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21 November 2016 - What's new

21 November 2016
  • This week we have just launched the Writer's edit, a top-level new service for writers who want line-editing as well as copy editing. Does your manuscript need high-level input from an editor to help you get it into the best possible shape for submission or self-publishing? This may be the service for you, offering the kind of editing which publishers' senior editors used to do in-house on their authors' manuscripts and which is now hard to find.
  • 'So what can we say that's positive about the big changes in the situation for authors over the last few years? It's really a matter of the way writers now have the opportunity to get out there and shape their own destiny. This week's News Review is on how Self-publishing has changed the world for writers.
  • Have you ever wondered why you don't win any of those competitions? Our tips on Entering Competitions will help you to improve your chances.
  • 'But the truth is that sex and love make the world go round, just as much as money does. I think now more than ever, erotic fiction is there to be read and people are reading it. It's maybe taken too long to get to this point, but I think it can only be a good thing...' 'Queen of erotic literature' and author of bestseller The Protector Jodi Ellen Malpas, from an interview in Bookbrunch, provides our Comment on Writing bestselling erotic fiction.
  • Joanne PhillipsUK-based freelance writer and ghostwriter. She has had articles published in national writing magazines, and has ghostwritten books on subjects as diverse as hairdressing and keeping chickens. Visit her at www.joannephillips.co.uk' The Business of Writing for Self-publishing authors offers terrific advice for all writers: 'Self-publishing authors - also known as ‘indie' authors or author-publishers - have had a steep learning curve these past few years. Getting to grips with the various sales channels available to them, producing top quality ebooks and paperbacks, and finding a place in mainstream outlets have left many writers struggling to keep up with the paperwork. What follows is brief guide to the essentials your self-publishing business needs - because it is a business, even if you only publish one book!'
  • Our links: a witty article asking: is the new book reviewing world a soft touch? Death of the hatchet job; from the tireless writer on writing, really useful Marketing and Publishing Checklists for Writers | Jane Friedman; poetry, it seems, is back, Don't Look Now, But 2016 Is Resurrecting Poetry | WIRED; and you may have a clear vision for what or who your book is about - but do you know how to tell your story? Writing in Third Person Omniscient vs Third Person Limited • Reedsy Blog.
  • The editor of the new imprint in our Talking to pubishers series explains in the eleventh article what her new list is looking for - 'the freshest thinkers and the most successful practitioners in the areas of marketing, management, economics, finance and accounting, sustainable and ethical business, heart business, people management, leadership, motivation, biographies, business recovery and development and personal/executive development'.
  • And, in one of the earlier articles in the series, In Talking to publishers 2 Suzanne Ruthven of Compass BooksAn Imprint Of John Hunt Publishing. Focuses on practical and informative ‘how-to’ books for writers interviews her colleague Autumn Barlow, publisher of the new Top Hat historical fiction imprint at John Hunt PublishingExplore the "Our Imprints" section to learn more about our uniquely qualified publishers and their supporting teams. : 'Periodically we are told that the historical novel is dead - and then along comes Hilary Mantel winning the Man Booker for the second time, setting reading fashion on its head again...'
  • More links: advice for writers in videos from the finalists, from On the Red Carpet at the National Book Awards | Literary Hub; the pan-African award announces its longlist, Longlist Announced for Africa's Etisalat Prize for Literature; and Literary Review Releases Bad Sex in Fiction Nominees 2016.
  • This week's Writers' Quote is from the great William Trevor, who died this week: 'As a writer one doesn't belong anywhere. Fiction writers, I think, are even more outside the pale, necessarily on the edge of society. Because society and people are our meat, one really doesn't belong in the midst of society. The great challenge in writing is always to find the universal in the local, the parochial. And to do that, one needs distance.'