Thank you for your interest in the 21st Century Essays series. We are accepting submissions March 1st-April 30th. Please include as much of the following information as you can when you submit your manuscript materials:

• Title of your manuscript
• General description/overview of your project and what makes it unique. Why would people want to read it? What makes it different and special?
• At least two sample chapters (and expected date of completion), or the full manuscript. Full manuscripts are welcome!
• Word count of the project (we publish manuscripts that range from 45,000-85,000 words), along with information about any images you plan to include.
• CV or Resume

If you are unsure if your project fits the series, please contact Kristen Elias Rowley at eliasrowley.1@osu.edu.

We make every effort to review submissions within 8-10 weeks of the close of the submissions period, so please refrain from sending follow-up inquiries before the end of that time. Thank you!

More info about the series:

This is the first and only major series that announces its focus on the essay, a genre whose plasticity, timelessness, popularity, and centrality to nonfiction writing make it instantly important in the field of nonfiction literature, with books that use words as artistic medium, appealing to literary, academic, and trade audiences. 21st Century Essays is a major addition to the possibilities of contemporary literary nonfiction, focusing on that central, frequently chimerical, and invariably supple form: The Essay.

The 21st Century Essays series is edited by David Lazar, Professor at Columbia College Chicago, and Patrick Madden, Professor at Brigham Young University and Vermont College of Fine Arts. Lazar is the founding editor of Hotel Amerika and is a recipient of a John Simon Guggenheim Fellow in Nonfiction for 2015–2016. Lazar's essay collections include I’ll Be Your Mirror: Essays and Aphorisms, On Character, Occasional Desire and The Body of Brooklyn. Madden is the author of two books of essays, Sublime Physick and Quotidiana (ForeWord magazine and Association for Mormon Letters awards winner) and he is the coeditor with Lazar of After Montaigne: Contemporary Essayists Cover the Essays.

Editorial Advisory Board:

Robert Atwan, Mary Cappello, John D’Agata, Wayne Koestenbaum, Phillip Lopate, Maggie Nelson, Lia Purpura, Claudia Rankine, David Shields