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Now that The Disappointed Housewife has quite a few miles on its odometer, it’s time to announce a change in our submission requirements.

Prose pieces should now come in under 1000 words.

Different editors have different ideas of what flash fiction and CNF are—some, unreasonably, I think, limiting it to less than 500 words—but here at The Disappointed Housewife I’ve learned that 1000 words is usually enough room for writers to stretch out, get comfortable, and wow readers with their vision. More than that and many potential readers, I’m sorry to say, pass it by. Our page view stats are pretty clear on this point.

Do take a moment now to review our submission guidelines for more information. We continue to require your text to be pasted into the body of an email to thedisappointedhousewife@gmail.com, a detail that many contributors are somehow missing. Failure to comply with this one only takes extra time and delays a decision on your work. Attachments are acceptable for visual pieces in the form of photos, which can be viewed without downloading.

Here’s the paragraph in the guidelines reflecting the new requirements:

Flash fiction and creative nonfiction should be 1000 words or less. Submit only one piece at a time. Submit up to three poems. For items that are harder to categorize (lists, faux official documents, parodic advertising, humorous-text tattoos …), we’ll know the right length when we see it, but understand that exceptions to the word limit are going to be rare.

Thanks for your understanding and for your continued support of The Disappointed Housewife.

Kevin Brennan
Editor