Terrapin Books Now Open for Submissions of Full-length Poetry Manuscripts

We will be open for submissions of full-length poetry manuscripts from January 24 thru February 28.

We plan to select 2-4 manuscripts each submission period.
​All submissions must go through Submittable.
Please read our FAQs page before submitting.
Any questions, please use the email address or the Contact Form on the Contact page.

Guidelines:
A manuscript of approximately 40-55 poems​. This will produce a book of approximately 90-110 pages. (Please note that your book will always be more pages than your manuscript. Page count for the book includes poems, front and back matter, blank pages, and section dividers).

Include contact information on title page (we do not read anonymous submissions)

One inch margins all around

Include Table of Contents

Include page numbers

Include Acknowledgments Page

• Please include a list of poems and journal titles rather than just a list of journal titles. Format as a list, not as a paragraph.

• Please note that we allow a maximum of 6 poems from a previously published chapbook. Regardless of the number of chapbooks, it’s no more than 6 chapbook poems. Poems previously published in a chapbook should be indicated as such on the Acknowledgments page. Include title of poem and title of chapbook.

In cover letter area include a brief bio and a 4-6 sentence description of your manuscript—in your own words, not a blurb
​
We recommend that 25-50% of the poems have been previously published. More than that is fine.

Simultaneous submission is acceptable but please immediately withdraw your manuscript if it's accepted elsewhere.

Please note that there is a minimal $12 reading fee to help cover our costs.

If you are resubmitting a manuscript, please explain in your cover letter how you revised it.
​
​We strongly suggest that you peruse at least one book from Terrapin Books before submitting. We suggest that you peruse the work of any press before you submit.

​Please note that at this time we are unable to accept manuscripts from outside of the US.
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Terrapin Books is committed to publishing outstanding books of poetry by outstanding poets. We intend to fully support our poets. We will edit your manuscript and work with you on revisions. We expect our poets to actively engage in promoting their books. We require our poets to maintain a dedicated website and to be a member of Facebook.

Our books are 6 x 9, paperback, perfect bound, color cover, with printed spine (poet's name, title, press).

We are committed to publishing accepted titles within six to ten months of acceptance. We do not maintain a long list of books-in-waiting.
​
We offer a standard contract, a generous number of author copies, a substantial discount on additional copies purchased by the author, and an annual royalty payment.

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Trish Hopkinson interviews me (Diane Lockward) about my new craft book, The Strategic Poet; the selection/publication process at Terrapin Books; and Terrapin’s current call for submissions of full-length poetry manuscripts. Get a behind-the-scenes look into Terrapin Books.

 

Sample Bonus Prompts from The Strategic Poet

 FYI--Terrapin Books will open for submissions of full-length poetry manuscripts on January 24 and will remain open thru February 28. Please note that we publish only poets living in the US. Check our Guidelines and our FAQs. Then send us something wonderful.

  Named a Best Book for Writers by Poets & Writers

Click for Amazon

Now that the holidays have come and gone, it's time to return to your poetry. If Santa didn't bring you a copy of my latest craft book, The Strategic Poet: Honing the Craft, perhaps you should gift yourself with a copy. To entice you and to give you something to work on until you have the book, I'm offering you below two of the 39 Bonus Prompts from the book.


114 fabulous poets contributed to this book, poets such as Ellen Bass, Jan Beatty, Diane Seuss, Dean Young, and George Bilgere. The book includes Craft Talks, Model Poems, Commentaries, and Prompts. It is suitable for use by poets working independently, by poets in writing groups, and by teachers in the classroom.

Here are the strategies covered in the sections of the book:



I. Descriptive Details

II. Diction

III. Imagery

IV. Sound Devices

V. Repetition

VI. Figurative Language: Simile

VII. Figurative Language: Metaphor

VIII. Figurative Language: Personification

IX. Figurative Language: Hyperbole

X. Figurative Language: Apostrophe

XI. Syntax
XII. Sonnet

XIII. Odd Forms

Each of these 13 sections ends with 3 Bonus Prompts. These focus on the specific strategy of the section. They have the twin benefits of being short and recyclable. I solicited these prompts from outstanding poets who are also outstanding teachers. Here are two of these prompts. Give them a try!

1. Section VIII focuses on Personification. The Bonus Prompt poet for that section is Kerrin McCadden, a high school English teacher in Vermont and Associate Director of The Frost Place in New Hampshire.

Your Word Bank Comes Alive
Build a ten-word word bank according to this formula: a place name (a park, a neighborhood, a city, town, or country), an insect, a weather term/event, a tool, a geographical feature, a period or event in history, a term that has to do with furniture, and three words you like the sound of. Now, write a poem in the voice of an object you care deeply about. Let the object tell its story, or talk about you, make complaints, pontificate, or muse—but you must include all the words from your word bank. In a final draft, you might kick these words out of your poem, but their job is to push your imagination into sparking through the act of weighing what you love against words you might struggle to use.

2. 
Section XII focuses on the Sonnet. Poet Jeffrey Bean provides three delightful prompts for this form. He teaches English and Creative Writing at Central Michigan University.



Animal in an Invented Sonnet

Write a sonnet about an animal. Don’t choose a traditional sonnet form—instead, devise your own fourteen-line rhyme scheme. Feel free to use meter or abandon it. Either way, use concrete imagery to bring the animal to life. What colors, smells, textures does it evoke? Try to engage all five senses and use sound and syntax to embody this animal’s movements, the noises it makes, how it feels to touch it or look at it or stand in its presence.

Terrapin Books Now Open for Submissions

I am happy to announce that my poetry press, Terrapin Books, is open for submissions of full-length poetry manuscripts. Our current submission period is August 1 - August 31, 2018.

Be sure to read our Guidelines before submitting. Please note that we request both a bio and a brief descriptive statement with your submission. Be sure to include both.

Most questions are answered in our FAQs, so be sure to read that page also.

Our Guidelines ask for a manuscript of approximately 40-55 poems for a book of approximately 90-110 pages. Page count includes poems, front and back matter, and section pages; it also includes all blank pages. Please note that your book will be longer than your manuscript. Manuscript length and book length are not the same thing. If you have 40-55 poems, go ahead and submit. Let us worry about book length.

Here's some general information about the press:

We publish only poetry books, primarily single-author collections but also an occasional craft book or anthology.

Terrapin Books is committed to publishing outstanding books of poetry by outstanding poets. We intend to fully support our poets. We will edit your manuscript and work with you on revisions. In order to give the kind of individual attention we want to give each author and book, we accept a limited number of manuscripts during each reading period.

We respond to submissions within one month of the close of the submission period. We are also committed to publishing accepted titles within six months of acceptance. We do not maintain a long list of books-in-waiting.

We promote our poets' books. We also expect our poets to actively engage in promoting their books. We require our poets to maintain a dedicated website and to be a member of Facebook.

Our books are 6 x 9, paperback, perfect bound, color cover, with printed spine (poet's name, title, press).

We offer a standard contract, a generous number of author copies, a substantial discount on additional copies purchased by the author, and an annual royalty payment.

We are the proud publisher of collections by Neil Carpathios, Lynne Knight, Christine Stewart-Nunez, Jessica de Koninck, Carolyn Miller, Patricia Clark, Susanna Lang, Hayden Saunier, Michelle Menting, Karen Paul Holmes, Geraldine Connolly, Michael T. Young, Lisa Bellamy, and Paige Riehl.

We welcome submissions from poets at any stage in their career. Some of our poets have a long publication history with multiple books. A few of our poets have two books out. And we are very proud to be the publisher of several debut collections.

We look forward to reading your work.

Terrapin Books Is Open for Submissions

I am happy to announce that my poetry press, Terrapin Books, is currently open for submissions of full-length poetry manuscripts. Please note that our submission period closes on February 28, 2018.

Be sure to read our Guidelines before submitting. Please note that we request both a bio and a descriptive statement with your submission. Be sure to include both. Most questions are answered in our FAQs, so be sure to read that page also.

Our Guidelines ask for a manuscript of approximately 40-55 poems for a book of approximately 90-110 pages (count includes poems, front and back matter, and section pages). Please note that your book will be longer than your manuscript. If you have 40-55 poems, go ahead and submit. Let us worry about book length.

Here's some general information about the press:

We publish only poetry books, primarily single-author collections but also an occasional craft book or anthology.

Terrapin Books is committed to publishing outstanding books of poetry by outstanding poets. We intend to fully support our poets. We will edit your manuscript and work with you on revisions. We expect our poets to actively engage in promoting their books. We require our poets to maintain a dedicated website and to be a member of Facebook.

Our books are 6 x 9, paperback, perfect bound, color cover, with printed spine (poet's name, title, press).

We are committed to publishing accepted titles within six months of acceptance. We do not maintain a long list of books-in-waiting.

We offer a standard contract, a generous number of author copies, a substantial discount on additional copies purchased by the author, and an annual royalty payment.

We are the proud publisher of collections by Neil Carpathios, Lynne Knight, Christine Stewart-Nunez, Jessica de Koninck, Carolyn Miller, Patricia Clark, Susanna Lang, Hayden Saunier, Michelle Menting, and Karen Paul Holmes. We look forward to books by Geraldine Connolly (March) and Michael T. Young (April).

We welcome submissions from poets at any stage in their career. Some of our poets have a long publication history with multiple books. A few of our poets have two books out. And we are very proud to be the publisher of two debut collections.

We look forward to reading your work.

Manuscript Organization

As the publisher and editor of Terrapin Books, I see a number of manuscripts each submission period that include many outstanding poems; however, I often have to say no to these manuscripts because they are not yet ready for publication. What's missing? Good organization. That's a simple and honest answer, but good manuscript organization is by no means an easy project. We poets all wrestle with it. We lay out our poems on the bed, the floor, the table. We go away to retreats or hole up in hotels, wrestling with those pages and hoping to find the right plan. That right plan can be very elusive.

Many poets, especially those working on a first manuscript, fall prey to the topical arrangement. That is, they put all related poems in the same section—a section for poems about birds, another for poems about vegetables, another for poems about dogs, and so on. So what's wrong with that? It's tedious for the reader, for one thing. Such an organization deprives the reader of one of the greatest pleasures of reading a poetry book, i.e., surprise. The topical arrangement results in predictability and monotony. After I've read 3 or so bird poems, I'm pretty sure that when I turn the page, there will be another bird flying around. My attention to the poem disappears, my interest disappears, my excitement disappears. All flown away. This topical approach does sometimes work, but more often than not it doesn't.

What does work? Here is a list of four excellent discussions of manuscript organization that you might find useful as you wrestle with your poems trying to find a pleasing plan, one that will turn a bunch of poems into a collection of poems, a work of art.

Thinking Like an Editor: How to Order Your Poetry Manuscript
by April Ossman

On Making the Poetry Manuscript
by Jeffrey Levine, publisher of Tupelo Press

Dynamic Design: The Structure of Books of Poems
by Natasha Saje

Putting Together a Manuscript of Poems
by Marilyn McCabe


I'm posting this list now as Terrapin Books will reopen for submissions on January 22 and will remain open thru February 28, 2018. So get your manuscript in good order and check out our Guidelines and our FAQs.

Terrapin Books: Progress Report

All the essential parts of Terrapin Books, my new small press for poetry, are now in place, and I’m making good progress on our first book, The Doll Collection, an anthology of poems about dolls. Poet Nicole Cooley is at work on the Introduction to the book. She was a perfect choice for the job as she’s written a number of poems about dolls and is writing a non-fiction book about dolls.

I received close to 400 submissions for the book with many of the poets submitting as many as 5 poems. The quality of the work was gratifyingly high, so making the selections was hard. I had to turn away many fine poems which I would have said yes to if I hadn’t wanted to keep the book to around 100-120 pages. The final count was 87 poems by 87 poets. Some of the poems go back as far as the 1970’s; others were written for the collection.

I hope to have The Doll Collection out in early spring. In the meantime, the list of poets can be seen at the Terrapin website. I think it’s pretty impressive!

I’ll be taking submissions of full-length collections from late January through February. I plan to be on Submittable by then and will be asking a minimal $12 reading fee. I hope to select 2-3 manuscripts from this first open submission period. My goal is to publish 4-6 books in 2016. Manuscripts will be carefully read. Those selected will receive editorial input. All poets will receive review copies, discounted book purchases, and royalty payments.

I hope to publish beautiful books of outstanding poetry. I also want those books to sell well and to get into the hands of many readers. Therefore, I suggest that each poet submitting a manuscript be able to say yes to the following expectations:
       1. has 25-50% of the poems already published in respectable journals
       2. has a dedicated website or is willing to create one prior to the book’s publication
       3. has some involvement in social media
       4. enjoys giving public readings and is willing to seek them out
       5. will take advantage of review opportunities

In other words, there’s an expectation at the press that the poet has been actively involved in getting his/her work “out there” and will be committed to promoting the book.

The selected poets can expect that their books will not be published and then abandoned, that the publisher will be committed to promoting each book and maintaining an ongoing positive relationship with all Terrapin poets.