Magazines

What could – and indeed, should – a magazine look like in 2020? That was the question British publishing veterans Dan Crowe and Matt Willey asked themselves when their latest collaboration, INQUE – a large-format literary magazine launched last month – was in its nascent stages. As the founders of Avaunt and Port magazines (at the latter, Crowe is editor and publisher) they were all too familiar with the traditional magazine model; the reliance of advertisers to fund the printing and distribution of a magazine, and the way that such partnerships impact the content inside the pages.

Q magazine will close after one final issue, it has been confirmed. Publisher Bauer Media had hoped to find a buyer, but seemingly no deal could be done to rescue the music magazine.

It was one of ten titles put up for review by Bauer in May. Last month it was announced that three of those ten would close, including another younger music title, the magazine spin-off of radio station Planet Rock. But Q was among five magazines that the publisher hoped might be bought by another company, with talks about a possible sale seemingly at an “advanced” stage.

Prior to that announcement the team who produce Q were pretty certain closure was incoming and put together the most recent issue as if it was the last. The prospect of surviving under new ownership allowed them to start working on another edition, but yesterday Editor Ted Kessler confirmed closure was now confirmed, making the upcoming issue the grand finale.

Foundry Literary + Media co-founder Yfat Reiss Gendell has left the New York book agency to form YRG Partners. She leaves with agents Tanusri Prasanna, Peter Steinberg and Adriann Ranta Zurhellen to launch an agency that will focus on representing publishing rights for writers and consumer brands.

Gendell said the agency will partner with a series of existing and new private equity firm relationships, each active in intellectual property and consumer brand development, to match-make between clients and the investment community, and to create unconventional opportunities that work alongside or independent of existing publishing models. Gendell has represented clients’ publishing rights, typically along with managers, and often as the agency of record for writers who are also represented at other agencies for screenwriting. Gendell will bring that formula to the new agency.

A 28-year-old first-time author from Canterbury has landed what is believed to be the world’s largest ever book advance for a debut children’s writer, with a fantasy series about “bloodthirsty unicorns”.

Annabel Steadman, writing as AF Steadman, was paid a “major” seven-figure sum by Simon & Schuster this week, following a hotly contested multi-publisher auction for three books in her fantasy adventure series for children, Skandar and the Unicorn Thief. Set in a world where unicorns are deadly, and can only be tamed by the rider who hatches them, the series follows Skandar Smith, who is preparing to become a unicorn rider. When the most powerful unicorn in the world is stolen by a mysterious figure, becoming a rider becomes a lot more complicated than Skandar ancitipated.

“Unicorns don’t belong in fairytales; they belong in nightmares,” writes Steadman as the series opens. The unicorns in her books are “not at all like the unicorns we know in shops, these fluffy unicorns with rainbows, they’re different and exciting and magical but also dangerous,” she says.

Simon & Schuster, which will publish the first book in the series in spring 2022, said the deal was believed to be record-breaking for a debut children’s author. Sony Pictures has also signed an “aggressive” seven-figure deal for the feature film rights in the series, which is aimed at readers of nine and over.