New Challenge - 11 Word Story

We really want to challenge you this time. Write us a story, something haunting, creepy, scary, spooky, slithering. But you can only use 11 words. Do not distress! You can do this.

The girl tried to stand, but her leg wasn't there anymore.
Being invisible was the best thing of all, until it wasn't.
While eating the pages, Tex didn't see the 'T' with teeth.


Guidelines

The story must be 11 words in length, no more, no fewer. Not eleventy, not eleventeen, 11 words. ELEVEN!!!

Please send your entries to junipertreelit@gmail.com and put "11 Word Story" in the subject line or else your email will be eaten by the Spamster and never found again.

Deadline for submissions is Saturday, August 20. The winner will be announced on Monday, August 22.

For the name of your document please put your story/artwork name, underscore and your name. Ex: ToesForEating_MarjorieMerle.doc

You can submit your work as a Word document or stick it directly in the email to junipertreelit@gmail.com and please forgive us in advance if we don't write back to you immediately. Tex is fairly anal about reading and viewing everything we get. With your submission please tell us a little bit about yourself and please send us your website if you have one. If you don't have one, get one. They are free, you know.

For the rest of the guidelines and what should not be submitted, go to our Submissions & Guidelines page.

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Get down with the goods on Google+ 

Don't forget to check out our August Issue

Blast from the Past: Rats Edition - TWO DAYS LEFT!

I can hear your pens scratching away. Two days until the deadline. Quickly, poppets, quickly!

In under 500 words, write us a piece inspired by this photo. Your piece can be poetry or a short story as long as it is under 500 words. If you can think of other creative ways to be inspired by this photo, go ahead and surprise us! The winner (or winners) of the challenge will be featured in the September issue!

Deadline for submission: Saturday, August 6. The winners will be announced Monday, August 8.

With your submission please put in the subject line "Blast from the Past - Rats Edition". 

For the name of your document please put your story/artwork name, underscore and your name. Ex: ToesForEating_MarjorieMerle.doc

You can submit your work as a Word document or stick it directly in the email to junipertreelit@gmail.com and please forgive us in advance if we don't write back to you immediately. Tex is fairly anal about reading and viewing everything we get. With your submission please tell us a little bit about yourself and please send us your website if you have one. If you don't have one, get one. They are free, you know.

For the rest of the guidelines and what should not be submitted, go to our Submissions & Guidelines page.

We look forward to your creative mind-doodles!

Be our fiendish friend on Facebook 

Follow our terribly terrific tête-à-tête on Twitter 

Don't forget to check out our July issue

August Issue

Hello everyone! It's been a flurry of activity getting everyone's pieces clothed, brushed, fed and shoved into  our August issue but we did it. Thank you to all the lovely people who put all their sweat and mostly blood into this issue. Thank you again to our Murder of Editors for taking their time to dissect each word. Thanks Tex for restraining of scaring off any contributors with your unappetizing diet.

My pleasure, darling.

Drum roll please!

Drrrrrrrummm roooollllllllllll

The August issue!

Open publication - Free publishing - More dark

UPDATE: To download a PDF of the issue, visit our bookshelf at http://issuu.com/underneaththejunipertree. Open the publication and underneath the issue is an option to download or print the issue. 

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Get down with the goods on Google+ 

A THRILLING Contest in Collaboration with Literary Asylum and Walden Pond Press!

Ahh, my lovely, fleshy, ripe for the taking friends...


Marjorie is taking a nap so I snuck down from the attic to try this blogging thing for myself. Nom Nom! I like it so far!


So you want something exciting? Something more exciting than we've already given you over the past few months? You greedy toe suckers! That's alright. I'm right there with you. So here you go:


Our devilish friend D.M. Cunningham over at Literary Asylum, in cahoots with Walden Pond Press and yours truly, is hosting a thrilling contest to die for!


Here's the low down: In celebration of the upcoming release of Walden Pond Press' Guys Read: THRILLER (Aug 2011), we want YOU to give us your best opening paragraph (or two) of the most thrilling, terrifying, spooky, creepy, and crazy MG/YA story you can muster.

Contest Rules

1) Submit your best work up to two paragraphs. Anything beyond that will not be read and taken out of the running.

2) Send your submissions in the BODY of the email, not attachments (they will not be opened) to the following emails (either or - no need to do both) LiteraryAsylum@hotmail.com OR junipertreelit@gmail.com.

3) Be sure to put THRILLER contest submission in the RE: Line or it may get overlooked.

4) Deadline is OCTOBER 13th (why? because we like that number) at MIDNIGHT

5) Follow our blogs (links above) and join us on Twitter

@WaldenPondPress
@UndertheJuniper
@JuniperTreeLit
@LiteraryAsylum

6) Most of all, have fun and keep the kids in mind. Let's give them stories that will keep them reading late at night!


Prizes? You ask? Greedy...I like it!


The top writer will receive a copy of GR:THRILLER signed by the ambassador of Children's Lit himself Jon Scieszka. And, your paragraph(s) will appear in an upcoming issue of UTJT. 


WAIT, there is more! The winning writer will be interviewed on the Literary Asylum blog to celebrate your thrilling job well done. Now those are some gruesome prizes!


So hop to it. 


Tex? What are you doing on my computer?


Ummm... researching... exploding brains? OOPS GOTTA GO!

Be our fiendish friend on Facebook 

Follow our terribly terrific tête-à-tête on Twitter 

Don't forget to check out our July issue

Blast from the Past: Rats Edition - ONE WEEK LEFT!

You heard right, headless pumpkins, you have only one week to enter your submission for the Blast from the Past: Rats Edition challenge. Haste, friends, haste!

In under 500 words, write us a piece inspired by this photo. Your piece can be poetry or a short story as long as it is under 500 words. If you can think of other creative ways to be inspired by this photo, go ahead and surprise us! The winner (or winners) of the challenge will be featured in the September issue!

Deadline for submission: Saturday, August 6. The winners will be announced Monday, August 8.

With your submission please put in the subject line "Blast from the Past - Rats Edition". 

For the name of your document please put your story/artwork name, underscore and your name. Ex: ToesForEating_MarjorieMerle.doc

You can submit your work as a Word document or stick it directly in the email to junipertreelit@gmail.com and please forgive us in advance if we don't write back to you immediately. Tex is fairly anal about reading and viewing everything we get. With your submission please tell us a little bit about yourself and please send us your website if you have one. If you don't have one, get one. They are free, you know.

For the rest of the guidelines and what should not be submitted, go to our Submissions & Guidelines page.

We look forward to your creative mind-doodles!

Be our fiendish friend on Facebook 

Follow our terribly terrific tête-à-tête on Twitter 

Don't forget to check out our July issue

Be one of our Contributors

Being one of our contributors is hard work. Having to write scary stories until they cry,

eating toes to keep invigorated,

running into dark forests to find the fantastically ferocious creatures that inspire their stories; it's really something to be in awe about.

Do you think you could do what our contributors do? Why don't you give it a shot: we are accepting general submissions of short stories (2000 word maximum), poetry, limericks, doodles, drawings, paintings, ghost rants, robot rhymes,

severed toes,

(please send those to Tex only) and any sort of rambunctious and stupendous stanza you might have secretly stowed away in that brain of yours.

Tell your friends. Your neighbors. Deceased ancestors.

Don't forget to check out our July issue

The Man in Galloway Bay - Dawn Pisturino

A man lost in Galloway Bay,

Cried out in a very loud bray,

"Please come rescue me, 

hungry sharks can't agree,

Am I breakfast or dinner entree?"

The Man in Galloway Bay

Written by Dawn Pisturino 

Don't forget to check out our July issue.

Monthly Contest - Time Travel

Here at UTJT, we not only sneak into dark forests and romp in swamps, we also slip through space in our marvelously metal time machine!

This month's contest is all about time travel. Perhaps your characters glide through time with a jet pack not unlike this image to the left here. Or maybe they use giant, glossy baubles? Or maybe they don't need a time machine at all, instead flying through time by entering a cave guarded by savage crocodile beasts with scales so sharp they cut through bone with the slightest bit of pressure.

Guidelines
Stories and drawings/paintings/doodles must be about time travel. However you think time travel should be done, let us know in short story form (2000 words or fewer) or an image (one image per artist). It must also fit our guidelines in our Submit Work page. Submissions that do not adhere to the requirements will not be considered so read carefully!!!!! If you aren't sure as to what we accept, thumb through our June and July issues or scan the site to see what we're all about.

Only the most curious and imaginative pieces will be chosen and featured in the August issue of Underneath The Juniper Tree. If your pieces doesn't win but we're terribly keen on it (and Tex is in a good mood that day), we'll feature it on the site. The winning images will also be featured in Featured Artists located on the right sidebar.

When emailing us, please put "Time Travel" in the subject line.

With your submission, please include a short bio (50 - 75 words) about yourself written in third person with your name (or alias) and your website if you have one.

Email your story or artistic rendering to junipertreelit@gmail.com
Submission deadline: July 25, 2011
The winners will be announced in the August 2011 online issue which is free for all eager eyes to nom on.

We look forward to reading all your submissions and potentially eating a few. Good luck to everyone!


Don't forget to check out our July issue.

Blast from the Past - Fox Edition Winners!

The entries were nothing short of horribly creative and terrifying terrific! Thank you to everyone who entered. Your creativity and constant rhythm of words never fails to amaze us.

The toe bribes help as well.

Oh, too true, Tex, too true.

Now – the winner of the Fox Edition is......

Jenn Preston Chushchoff with her piece Now He Has None. The piece will be featured in the August issue of Underneath The Juniper Tree.

I hate waiting, you know.

Don't we all Tex, don't we all! So below is her lovely written ditty with a sea shanty tune we can all sing along to in our minds while we toil away at the day. Let it begin, Jenn!

Charles and Victoria booed and hissed as Johnny sang a favorite sea chantey. The song was in poor taste considering the prior evening’s event. 

     Away, away, get the anchor aweigh!

    Our ship must set sail on the bonny sea.

    Goodbye, farewell. Give a heave, get it done.

    We’re homeward bound, we’re leaving.

    If you don’t pull, you’ll walk the plank

    or have your head nailed to one.

To be fair, Charles had a weak upper body. 

Now he has none.

And just a friendly reminder that your Edward Gorey - Chapter II submission deadline is on Tuesday!

The horror.

Quite. SO! Stop procrastinating and get it done and sent it in. You'll feel better about it in the morning.
junipertreelit@gmail.com 

Blast from the Past - Fox Edition: Deadline

Just a friendly reminder that your Blast from the Past - Fox Edition submission deadline is TOMORROW!!!

The horror.

Quite. SO! You have until midnight tomorrow night to send them in.

junipertreelit@gmail.com

July Issue - Sneak Peek

In next month's issue I will be touching on something very near and dear to me.

Me?

The Beast. Most of you don't know about the animal that haunts the shadows in my house. Find out in the July Issue. Come back July 1st for the whole tale as I dive into the story that has become legend of The Beast and I.

The Beast and I – Part I:

I watched him gallop around, exploring the world with his teeth. Laying down, he was already as tall as I was standing up.

It wasn’t long before they were after us. Get that monster out of here, they hissed. 

Now you can keep up to date with our weekly challenges, monthly contests and giveaways! They are all on the right side of the screen.

And don't forget about our Friendly Contest! We want to give you free books. It's easy to enter and anyone can enter as many times (as many friends) as they have/want! Please pay attention to what you have to do or else you won't be entered and we want you to win. So.

Good luck!

Welcome to Underneath The Juniper Tree

Hello Friends. Oh my, you are looking sparkly today. Welcome to the first day of Underneath The Juniper Tree. As Geraldine McCaughrean of The White Darkness would say for Titus Oates, 'Warm, isn't it.'

Yes, darling.

Yes, thank you Tex. Introductions are always sticky, aren't they. For records and notes and Keepers of Minutes Or Things Such As That, I'm Marjorie and you can read about how I came to be The Keeper Of The Stories in the About page. Tex is my faithful companion who sleeps in The Attic with The Stories so they don't run off and get lost.

To make a long introduction short, Underneath The Juniper Tree is an online magazine dedicated with it's whole soul to children's literature and artwork; particularly the creepy, prickly, what's-that-noise kind. The pricklier and more creative the better. If you are looking for something soft like warm pudding you've come through the wrong door little poppet. Hurry back, now.

Before the wolves come out.

Quite. For the rest of you, we welcome you with open arms. You will like this place, I'm sure.

Each week we'll gather on the stairs to share some of the spine-tingling stories we've found up in The Attic and with them delicious pieces of artwork for your eyes to feast on.

Each month there will be a contest for both writers and artists. You can enter one piece of work only for each contest and if yours is selected, it will be in the next month's issue. Artists, if you work is selected it will be displayed in our lovely Featured Artists space in the right side bar as well as the monthly issue. You can see the contests and their deadlines/requirements by clicking on the Contests tab. Please read carefully for fear that you may not be chosen if you don't follow the guidelines properly. The contest beginning today is the Sinister Summer Stories contest. Please remember that anyone can enter, but all work shown on Underneath The Juniper Tree is for children nine years old up to ninety-nine years old.

I'm a centenarian.

Then to nine hundred ninety-nine, how abouts? There will always be chances to submit work beyond just the monthly contests so please come back often and see what perks your monster under the bed.

There is also an opportunity to help out Underneath The Juniper Tree by becoming one of our editors. The Attic is stacked full, my darlings, and there is much to do. We also are accepting book reviews for any children's books that you think should be lifted up and shown to the world.

So welcome. Stay for awhile. And always come back. We miss you already.