We are grateful for the chance to evaluate your work. It not only gives our distinguished editors the opportunity to give you feedback but it will also give Memoir Journal a chance to get to know you better. Our organization publishes two issues of our periodical Memoir(and) a year. It is not unusual to receive between two to three thousand submissions per submission period. Out of those, we have to choose roughly a dozen prose pieces and 12 to 14 poetry submissions to be published per issue.

So, what makes a piece worthy of the final round of review? And why do some pieces get rejected after the first round? These are the questions we would like to answer for you by having one of our devoted editors carefully review and critique your work. While this does not place you at the front of the acceptance line, it will give you an idea of what we look for in a memoir. And that should also help you when seeking publication with other literary publications around the world.

Here is a summary of what we need and what we can give:

1. A one page written critique of a memoir submission for a minimum donation of $25 for pieces up to 5,000 words or a minimum donation of $50 for pieces between 5,000 to 10,000 words.

2.  Memoirs submitted for a critique should follow our Submission Guidelines for online and snail mail submissions.

3. It may take a few weeks to complete your critique, but if you need it sooner rather than later, please let our staff know and we can see what we can do to accommodate your request

If you are interested in participating, please contact Production Coordinator, Madison Brewer, via email at mbrewer [at] memoirjournal.com or call our office at 510.594.1059. We look forward to hearing from you!