Close encounters in war are, before anything else, life experiences that change in depth those who make them. The Close Encounters in War Journal proposes an experimental encounter between scholarly research and forms of creative and non-fictional writing whose roots go deep into experience and imagination.

This section of the journal is divided into three subsections (Poetry, Fiction, and Testimonies and Autobiographical Essays) and is meant to be a space for creativity and exploration of all forms of writing that help us understand war more thoroughly as a multifaceted and complex experience. We invite storytellers, veterans, practitioners, relatives and friends of veterans, poets, writers, therapists, and much more to submit their contributions to the CEIWJ. We will be happy and grateful to read your original work about your encounters in and with war, real and imagined.

We consider short stories, novellas, creative non-fiction, flash fiction, monologues and plays. We accept historical fiction, speculative fiction, science fiction, autofiction, and more. What we do not consider is: novels, unnecessary graphic violence and sex, verbal abuse, and any kind of writing that deliberately offends or hurts people and their feelings. We will select and publish the best, most insightful, and inspiring contributions.

If you wish to submit autobiographical texts about your first-hand war experiences, please consider the “Testimonies and Autobiographical Essays” section.

Please observe these basic guidelines:

Short stories: max. 10,000 words

Novellas, monologues, and plays: max. 30,000 words

Poetry: max. 10 poems per submission

Autobiographical texts: max. 10,000 words

Check your text for typos and misspellings before sending it. Do not add double spaces after a full stop. Use “…” (not ‘…’) for dialogues.

Please send your texts in English (either American or British) to ceiwj@nutorevelli.org. There is no deadline for submitting your work, and we accept proposals year-round. We will read everything. Please allow us some time to answer.

Please remember that the CEIWJ is an independent publication, and we cannot offer any economic compensation to our authors.