Submissions

Only subscribers may submit to Femspec.

For CRITICAL ESSAYS, POETRY, ART, MEMOIRS, DRAMA and FICTION

Please submit two copies of your piece *without* any indication of your name on them so that your piece may be read anonymously. Include a separate sheet with the title and genre of your piece, your name, address, email, phone and a two sentence abstract . Also, include a disc with your document in Word and RTF format. All submissions should conform to MLA standards, as found in the latest edition of the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. MLA guidelines can also be found on-line at http://www.mla.org. Any submission that does not come in with sufficient copies will not be sent through the review process at our expense.

Send submissions to:

Femspec
1610 Rydalmount
Cleveland Heights OH
44118.

All editorial enquiries should be directed to Batya Weinbaum.

BOOK REVIEW GUIDELINES.

These are intended to be flexible, not rigid, and if you have any questions or suggestions, please contact us.

GUIDELINES

Head your review with the title of the book. Next is the bibliographic information, including author, title (in italics), city of publication, publisher, year, page length, binding, price, and ISBN number. If you are reviewing a serial, include the ISSN number. Please include all of this information.

Example:
Sargent, Pamela. Climb the Wind. New York: HarperPrism, 1999. 436 pp., cloth, $25. ISBN 0-06-105029-6.

Content:

Reviewers should keep Femspec’s diverse audience in mind -- writers, readers, and scholars of feminist speculative fiction, poetry, and theory. Reviews should encourage critical rather than merely aesthetic response, and, especially in the case of fiction, should avoid summarizing a book’s narrative. Writers should consider the following questions in writing their reviews. Note that since Femspec reviews fiction, poetry, and academic work, not all questions will be relevant to all books reviewed. Contact the book review editor if you need clarification.

1. What is the book about? Don’t summarize the plot, but do identify the genre or sub-genre the book belongs to. (utopia, dystopia, alternate history, etc.) Your description should enable scholars and teachers to decide whether the book is useful to their research or classroom curricula. What courses would the book be good for? What level (freshman, senior, etc.)?
2. What is the context of the book? Where does it fit into the author’s other works, if any, and into the tradition(s) of feminist speculative fiction and criticism? Context should place the book in terms of its relationship to other texts with which it can be compared. If the book is an anthology, indicate whether it contains mostly new essays.
3. What is the scholarly potential of the book? What interesting issues are raised? What insights are offered? What moral problems are addressed and how useful is the author’s treatment of them? How well researched is the book, and does the author’s bibliography (if applicable) provide useful resources for further study?

Style:
1. Do not use footnotes. All references to the text should be noted in parentheses with the relevant page number.
2. If you refer to other works in your review, include a separate list of works cited at the end of your review. Include relevant page numbers in parentheses in the text.
3. Do not refer to other reviews of the book.
4. Double-space your review. If you are using a computer, it will be immensely helpful if you use Times New Roman 11 pt. font.
5. Finish your review with your name in capital letters, your institutional affiliation, if applicable and you wish to include it, and email address, if you wish to include it. Right-hand justify this block of text.

Length:
Reviews of anthologies may be up to 1200 words, depending on whether you have been asked to review the entire contents or only selected contributions. Consult the book review editor. Reviews of poetry and fiction should not exceed 1000 words. Do not feel that you must meet the length limit ? sometimes a short review is preferable.

Deadlines:
Reviews are due 8 weeks after you receive the book. They may be submitted by post, fax, or email. If you submit by post, include a disc copy in MS Word 95 or higher.