Kickstarter

UPDATE: For important information regarding this funding campaign and the future of Grim Corps Magazine, please read this update.

UPDATE: We have included the option for buying ad space in the magazine. And, since we are still running the Kickstarter, we've integrated it into the project with Ad Space backer levels.

We are a niche market with a target audience of horror enthusiasts and fans of dark culture, for example, the goth subculture. If you have a business with a similar clientele, you might consider advertising with us. Read More

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What We Aim To Publish And Why

We are a new quarterly magazine with an emphasis on promoting writers. We started this project because we have a passion for weird and dark short fiction -- and we believe in supporting our authors!

As writers ourselves, we know how much labor goes into crafting a quality short story. Writers are typically underpaid, so we would like to be able reward them with the best payment we can reasonably afford to offer.

We could easily start a free e-zine that doesn't pay its contributing writers and which wouldn't cost the reader anything to read, but that just wouldn't be as rewarding to all of those involved!

Being a not-for-profit magazine means that proceeds from sales or donations will go directly into funding the publication, and the rate at which we pay authors will increase as funding allows.

In turn, readers will have greater confidence knowing that the collection of short fiction they receive will be of professional quality with well-crafted and entertaining stories.

Why the name Grim Corps?

The connotation of the word grim hardly needs explanation, as it immediately invokes a sense of the ghastly and the macabre. Corps (pronounced "kor" and not to be confused with corpse, even though a cadaver ironically fits our emphasis on the macabre) is "a body of people associated together", as in a diplomatic corps, or the humanitarian organization known as The Peace Corps.

Simply put, Grim Corps is a body of people associated together for the common cause of promoting and sharing our passion for dark literature, art and culture.

While the magazine will remain specifically focused on short fiction, our Facebook page is our community extension of the magazine in which we share our passion for dark culture.

The Format

The magazine will appear four times a year as eBook issues, available for sale on our website and through Amazon, either individually or as a subscription in Kindle and ePub formats, and in other digital formats such as PDF for viewing on a personal computer. The debut issue is slated to appear in January 2013.

We are currently accepting submissions for the first issue. Details can be found on our Submission Guidelines page.

The cover will appear in full-color, with artwork provided by professional artists whose style reflects speculative, surreal, and dark or gothic elements. This way, the magazine will also promote artists whose work is often either overlooked or undervalued by mainstream culture.

The artwork to be featured on our first issue is an original oil painting by Marisa Cole, an established, Seattle-based artist and a graduate of the Pacific North West College of Art. Primarily known for her surrealist paintings, Marisa was kind enough to supply us with this piece that nicely reflects the dark nature of the fiction we intend to publish.

We are currently accepting art submissions for future issues. If you would like us to consider your artwork, please check our guidelines on the Submissions page.

Author Pay Scale

According to standard industry rates, professional payment begins at .05 cents per-word. We're willing to accept that it could take us a few years to gain experience and establish ourselves as a small press before being able to offer these rates. That is why we are setting our goals for the first year with the minimum offering of what is known in the industry as a "token payment".

HOWEVER, what we'd really like to do is to begin by paying authors at least semi-pro rates of .01 to .04 cents per-word. We've set our funding goals as such that the more this project is funded, the higher the payment will be along this pay-scale for the first annual year of the quarterly (4 issues). Funds received through sales (or additional donations through the magazine's website) within that first year will go into funding the next year's quarterly, hopefully at the same pay-rates, if not more.

Here's the break-down of our funding goals:

• $2,500 The magazine will be able to launch as a paying publication, offering its writers a "token payment" of $25 per-story and $25 to artists for issue cover artwork.
• $4,000 The magazine will be able to launch as a semi-pro publication, offering its writers a payment of .01 cent per-word and $50 to artists for issue cover artwork.
• $6,500 Writers get .02 cents per-word and artists $75.
• $9,000 Writers get .03 cents per-word and artists $100.
• $11,500 Writers get .04 cents per-word and artists $125.
• $14,000 Reaching this level would technically allow us to launch as a professional publication, paying .05 cents or more per-word. It would also set us on our way to becoming a SFWA (Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America) Qualifying Publication! However, sales are impossible to predict and we want to still be around after the first year. So we'll remain as a semi-pro zine for at least the first two years. Should we reach this level of funding, it would cover the cost of the quarterly's first annual year, plus the cost of the first issue in the second year.

By making a pledge, you will essentially be pre-ordering a copy or subscription of the magazine, as well as helping to launch this exciting new publishing venture!