In 2006, 2007 and 2008, some wonderful and talented authors contributed their creative efforts to three anthologies, By the Chimney With Care, Carols and Crimes, Gifts and Grifters, and Dying In a Winter Wonderland. Because of those wonderful folks, Wolfmont Press was able to contribute almost $6,700 to the Toys for Tots Foundation over those three years, and make some underprivileged kids much happier than they would have been. Our target for this year's anthology is to be able to contribute $3,500 more to Toys for Tots.

This year, noted short-story author John M. Floyd will be compiling and editing the anthology. John has two published collections of his own short stories, as well as literally hundreds of his stories published in a variety of online and print venues and anthologies. I was honored that John was willing to take on this task, and I’m sure he’ll do a fine job.

We are often asked, "What will be contributed to the Toys for Tots?" The answer is, "All publisher profits." That means, all the money remaining after paying the expenses of production, printing, distribution, review copies, contributors' copies, shipping and promotions. No contributor receives any payment for his or her work, although if the contributor buys copies at a discount from the publisher they are welcome to do what they wish with any profits they make—we have no control over that, and don't wish to have control of it. Booksellers obviously will keep any profits from sale of the anthology. So, we don't know the exact amount that will go to the Toys for Tots until after all the expenses are tallied up.

We are now looking for contributors for the fourth anthology, The Gift of Murder, scheduled for release October 1, 2009. Stories should be between 2,000 and 4,000 words in length and should focus on a crime that occurs during the winter holiday season. Those wintertime holidays include Christmas, Hanukkah and Kwanzaa, and we encourage you to submit a story themed with any of those holidays in mind! The story may occur in the present day or in a historical setting. It may be serious or humorous, mystical or down-to-earth. Most importantly, it must be well-written and properly reflect the theme of the anthology.

The story may involve a murder, although it is not required. But we do want to keep it relatively “family friendly” in that the “spatter factor” should be low, no torture or other distasteful things of that nature, and gutter language should be minimized. We understand that this is a crime anthology, but we also know that many people buy this because of the charitable side of it, not because they particularly want to read the "usual" crime fiction. They are looking for something different.

Contributors for this anthology will be a mix of invited authors and open submission, about fifty-fifty. The competition may be stiff, as this has been a popular project since its inception.

Potential contributors should also be cognizant of the fact that, because this is not commercially a big hit with the bookstores (the discount is low to maximize the amount going to the kids), we really need authors who are willing to go the extra mile to promote the book. The authors for the last three anthologies have been great and we'd like to continue that trend. We would prefer authors who are willing to commit to signings, try to get local newspaper coverage or radio coverage, talk up the book to their friends and neighbors, etc. Remember all those Girl Scout cookies you bought from the neighbors’ kids? What goes around, comes around.

The book will be published in trade paperback, approximately 220 to 240 pages and either 5"x8" or 5.5" x 8.5", and will have a retail price of around $11 to $12.

Essentially, the conditions are these:

 

To submit, send your story as an attached file, either RTF or MS Word format, to this email address: toysfortots(AT)wolfmont(DOT)com

You should receive an autoreply when you send your story.