Stone’s Throw is the monthly online companion to Rock and a Hard Place Magazine, delivering shorter, sharper content on a regular basis in an electronic medium, before collecting all 12 stories for an annual print anthology. Each month, writers will be given a submission prompt, and the best of the best, by our estimation, will be posted here the following month.
Interested in Submitting?
Stone’s Throw will open for submissions the first three days of every month, from 12AM on the first through 12AM on the fourth (with some wiggle room here and there to account for the editors being human). We’re looking for all the same dark fiction, crime, and noir as our usual submissions, but with a target length between 1,000 and 2,000 words, and aligned with the monthly submissions prompt (see below). We’ll read through each story, choose the one story that shines brightest, and publish it online the following month, paying $25 per accepted story.
After a year, we’ll collect all twelve stories into a Stone’s Throw Annual Anthology, to be published alongside our other print issues.
PLEASE NOTE — If you have been accepted within the calendar year for Stone’s Throw, you are ineligible to submit again during that same calendar year. However, we look forward to reading your submissions during our regular RHP Magazine open calls!
Upcoming Submissions Prompts
JANUARY SUBMISSIONS (opens December 1 - 4, 2024) — The holidays are over, and it's time to get back on the straight and narrow. Easier said than done, though. This month, we want stories about overindulgence. Opulence. Living beyond your means. Whether that's money, drugs, generosity, or viciousness, we want stories about people who overdo it, and what happens when they realize they’re in a hole they can’t hope to fill. Click here to submit.
FEBRUARY SUBMISSIONS (opens January 1 - 4, 2025) — There’s always a bigger fish, and this month, give us stories of characters who think they’re the top of the food chain, only to find out in spectacular fashion that they are, in fact, way out of their depth. We want hubris. We want bravado. And then, we want the sinking feeling that you can only get when you realize you’re just a minnow swimming with a bunch of sharks.
MARCH SUBMISSIONS (opens February 1 - 4, 2025) — March is in like a lion and out like a lamb, but this month at Stone’s Throw, we want to reverse it. Give us meek characters who find their fire by the end of the story. What happens when repression gives way to hedonism and rage? Or maybe your protagonist was already a secret badass, and just needed that nudge to show their true stripes? Maybe they go too far, and have to make sense of what they’ve done when they come back to their senses? Keep it within the usual RHP boundaries.
APRIL SUBMISSIONS (opens March 1 - 4, 2025) — Fuck it. It’s Hector Acosta’s birthday month, and to get him off our backs, send us noir stories featuring either pro-wrestling, or pop-punk. All of the other usual Rock and a Hard Place rules still apply. Editor’s Note—no Gundams. It’s a bridge too far, Hector . . .
MAY SUBMISSIONS (opens April 1 - 4, 2025) — The saying goes that necessity is the mother of invention, and this month, in honor of Mother’s Day, we want your stories focused on Mama Bears backed into a corner. What will they do to protect their cubs? How do they invent a justification for crossing the uncrossable line? And was it all worth it? Remember, the tagline for Rock and a Hard Place is “bad decisions and desperate people.”
JUNE SUBMISSIONS (opens May 1 - 4, 2025) — Happy Pride Month! Rock and a Hard Place Press is a proud ally of the LGBTQ+ community, and this month, we want stories where the pride rainbow isn’t quite as bright. Queer characters (and queer people, for that matter) put up with enough bullshit from homophobes and transphobes, and this month we want noir tales where they turn the tables on the haters in fabulous and brutal ways.
JULY SUBMISSIONS (opens June 1 - 4, 2025) — School’s out for summer, and this month at the Throw, we want stories of junior rocketeers discovering the darker side of summer break. We’re looking for noir coming-of-age tales, set against the backdrop of freedom afforded by summer recess. Keep it dark, keep it mean, but don’t glorify violence committed against children . . . it’s got to be in service to the story.
AUGUST SUBMISSIONS (opens July 1 - 4, 2025) — We recognize National Women’s Equality Day on August 26, commemorating the adoption of the 19th Amendment in 1920, which granted women the right to vote. This month, we want women-led stories and female-identifying protagonists. The sisters are doin’ it for themselves, but when you’re on the receiving end of a Stone’s Throw, that’s not always the safest place to be.
SEPTEMBER SUBMISSIONS (opens August 1 - 4, 2025) — September is smack dab in the middle of Atlantic hurricane season, and the planet is actively trying to kill us all. This month for Stone’s Throw, give us stories of the Earth in revolt. Hundred year storms every other month. Flash flooding. Tornados. Fire-nados. Bee-nados. Shark-nados. How do your characters cope? And do some of them see opportunity in the face of disaster?
OCTOBER SUBMISSIONS (opens September 1 - 4, 2025) — During the month of October, the veil between the living and the dead is at its thinnest. This month, give us stories of haunted characters—either haunted by the remembrance of a lost loved one, or maybe haunted by the things they didn’t do . . . or worse, the things they did do. Supernatural stories are okay (though not a requirement) in response to this prompt, but above all else, make it character-driven, and make it noir.
NOVEMBER SUBMISSIONS (opens October 1 - 4, 2025) — War . . . huh. . . good God, y’all . . . what is it good for? Absolutely nothing. Say it again. This month, give us noir directly from the warzone, however you define that. War is inherently bleak, but we want character-driven turmoil. Remind us why war is hell.
DECEMBER SUBMISSIONS (opens November 1 - 4, 2025) — The office holiday party is the setting for this month’s Stone’s Throw prompt. What happens when you’re forced into a social setting with a bunch of people you would never willingly socialize with except for a paycheck? How does dipping into a less formal space embolden your protagonist to tell Jan from Accounting what they really think of her? What hare-brained schemes can your protagonist come up with after knocking back a few cold ones and eyeing up the unguarded bank safe? And what fresh hell and awkward hangovers await the story’s characters the morning after?
JANUARY SUBMISSIONS (opens December 1 - 4, 2025) — The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. had a dream about the brotherhood of humanity, but dreams don’t always have to be so big . . . or so magnanimous. This month, give us noir on the theme of dreams. Maybe it’s petty dreams about gangland glory, or maybe it’s a story about “a dream deferred” as Langston Hughes wrote. Let’s kick off the new year by taking a look at “what dreams may come,” and what happens next when all your dreams come true . . . or don’t.
Submissions are CURRENTLY CLOSED for our DecEMber SUBMISSIONS WINDOW
New Year, new Stone’s Throw, and it’s time to throw caution to the wind and overdo it! Send us your best noir stories about overindulgence by the 4th at 11:59 PM. Click here to submit.