, memoir, and essays, and up to 10 slides or digital images of artwork.
We encourage submissions through Submittable, using the forms below, with a $3 processing fee.
In the spirit of inclusion and fairness and knowledge of the widening technological gap, HDJ accepts fee-free submissions through the postal service so those who are incarcerated, suffering economic hardship, or without easy access to the Internet are still able to send work. All manuscripts and all correspondence regarding submission should be sent to our physical address and accompanied by a self-addressed, stamped envelope (SASE) for a response. As with emailed submissions, we will adhere strictly to posted dates and any mailed submission postmarked outside the listed submission periods will be recycled unread. Submissions sent within the United States may be posted to the editor of the appropriate genre during open reading periods.