Writing is the easy part. Finding a home for your work is more difficult. That’s why I, like many other writers of short fiction, are indebted to those who find and list the markets for those. There are three sources that I frequently use.

The first is Submission Grinder. As of today, it has details of 2784 open markets. You can search by a range of criteria and the best part is a database that allows you to log submissions. It then uses this data to provide an average response time for each market, prompting you to chase anything outstanding.

The next is Ralan, a long established and easy to search site. I especially like the way it is divided into categories so that you can easily distinguish between professional and non-paying markets. Like the Submission Grinder it encourages writers to send in updates so that you can help keep listings up-to-date.

Finally there is the Horror Tree. I subscribe to the free weekly newsletter which almost always has a market that I haven’t seen before and helpfully copies the guidelines. There’s also some original fiction and other interesting features.

All three are not-for-profit sites run by writers who are interested in helping others. Their efforts are much appreciated.

Paul Williams is a writer of fiction and non-fiction. His study of the Jack the Ripper suspects is available now.