Horror is experiencing a literary boom with a record-breaking year of sales, as editors and agents reveal a rise in submissions from the scarier side of fiction.
Agents have predicted continued demand in 2023 for feel-good stories as well as a romance and ‘romantasy' boom thanks to TikTok but say there could be a shift this year towards darker, genre-busting and challenging books.
Transatlantic author Catriona Ward, 41, published two well-received gothic horror novels, both historical, before switching things up and setting her third, The Last House on Needless Street, on the edge of a forest in contemporary America. It became her breakout book, a bestseller described by Stephen King as a "true nerve-shredder". Read more
Like a horror-movie villain who just will not die, Stephen King haunts us. We're in the middle of a King revival in movies and TV. The gold rush for marketable intellectual property has made Hollywood return to the immensely popular author's work in a spectacular way. Read more
RL Stine may be one of the most successful authors of our era, but, being a modest and amusing fellow, he'd much rather talk about other writers.
"I've actually done entire interviews about the author Sebastian Barry, " says the Goosebumps creator. "He's a really good friend of ours in Wicklow. I think he's the best prose stylist on Earth. I really do. We should just talk about him." Read more
I guess there are countless different ways to start writing a crime novel. The author might come up with a certain crime or a relatable protagonist who is ready to solve it. Sure, these two examples are important parts of a writing puzzle, but either one is something I usually start with. Namely I'm a huge fan of the location, or perhaps rather the setting. Read more
Edgar Allan Poe's life and works have been widely dissected and analyzed by literary scholars almost from the first, that being his untimely, premature, and somewhat mysterious demise in 1849. Rufus Griswold, Poe's executor, was that first, and his fiercely negative account set the tone for confirming and denying major biographical details and personality traits. Read more
My parents-good Protestants that they are-often ask me, "Why horror? Why can't you write nice things?" To which I generally reply, "Have you read the newspaper lately?" Read more
'I'm very reassuringly honest. It's a job as well as a calling. It's my living - I'm the chief breadwinner in my house. My husband is retired, he supported me through the two decades while I wasn't making enough to live on, and was doing all kinds of things to do with writing to survive - judging competitions, running workshops, appraising manuscripts.
‘My settings of Europe and English visitors weren't really doing it for them, so we decided Scotland would be good. I thought an island would be great, because it's a small community, and it's an opportunity for my main character to get away from it all. The team at HarperCollins have been so supportive and enthusiastic... Read more
For the past five years or so, I've read books on my phone. The practice started innocently enough. I write book reviews from time to time, and so publishers sometimes send me upcoming titles that fall roughly within my interests. Read more
The Guardian calls Irish-Indian poet Nikita Gill "Britain's most-followed poet on social media"-she has 780,000 Instagram followers and 180,000 TikTok followers, and her Instapoetry has been reshared by the likes of Khloe Kardashian, Alanis Morissette, and Sam Smith-and she has published seven volumes of poetry and two novels in the U.K. But she is far less known on this side of the pond. Read more
Nikkolas Smith knows a thing or two about book bans. The illustrator has created five picture books over the last three years-four of which have been yanked off library shelves. There's I am Ruby Bridges, about the civil rights icon; That Flag about the confederate flag; Born on the Water, which explores slavery; and The Artivist which features a child supporting trans kids.
Simon & Schuster has acquired the largest Dutch publishing group Veen Bosch & Keuning, including all of its publishers in the Netherlands and Belgium, as well as sister companies Thinium and Bookchoice.
The Publishers Association (PA) has criticised the government's response to a House of Lords report on AI, saying that it has failed to make "any tangible commitments to protect the creative industries against mass copyright infringement".
'You must keep sending work out; you must never let a manuscript do nothing but eat its head off in a drawer. You send that work out again and again, while you're working on another one. If you have talent, you will receive some measure of success - but only if you persist.'
'I'm very reassuringly honest'
‘My settings of Europe and English visitors weren't really doing it for them, so we decided Scotland would be good. I thought an island would be great, because it's a small community, and it's an opportunity for my main character to get away from it all. The team at HarperCollins have been so supportive and enthusiastic... Read more