Hen&ink opens to submissions at scheduled times, colloquially known as Open Coop Day, announced on social media and here on this page. If we are not open to unsolicited submissions, please do not send any. Unsolicited submissions sent while we are closed will be deleted without being read.

If you have been invited to send us a query, please do so per the instructions in the invitation.

What we’re pecking for when the doors open:

• Illustrators who can write.
• Smart and funny and moving MG fiction
• Fantastic Voice
• Characters that we care about
• Tons of atmosphere
• Pacey, action-packed plots with heart
• Rich writing
• Dialogue that sings
• Smart humor
• Graphic novels: Would be thrilled to see a graphic novel dummy for a middle-grade story.

Double Yolks, a.k.a. Big Positives:

• A really funny, yet poignant, illustrated/graphic novel for girls (but not a comic book)
• An original and surprising friendship story
• A big family MG story
• Atmospheric writing
• Setting as character
• Writing that makes us laugh and cry (and sweat) and laugh again
• Good spelling and grammar and paying attention to formatting
• Gorgeous use of simile and metaphor
• Poetic writing (not to be confused with poetry)
• Grounded fantasy
• A little magic

Rotten Eggs, a.k.a. What We Don’t Want to See:

• Picture books
• Fowl stories. Fowl puns. Fowl jokes.
• Toilet humor
• One-note payoffs
• Didactic, message-y, or knock-you-over-the-head issue stories
• Poetry and rhyme or novels in verse
• Historical fiction
• Heavy subjects with no levity
• Derivative work that makes us say, “Where did I read this before?”
• Stories without a beginning, middle, end
• Horror, gore, or gratuitous violence
• Traditional fables, folklore, or fairytales
• High fantasy
• Academic writing and projects specifically for educational or institutional markets
• Stories that drift / “mood pieces”
• Self-indulgent narrative that waxes on and loses the reader
• YA