Editor Interview: Roses and Wildflowers

lyric mythopoeia

I really like what is happening in the speculative fiction genre right now. The "old favorites" Strange Horizons, Uncanny, Asimovs, are all publishing terrific stuff, but there's some newer publishers that I seem to go back to regularly like New Myths and Haven Spec. The magazines using the graphics and visual presentations in new and innovative ways are an inspiration. Club Chicxulub is also pointing the way to including audio and it is very exciting. The re-emergence of sword & sorcery as a genre is just fun. (We don't publish S&S, but we love to read it.) When I read the newer authors in the other magazines, and when we review our submissions together, it also seems that the overall level of writing has improved with the diversity of voices represented over the last few years. I never think of any of these magazine as competition in any way: the more the merrier!

All of the artists who place their work in our journals are wonderful. But my personal favorite artists in our magazine are a trio of fine artists that have chosen to grace our pages with their work. Award-winning, visionary artists, Denita Benyshek, Lauren Raine, and our arts editor, Helena Domenic are so talented and their work is really inspiring!
I also really want to mention a Ukrainian artist who has graced our pages, Inna Vjuzhanina. She is in Zaporizhzhia and sometimes writes about her daily experiences in her Patreon Blog.
For writers, we get so many great stories that it's hard to pick a favorite, but Lannie Pihajlic made us laugh out loud. There isn't enough humor in speculative fiction and we are always actively seeking science fiction, in particular, more on the lighter side. Irisanya Moon's poetry touched us with their lyrical style. In the upcoming Autumn 2025 issue, there is a story by newcomer, Torger Vedeler that is just beautifully written. In the first issue, Rachel Rodman's
"The Yellow Brick Roooooaaaad…" left us breathless. Illustrated by another fine artist, Shelly Kay, we were thrilled to publish this story.

We developed Roses & Wildflowers with the aesthetic concept of focusing in mythopoeia in fiction and poetry and fabulism in the visual arts. We pair artists and writers, be it fiction, poetry, or the featured "audio offering" . We encourage the artist and the writers to communicate their concepts and ideas to each other, and when that becomes a collaboration, the results are pretty gorgeous. In the final stage of the process, Artist in Residence for 2025/6, Jack Ruttan, designers, Dara “Maverick” Napoli, and Sharon Knight dive in to create something very special from the work of the writers, editors and artists in each issue. It takes a little over a year from idea to publication for each issue . It's a labor of love. As an editor, I consider myself very lucky. There are still bugs to be sorted out on our webpages as we continue, but we are learning.

Read the guidelines and work to the theme of the issue you are submitting to. We post the themes for each issue as far in advance as possible in order to give writers lots of time to consider, create, and be inspired. (Long before we actually open for submissions.) Consider: if we're looking for works exploring interdependence and societies based on mutual aid, dive deep into the philosophies of Goldman, Kropotkin and Kimmerer. In the Spring of 2026, we're going to be looking for works that include an eclipse. There happens to be a total solar eclipse in August 2026, look to the skies and be inspired. In short: seek out the calls and send us your best stuff. We only wish we could publish more stories and poetry, because so much of what we receive is awesome. Keep submitting! We ask that writers skip one issue, but it's not a hard and fast rule. Your next story could be the one that makes it in.
Our editors all have writing careers of their own, so if it feels like we choose pieces from a "writer's writers" and "poet's poets" perspective there is a reason for that. Look for that spark in your work that says "Yes. This." We want to know what inspires and excites you, be it a retelling of an ancient trickster tale or envisioning a future very different from this time and place we live in. Be professional in your presentation and don't tell us too much in your cover letter. Poets: make sure your work is speculative poetry. Then: use Shunn as your guide for formatting. We get too many submissions from poets where the name and contact info of the poet is absent. Do the due diligence, submit your work with pride and put your name on it.

We don't have an ideal, really. It all sounds trite, but it's true: read the past issues, then submit a clean submission with no spelling or grammatical errors. Remove all the bookmarks, tags, editor's marks and double check to make sure.
We look for:
1. Quality of writing. We like writers who dive head first into the art of *story* itself. We don't want to be grabbed by the scruff and shaken with graphic violence sex or clever first lines. But: if your prose stands up and does a little dance, we will probably be your fans for life. We have a penchant for intelligent, lyrical prose that tackles difficult themes.
2. Engaging characters, interesting plot, a satisfying ending, unique storytelling that avoids the obvious plot twists. We don't want "clever", or high concept pieces without a plot, engage us with solid storytelling. Be it on a space ship or faery, the afterwards of an apocalypse, or the heart of a modern city.
3. Is it mythopoeia? (Check our guidelines for an explanation)
4. Does it speak to the theme of the issue?
5. We do much the same for poetry.

They try to go around it by sending submissions to our business email address. (We delete those.) A query is great, but an attached story submission isn't. Or put extra things in the text like graphics or biographical statements in text.
Or: send us "think pieces" or reviews that should be submitted to our non-fiction sister publication, "Coreopsis Journal". (Which has a different process.)
Poets who don't give us their contact info or their names... (!)
We also get too many submissions that really should go to a magazine that publishes experimental works or mainstream literary works. We try to direct those writers elsewhere when we can.
Otherwise, most writers seem to be pretty savvy at sending submissions that are perfectly fine.

Cover letters are most important during the first round of reading when we are looking for work from our priority submission group. For the foreseeable future, that is people living in or displace by war zones (first) and the global climate crises front lines, particularly climate related disaster zones. We want to know how you are doing and if - and how - this experience influences your work. It doesn't have to, but we like to know.
After that, we tend to read the cover letters after we read the stories or poems to get an idea of who the writer is, if the writer is willing to tell us. It's really fine if they don't, we know you are busy people and a cover letter is an art form in itself. Writers really, truly can just say, "Please consider my (number of words) story. Thank you."

As the editor in chief, I read everything. I flag those that just aren't going to get to the first readers, those that might need a little work but have promise, and those I particularly like. I leave comments for the readers and most of the readers make notations as well. There is a dialogue that takes place between all of us, including our arts editor and sensitivity readers, usually over two rounds of reading. It's rare that we put something down after the first page, but it has happened. Usually because it's really more suitable for a different market or it's in a strange format that we can't read properly.

There are three parts to this process:
I read everything, sometimes as it arrives. I flag it and leave comments for the first readers.
Then, there are two rounds of reading. The ones rejected in the first round are held in a file, I take another peek to make sure we didn't miss anything, and then send out the notifications to the writers.
Of those that we hold for the second round, if they need to be reviewed for sensitivity, we send them to one of two specialized sensitivity readers for comment.
We are still open for submissions at this point, so the second round consists of new submissions that I have reviewed and the ones held for consideration. We may do a second round of sensitivity reading as well.
Out of this process we select 4-6 stories and look at what we will take as the "featured story" for that issue. (This story is solicited.) We also look over audio submissions during this round.
Poetry is handled by our poetry editor, Peggy Wheeler, who selects up to 8 poems that we discuss and make our final selections from her list during the second round.

I wake up early, check the submissions, answer emails, then do the various fundraising activities: social media, seeking grants and other support, setting up events such as the live streamed reading on June 29th. I have to think several issues in advance while seeking support and that takes a lot of time and energy. If we are in the design period, I may spend a good part of the morning talking to the web team. The afternoon is reserved for my own writing and art and the usual household chores that visit everyone's life. The selection process is quite convivial. We are geographically spread out all over the map, so we set up a zoom call. It can take most of a Saturday or Sunday morning or lunch time, so there's coffee and tea on our desks for those of us in PST, and lunch in EST, and for one reader, a late night snack on another continent. (We try for "time zone sensitivity".)
We do a little check in and then dive into the slush pile and find our favorites. Each reader reads a section of the story and tells us why she/he/they/gher likes that particular story or poem and we talk about it together. There's lots of discussion back and forth and questions and ideas. Sometimes we all agree on something and it's a fast yes or no, sometimes we spend a quite a while on one or two pieces.
Once we have a list we agree upon, we look for balance and diversity and how all the pieces, stories and poetry, fit together within the theme of the issue.
Once we have consensus we are done. The design team meets, selects artists, Helena and I do the final pairings, we send out the acceptances and rejections and all the accepted stories and poems go to the copy editors.

Our process upon acceptance is to pair writers with a copy editor. They have about a month, sometimes a bit longer, to go over their fiction or poetry with the copy editor for mangled sentences and misplaced commas. Occasionally, we "mentor" a promising writer with content editing. We then do a thorough proofreading on the website just before publication.

We have only begun the process of learning how to do that. We would certainly like to be able to nominate the contributors to our magazine(s) for awards, fellowships, and grants.
So far:
In 2022 and 2024, respectively, we recommended Artist, Denita Benyshek, as an Open Studios Artist in Residence grant at Botanica Gardens, Wichita, KS. and for the The Koch Cultural Trust (KCT) Fellowship.
In 2024, we recommended writer and artist, Eleanor Hudson, for a fellowship at Harvard Divinity School.
In 2015, we created an award through our umbrella, The Society for Ritual Arts for music that creates awe and wonder (The Lost Chord Award) and an award for a promising scholar, (The Eos Award) and awarded these in 2016 and 2018. We could no longer support this award when the pandemic interrupted our work. We have no plans to continue this award.