There are a few guidelines we would like you to follow, should you like to submit something for viewing on the site. It's for your own good... well, more ours, actually, but that's beside the point.
1. You must send any works not already posted on this page to lucentnightsong@hotmail.com in one of two formats: either in .html format attached to the email, or in the body of the email itself. There is no real preference as far as this goes, but those are the ONLY two formats we will accept. If you send something in some other format... well, we'll simply ask you to resubmit. Also, make certain to include the name of the work and your own name (your penname will suffice, of course) in the subject of the email. Your work will NOT go up if you don't at least submit it correctly.
2. If you're a first-time author, you will most likely have your story go through the committee. Now, this isn't some big bad thing like it sounds, or some group of super-authors looking to tear your story apart. No indeed. All they check is to see if you follow the basic rules of grammar - correct grammar, and at least an ATTEMPT at correct spelling (that's why they make spell checkers) is very important if you want your work up on the page - and to make certain that your story doesn't break any of the other rules. It's not going to take an act of Congress to get your work on the page, just some time and effort on your part to make sure that things look as good as you can make them.
3. Once your story has been approved, send future chapters of it to this address for posting. Keep in mind that just because your story got approved doesn't mean that you no longer have to pay attention to quality; I can read, you know, and will try to read as many of the stories on the site as possible. Also, do not send bios and things of that nature to the committee box. This is rather annoying, and only makes it more difficult for me to get them up (my personal address runs through outlook express; the committee one does not). I repeat: unless your bio contains something you think would need to be approved by the committee, which it had better not, just send it here.
4. When I said we're taking the shackles off of what you can write, I meant it. However, that does not mean that I will post any sort of pornographic material up on the site. Believe me, I won't have to make a choice to; it won't make it past the committee. Such things are not what we think fit under our site's 'umbrella'. That said, you should not worry about inhibitions too much in a truly good story. No, we don't want you writing sex scenes in graphic detail... that does not mean that there can be no such thing as sex in your story. Think realism, of course, but don't make it the point of your story, and don't write any scenes that could be viewed as pointless smut... or they won't make it on the page. Simple, no?
5. Don't cuss for the sake of cussing. While I am all against censorship, there is such a thing as too much. It is one thing to have your characters let out expletives - some characters, in fact, have personalities that demand they use them. It is quite another for you yourself to overuse them in the narration itself.
6. A new thing: I am perfectly willing to accept poetry; however, I would prefer it (at least in original work) in 'collections'. This saves me a lot of time, especially if you submit thirty some odd poems (condensing those poems into three or four collections is much easier than making me throw up thirty links).