New Literary Agent Listing: Kathryn Willms
firstwriter.com – Tuesday February 16, 2021
Looking for non-fiction manuscripts with a unique point of view. As a generalist who simply likes “good books,” she’s open to a variety of genres and is, ultimately, a sucker for a good story compellingly told.
Why your favorite magazines are morphing into books
edition.cnn.com – Saturday February 13, 2021
Shopping in the pandemic often means buying supplies for working, cooking and exercising at home. But consumers are also looking for ways to pass the time, and for some, that means picking up a magazine while they're out and about.
Those who braved a drug store, supermarket or newsstand this past month may have seen in the magazine section copies of Better Homes & Gardens' "Secrets of Getting Organized," Delish's "Keto Comfort Foods" and Time's collector's edition on the Korean pop band, BTS.
But these are not traditional magazines. They are what some in the media industry call "bookazines" — a blend of books and magazines — and in recent years, they have become more crucial to publishers' success.
How to write a love poem
theconversation.com – Saturday February 13, 2021
For many, this year’s Valentine’s Day will be like no other. If you are spending the day apart from your loved ones, and don’t fancy the card selection at your local Tesco, writing a poem can be a more personal way to reach out and connect. Indeed, to paraphrase John Donne, “more than kisses, [poems] mingle souls”.
Here are some poems to take inspiration from, as well as some prompts to help you get that first line on the page.
Novelists are writing for TV more than ever. How it’s changing the industry
latimes.com – Saturday February 13, 2021
In 2013, Sheri Holman had just turned 47 and her life was falling apart.
Raised in Virginia by a struggling single mom, Holman had bootstrapped herself through college to earn a theater degree, then moved to New York City to pursue acting. When that plan proved unworkable, Holman took a series of temp jobs in publishing, eventually becoming an assistant to an influential literary agent.
Throughout the early 1990s, when book advances were soaring, Holman wrote her first novel, “A Stolen Tongue.” Published to raves in 1997, the book built an audience for her 2000 bestseller, “The Dress Lodger.” In 2003, Holman’s “The Mammoth Cheese” was a finalist for the Orange Prize. Secure in her work, she married a good guy with a real job. They bought a Victorian house in Brooklyn, had a daughter and then twin sons. Holman quit her job to write novels and mother full-time.
Slow-forward five years. One of Holman’s sons was battling cancer. Her marriage was over. Her third book was taking forever to complete. “Witches on the Road Tonight” was finally published in 2011, to disappointing sales, with the book advance money long gone.
Agents Kingsford and Campbell part ways
thebookseller.com – Friday February 12, 2021
The agency Kingsford Campbell is splitting up, after Julia Kingsford and Charlie Campbell decided to separate their activities after seven years of working together.
Kingsford will continue to represent her clients, as Julia Kingsford Ltd, while maintaining her involvement in The Good Literary Agency, which she co-founded with Nikesh Shukla in 2018, as well as her consultancy work for publishers, writers and production companies. She can be found at juliakingsford.com and julia@juliakingsford.com.
Saint Patrick Centre launches international writing competition to celebrate 20th anniversary
irishnews.com – Thursday February 11, 2021
A CO Down centre which tells the story of Ireland's patron saint has launched an international writing competition to celebrate its 20th anniversary.
The Saint Patrick Centre in Downpatrick is inviting young people to write about issues such as human trafficking and faith.
The International Spirit of Patrick Writing competition is open to young writers aged 16 to 20, as St Patrick himself was trafficked to Ireland, as a young person, around 400AD.
St Patrick is believed to have been trafficked at age 16 and held captive in Ireland for six years before he miraculously escaped, having found God in his isolation and suffering.
How I learned to stop worrying and enjoy writing sex scenes
inews.co.uk – Tuesday February 9, 2021
Around the time I started to go through puberty, I fell in love with Jane Austen’s novels. It may have seemed like an eminently proper hobby – parents and teachers no doubt imagined me chuckling at the gentle Regency satire and dreaming about bonnets and pianofortes. But in reality I was holding my breath, heart pounding, waiting for Frank Churchill to “make love” to Emma Woodhouse in the back of a horse-drawn carriage.
I didn’t know that, back then, “making love” just referred to hands-free flirting. I imagined something much more explicit, in great detail. Thanks to the Netflix series, I’ve just fallen in love with Julia Quinn’s racy Bridgerton universe, but I’m grateful I only had Austen as a teenager. After all, if I’d got my hands on Quinn’s novels in the 90s, I might still be in my teenage bedroom, with the curtains drawn. Filling in the gaps in Austen instead forced me to learn how to invent sex scenes – and eventually helped me to write my first novel, Insatiable.
Exposing Audiblegate
thebookseller.com – Tuesday February 9, 2021
A few months ago, the Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi)’s watchdog desk, which which monitors the self-publishing sector, rates the best and worst services, and offers a partner membership to approved services, downgraded Amazon ACX/Audible’s rating as a self-publishing service from "Recommended" to "Caution”.
This was done with a heavy heart. Unlike other publishers, indie authors have good reason to be grateful to Amazon for the tools and platforms that underwrite the author-publishing revolution. That gratitude remains but independent authors know, better than anyone, that Amazon’s publishing platforms are not perfect, and ALLi has always encouraged its members to publish widely through other distributors, aggregators and retailers, and their own websites, as well as Amazon. The ACX platform has been a cause of particular concern for some years, its payment percentages, exclusivity conditions, and licensing terms the worst in the self-publishing sector.
That concern started to intensify in the last quarter of last year, when a company glitch at ACX gave author-publishers a peek behind what had, until then, been a thick curtain of non-transparency.
When do you have enough material to start writing your book?
publishing.artshub.com.au – Monday February 8, 2021
The short answer to this is: you will not know until you try. We assume that writers are the ones who have a drive to write and will turn up at the desk no matter what.
This doesn’t mean that turning up is always easy. Procrastination can be self-doubt in sheep’s clothing. So can the sense that one does not yet have enough material to begin. But ultimately, the only way to know whether you do or don’t have enough material is to start writing.
The fascination with ideas and inspiration is understandable given that without these all-important seeds, a story cannot begin to grow and thrive on the page. Remember, though, the seeds themselves are not the full-grown tree or even the sapling; once you have an idea, you still have plenty of work to do.
Major UK publishers’ ebook sales up 15%
booksandpublishing.com.au – Monday February 8, 2021
In the UK, the top six trade publishers recorded a total 15.5% rise in ebook sales in 2020, the first double-digit percentage bump in seven years, reports the Bookseller.
Collectively, Hachette, Penguin Random House (PRH), HarperCollins, Pan Macmillan, Bloomsbury and Simon & Schuster sold 54.5 million consumer ebooks through UK retailers in 2020, up from the 47.2 million in 2019.
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