Why writing a book through letters is beautiful and wild
theguardian.com – Wednesday September 23, 2015
Author Leah Thomas is in love with letters, that spill their messy, chaotic, over-sharing, unreliably narrated content out into the world – and that's why she wrote her epistolary novel Because You'll Never Meet Me.
“Keep Dying! Keep Writing It Down!” C.K. Williams’ Final Poems Capture the Velocity of Death
flavorwire.com – Tuesday September 22, 2015
C.K. Williams, whose poetry of moral and political probity spread outward from unsparing introspection, died at his home in Hopewell, New Jersey on Sunday at the age of 78. Williams is survived by his wife Catherine, who told the New York Times that he died of multiple myeloma.
Between the novel and the book
thebookseller.com – Monday September 21, 2015
What do Hard Times, Middlemarch, Crime and Punishment, War and Peace, and many more of the greatest novels ever published have in common?
When they were first published, they were not published as books. They were published serially.
People unfamiliar with the history of something tend to assume that what they've always known is the way things have always been. That's why most people think the 20th-century model of publishing, which favoured the publication of novels in book rather than serial format (I call it the "Doorstopper Model"), is a "traditional" form of publishing. It's not.
OF WORDS AND WILL | I’m Just a Manuscript
cornellsun.com – Wednesday September 16, 2015
You probably heard the Schoolhouse Rock song "I'm Just a Bill" at some point in grade school. For anyone who missed out on such a key part of childhood: The song follows the journey of a legislative bill as he hopes to become a national law. After much back and forth between collaborators — and some instrumental breaks — the bill eventually receives the stamp of approval and becomes a law.
This summer I interned for Folio Literary Management, which is a literary agency based in New York City. As I learned about the publishing industry, I couldn't help but notice that the process of getting published mirrors the catchy "I'm Just a Bill." True to the song, writing a book manuscript is only half the battle — authors must work their way through interns, literary agents, editors and publishers in order to see their book on a shelf at Barnes and Noble.
How To Handle Rejection of Your Writing, Without Becoming a Basket Case
io9.com – Wednesday September 16, 2015
Rejection is part of being a writer. Unless you're that one-in-a-billion wunderkind who gets "discovered" while you're still in high school and goes on to become a literary sensation. Almost everybody who writes stories (or anything) has their work dismissed and sent packing, over and over. And learning to deal with rejection is a crucial part of getting better at this crazy game—both the writing part, and the selling part. But it never gets easy.
Pete Kalu’s top tips for writing non-cliched multicultural characters
theguardian.com – Wednesday September 16, 2015
Who does the washing up? How many kisses on greeting? Why avoid writing about Indian weddings? The award-winning playwright, poet and novelist Pete Kalu shares how to create multicultural characters that are well rounded but not cliched
Self-Publishing and Living the LLC Dream
huffingtonpost.com – Wednesday September 16, 2015
I've always wanted to be a writer, and as a child I imagined my name on the cover of several novels. As I've grown up into a digital age, the possibilities for being a writer today seem endless, and nowadays one doesn't have to rely on the mercy of large publishing companies to grant you your dream come true as self-publishing has fully come into its own in the publishing world.
The vanity presses
abc.net.au – Sunday September 13, 2015
Hundreds of Australian authors pay thousands of dollars to 'vanity publishers', often based on unfulfilled promises that their books will be widely promoted and distributed here and overseas. Hagar Cohen investigates the dubious practices of one Australian publisher as she tries to find the authors' books in any bookstore.
Writing Out Gender Bias
huffingtonpost.co.uk – Friday September 11, 2015
The Nine Worlds Multi Genre Convention arrived in London at the beginning of August and I had been invited to speak on two panels. Being a huge science fiction and fantasy enthusiast and writer, I was delighted to attend. Nine Worlds is proof that you don't have to be a nerd or fan to enjoy science fiction, fantasy and gaming. Personally I don't like to use the term 'fan' as it implies that anyone who follows a TV show or a band is a nut job. We're generally not.
Unlearning to Write
slate.com – Friday September 11, 2015
The first thing you learn when you set out to teach writing is that you will never teach anyone to write well. It's a cruel joke universities play on humanities grad students. As you're preparing to step into a classroom, they assign you an impossible task, one they cloak with a label like "Introduction to Rhetoric" or "Expository Composition." Here are 20 undergraduates, they say. Show them how to make their prose sing. Staring your new charges down, you begin to speak. Your voice cracks. They see the fear in your eyes.
Get the free newsletter | Submit a news item or article | Get Writers' News for your website
