AlienBuddha Press

Alien Buddha Press is open for manuscript submissions! We publish poetry chapbooks, full-length collections, novels, novellas, nonfiction, essays, plays, art/photography books, memoirs, and more!!! Genres We Love: 🔪 Horror, Gothic, Bizarro 🕵️‍♂️ Mystery, Thriller ✊ Protest & Revolutionary Writing ❤️ Love Poems & Rom-Coms 😂 Humorous & Satirical Works Send your manuscript as a Word document [email protected] Include: A third-person bio, a synopsis of your submission, and links to your social media Avoid expand/collapse tabs, built-in tables, sidebar notes, or anything that makes reformatting a nightmare. Royalties & Contracts: Details will be provided upon acceptance. ABP is also open for collaborative themed anthologies on the following subjects: Pride Month 2026 / LGBTQ+ Voices (online feature) Deadline May 30 TOO HOT FOR AMAZON / Previously Banned or Censored Work Deadline July 2 HAIBUNS Deadline July 25 The Nevermore: Speculations on Edgar Allan Poe No set deadline Poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and art inspired by the dreamworld Deadline September 9 Horror Stories (5,000 words max) / Horror Showdown with $450 grand prize Deadline September 21

First Call for Submissions 🏳️‍🌈 The Alien Buddha’s Pride Month 2026 🏳️‍⚧️ Deadline: May 30, 2026 Theme: LGBTQ+ voices Accepting: Poetry, fiction, and nonfiction Open to past Alien Buddha Press contributors featured in a standalone book or one of our zines or anthologies Work must be either about queer pride or written by queer authors Send up to 10 pages as a Word doc to [email protected] Include a third-person bio + social media links If previously published, add a footnote with details

👽 🧘‍♂️ Aviva Lilith is Alien Buddha’s Featured Artist for May 2026 🔮 🌿 alienbuddhapress.wordpress.com/2026/04/29/aviva-lilith-is-alien-buddhas-featured-artist-for-may-2026/ Check out this interview where we talk about her chapbook, unperfect: poems and photos from a hometown, her ongoing involvement in the first ever Alien Buddha’s Perseverance Tournament, visual poetry as a form of storytelling, drawing inspiration from the work of Anne Carson, and much more!

Look for IN THE SHADOWS OF RUMI by Darek Thomas, June 16

Only Horrible Things, I Promise: & Other Stories by Lemmy Winegardner is now available!!! Titular story- alienbuddhapress.wordpress.com/2026/05/12/spotlight-only-horrible-things-i-promise-other-stories-by-lemmy-winegardner/ Paperback- amazon.com/Only-Horrible-Things-Promise-Stories/dp/B0GWRKTND2/ (She wore a tattered, blood-red dress that clung to her curves, ripped and stretched in all the right places. Max was there too. He must have had a day of it. He was completely naked except for a pair of handcrafted thong sandals and his thick, dark body hair. He was smeared with period blood from several different people. Fingerprints of various sizes marked his skin. He looked happy.) New from Alien Buddha Press, these seven demented tales from Lemmy Winegardner push chaos, satire, and bad decisions to the utmost. In the titular mindfuck Only Horrible Things I Promise, Tommy Salami becomes the greatest sandwich artist the world has ever known after he and his polyglot roommates embark on a cannibal Instagram witchcraft cult that bestows strange powers upon them after they eat Small Shaun, a painter whose legs shrink and arms grow every time he creates a new masterpiece. These stories are full of bedlam, sex, drugs, audacity, controversy, murder, social commentary, conspiracies, and many other horrible things, I promise.

A Spider of a Thought Fell Down Onto His Head by Andrew Buckner is now available! Preview- alienbuddhapress.wordpress.com/2026/05/11/spotlight-a-spider-of-a-thought-fell-down-onto-his-head-an-experimental-epic-horror-poem-by-andrew-buckner/ Paperback- amazon.com/dp/B0GX7FJHZN It’s elementary genre logic, but necessary to the exposition at hand, ya understand? Now, back to the blood-soaked woman, who didn’t even know her own birthday, age. family, or any other personal information about herself. All she knew was rage. All she knew was that she was continually fucked over by any and every man she encountered. Thus, lasting relationships, sexual encounters, were not the focal point of her mental gravitation. All she knew was loneliness, the exploration of self, as is the case with all true heroes, resulting in a sense of zero Andrew Buckner is a multi award-winning poet, filmmaker, and screenwriter from Ohio, and with A Spider of a Thought Fell Down Onto His Head, he delivers a wildly original, darkly comedic, deeply symbolic, socially relevant, and unnerving epic experimental poem that lingers like a wound you cannot stop touching. A sword-wielding woman escapes Hell in order to track down a vampire who is leaving a cacophony of destruction in his wake, but this is only the surface of a work that acts as both a running commentary on the current state of society and a fourth wall-breaking glimpse into the creative process. This is Buckner’s 10th book with Alien Buddha Press, following BROADCASTING FROM THE END OF THE WORLD: POEMS AND TALES (2024) and THE BEAUTY IN THE WRECKAGE: OR THE BIBLIOTHECA TREATMENT: AN EXPERIMENTAL HORROR NOVELLA (2026), and it confirms his place as a fearless architect of experimental horror.

The Girl, The Witch, and The Princess by Rickey Rivers Jr. is now available!!!! Chapter 1- alienbuddhapress.wordpress.com/2026/05/10/spotlight-the-girl-the-witch-and-the-princess-by-rickey-rivers-jr/ Paperback- amazon.com/dp/B0GX1M8YBM (“Adventure, dear Tam, adventure!” she said. He smiled back, the sun raining down beams of light onto her. She seemed much younger, dancing in the strange part of the land, happy and free. He wanted very much for her safety, her absolute safety, to please the king, the queen, and even himself. “Adventure,” he said. Tam and the Princess went out further into the forest, talking of all the things that could possibly be.) Rickey Rivers Jr returns with The Girl, The Witch, and The Princess, his 4th book with Alien Buddha Press after Sensurlon (2022), Tree House (2023), and Surlondre (2025). Born and raised in Alabama, a Best of the Net nominated writer and cancer survivor, Rivers continues to build worlds where wonder and danger walk side by side. A bridge separates monsters from the Kingdom of Lyrac, and chaos ensues once the bridge is broken and monsters start disappearing. Aria must deal with the problems of her past. The princess, Emilia, is trapped with the monsters, while a mysterious stranger walks among them. Rivers threads these elements with a quiet intensity, where even a whispered poem in a prison cell can stir longing, fear, and something like love. His work, seen in Stellium Literary Magazine, the Nightlight Podcast, and Cosmic Horror Monthly, carries that same pulse here. The result is a tale of magic, memory, and uneasy boundaries, where the line between monster and memory never stays still for long.

The Alien Buddha’s House of Horrors 9 & The Alien Buddha’s 2026 Horror Showdown What’s New for 2026 • Word limit increased to 5,000 words • Past judges may submit stories two years after serving • Horror Showdown grand prize increased to $450 Deadline: September 21, 2026 We are accepting horror stories across all subgenres! Send your story as a Word document attachment to [email protected] Include a third-person author bio, a short synopsis of your story, & a link to your social media. Accepted stories will receive a contract for the contest. All submissions to the 2026 Horror Showdown are automatically considered for The Alien Buddha’s House of Horrors 9. Acceptance into the anthology makes your story a semifinalist in the 2026 Horror Showdown. After publication, with the help of guest judges Drew Huff (Divine Flesh), John Sara (The Poet Who Cried Monster), and Brooklyn Attic Books (New York indie horror promoter), Alien Buddha Press will narrow the field to five finalists. The final five stories will be posted publicly, followed by an open online poll to determine the 2026 Horror Showdown Champion. The winner will receive $450 ahead of Halloween 2026. This year’s cover art, inspired by Yellowjackets, was created by Hannah Prokop of Grr in Girl Designs.

‘On the Shoulders of Giants’ by Darek Thomas is now available!!! Preview first 5 poems- alienbuddhapress.wordpress.com/2026/05/09/spotlight-on-the-shoulders-of-giants-by-darek-thomas/ Paperback- amazon.com/dp/B0GWXQTLWQ I chased the boar that chased a man In a pig’s pin, ‘round the corner in a pig’s jam. Without its whiskers without its fangs. I have tamed a world that was never tame. Now I turn the boar into bacon into ham. And feed the sick. And feed the weak. And feed the damned. On the Shoulders of Giants marks Darek Thomas’ 7th book with Alien Buddha Press, following Overcoming My Fear of Nature and Lyrics of a Dark Sunrise, and it reads like a voice that has been sharpening itself for nearly thirty years. Darek Thomas is a graduate of CSU-Pueblo with an honorary degree in History. He has studied creative writing at Elgin Community College, Pueblo Community College and at CSU-Pueblo. Currently he is serving on The Historic Preservation Commission and on the Trinidad Urban Renewal Authority in Trinidad Colorado. He has written poetry for nearly thirty years and this is his second collection of poetry. There is restless and biblically damned understanding here. The result is a collection that feels untamed, always reaching beyond itself for that magic combination of words.

Look for Fatherhood Meanings by Jack Love, August 1

Subscribe to Alien Buddha Press! Digital Subscription- $25/year Get a PDF of every new Alien Buddha Press release emailed straight to your inbox on launch day. Alien Buddha Zine Subscription — $80/year (US & UK) Receive a brand new issue of Alien Buddha Zine mailed to your door every month. Bundle Subscription — $100/year Get the best of both worlds: digital + zine subscription, plus a bonus themed anthology as a 13th paperback. [email protected] to subscribe via paypal, or for more info Venmo- @ AlienBuddhaPress Upcoming releases from Darek Thomas, Rickey Rivers Jr, Andrew Buckner, Lemmy Winegardner, Mark James Andrews, Mary Coleman, Angela Arnold, Cosmic Brich, Louisa M. Reid, David Woodward, Carole Johnston, Richard Wayne Horton, Phoenix, Joseph Cooper, Anthony Le Chavez, Ron Scully, Jon Wesick, and many more.