22 February 2016 - What's new
22 February 2016
- The Basil Bunting Poetry Award 2016 has a First Prize of £1,000, a Second Prize of £750 and a Third Prize of £250. It closes on 7 March and is open to all poets writing in English. The up-to-date picture on Writing Opportunities.
- 'Nick Clee asks in this week's Bookbrunch if you need to transcend a prize to win it, inspired by the Costa win by Frances Hardinge's children's book. In this age of proliferating book prizes it's a reasonable question to ask, but does anyone really think that literary prizes should be thrown open to those who are writing, for instance, category romance or horror fiction?...' This week's News Review.
- Our 19-part Inside Publishing series gives you an insider's take on the publishing world, covering everything from subsidiary rights to the world English language market, from advances and royalties to the writer/publisher financial relationship. 'There's no escaping the fact that publishers and authors are essentially in an adversarial position. Even in the very best and most supportive publisher/writer relationships there is the tension caused by the fact that authors would like to earn as much as possible from their writing and publishers to pay as little as they can get away with. Understanding this is part of working your way through the relationship so as to come out of it in the way that best suits you as the writer...'
- ‘I knew this book would be my last chance and admit that before I wrote it, and even in the early stages, there was a fair amount of despair. People, like I was, are intrigued by what they see or imagine on a travel route. I'm sure, too, that Rachel's weaknesses as an unusual and troubled person, can be identified with...' Paula Hawkins, author of The Girl on a Train, which shot to the top of the bestseller lists in the UK and US when it was published last year, provides this week's Comment.
- Our links: does the class system really make a difference to writers? How The Literary Class System Is Impoverishing Literature | Literary Hub; making academic journals freely available, Why one woman stole 47 million academic papers - and made them all free to read - Vox; what made one mother turn to writing for children, Shirley Hughes's Dogger: one of the greatest picture books ever | Children's books | The Guardian; and do gender and other demographic factors actually affect reading? Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus, But What About Readers? | Digital Book World.
- Which Report? gives the details of the three reports we offer: the full Editor's Report, the basic Reader's Report and the most substantial Editor's Report Plus. There's also our specialist Children's reports, part of our Children's Editorial Services. If you want a professional editor's assessmen of your work, here's the place to start.
- More links: a good article to read if you're thinking of publishing your own book, Self-publishing a book: 25 things you need to know - CNET; how digital platforms are transforming the selling of rights for authors and publishers - or are they? Rights Platforms: Can Digital Match the Human Touch? - Publishing Perspectives; and prizes and genres, BookBrunch - Do you have to 'transcend' a genre to win a prize?
- Your submission package and how to put it together - 'given the difficulty of getting agents and publishers to take on your work, it's really important to make sure that you present it in the best possible way. Less is more, so don't send a full manuscript, as it's very unlikely to be read. Far better to tempt them with a submission package that will leave them wanting to see the rest of the manuscript'.
- 'To be a literary agent: it's a modest job. But it's a job that's important for the writer. It's a position that you take the right decision for your clients. And the problem is that the ego [of the agents] can get in the way. It's very important that the agency is a person, one person. It's not about money.' Super-agent Carmen Balcells, not long before she died, in this week's Writers' Quotes.
