Black Denim Lit welcomes thoughtful writers, new and established. Without entering into a debate as to what qualifies as "literary," we are looking for fiction up to 7,500 words that has unique and lasting artistic merit. Why "Black Denim"...? In work clothes, black denim is a less pretentious than khaki and more understated than blue jeans. This typifies the tone of writing style that appeals to us: grounded, approachable and unassuming. Don't get us wrong--bring the grit, complexity, humor and strength. We look at a lot of genre work after all. But our tastes consider that "lasting artistic merit" can emerge from almost anywhere. Does the denim reference imply that we are looking for only "American" stories? No. The work we love comes from all over the world--Afghanistan, India, France, Korea, China, Australia and so on, written by students, graduates, academicians and working-class folk. They are all writers, meaning they write out of pure love for the art form. It shows.