Doing the Work 03/10/25
Calls for submissions, reading recommendations, writing prompts 03/10/25
Hello friends!
Welcome to the thirteenth installment of our Doing The Work series. Here, we share opportunities for submitting your work, recommend some great reads, and offer creative exercises for you to try.
In this week's edition:
Calls for Submissions: Opportunities for poets, prose writers, and artists.
Reading Recommendations: A selection of writing I've been enjoying recently.
Creative Prompts: Writing exercises to inspire your creativity.
If you find this post helpful, please share it with your friends and family. Enjoy!
Calls for Submission
For those of your familiar with our old project, Poetry is Pretentious, you know we’re big fans of not taking yourself too seriously. So this week, I am suggesting perhaps the least pretentious literary magazine in the world: The Taco Bell Quarterly. They’re simply phenomenal.
I’ll let them describe themselves for you.
Taco Bell Quarterly seeks literary/creative essays, short stories, fiction/prose, poems, comics, art, one act plays, fever dreams, multimedia, stupid status updates, criticisms, manifestos, recipes and anything else that explore any and all elements of Taco Bell. Or not. Shoehorn a chalupa in your short story. Maybe we’ll love it. Review the new Beefy Fritos Burrito and how it reminds you of the time your grandma died? We want it. Something that introduces us to inventive form, dynamic language, and strong voice. Or perhaps it does none of the above. We’re not judgey and pretentious. We’re the Taco Bell fucking Quarterly. We lean towards pieces that are queer and center their pain/joy in a Taco Bell.
P.S. You will need a Submittable account. It is free to make, and I’d highly recommend doing it anyway if you want to start trying to publish work, since many journals use them.
Reading Recommendations
This week we’re sticking with a theme. I’m recommending reading Taco Bell Quarterly Issue 7. It came out in October of last year, and has such absolute gems with titles like, “EVERYONE I HAVE EVER KISSED THINKS ABOUT ME ALL OF THE TIME AND IS IN LOVE WITH ME” and “Poem in the Shape of the Poet Beating Henry Kissinger to Death with Their Bare Hands”.
They’re what we in the business call, “Very Good Poems.”
Writing Prompts
We’re running the gamut of Taco Bell Quarterly content, today. The writing prompt, you guessed it, is to write anything, literally anything, that has even a little bit to do with Taco Bell. It doesn’t have to be a lot, or it could be everything.
Write a poem, write a story, make some art, write a review! Just make sure to slot in a little hot sauce, or perhaps your favorite value menu item. Get creative, but most importantly, have fun.
And if you enjoyed this prompt, feel free to check out our book of writing prompts!
Thank You & Good Luck
If you found this useful, check out last Monday’s post.
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Thanks for reading,
Sam & Corey.