New Publisher Listing: LW Books
firstwriter.com – Tuesday December 6, 2022
Specialized books with price guides for collectibles, especially ceramics.
Hachette UK acquires Welbeck Publishing Group
thebookseller.com – Monday December 5, 2022
Hachette UK has acquired independent Welbeck Publishing Group for an undisclosed sum, with an agreement made between the shareholders of Welbeck and Hachette UK on 30th November 2022.
Welbeck’s gift, illustrated and adult trade publishing will become part of Headline Publishing Group and Welbeck’s children’s list will become part of Hachette Children’s Group.
Hachette UK says the acquisition of Welbeck is part of its longer-term strategy to diversify into specialist areas by acquiring publishers that are “leaders in their field”; in recent years its acquisitions have included Paperblanks, Bookouture, Jessica Kingsley Publishers, Laurence King, Summersdale, John Catt Educational and Short Books.
New Literary Agent Listing: Stephanie Stevens
firstwriter.com – Monday December 5, 2022
Loves working with mystery, thriller, women's fiction, and romance authors especially when the story involves an unexpected twist.
AI Reveals the Most Human Parts of Writing
wired.com – Friday December 2, 2022
A WOMAN HAS been working on her book, a young adult fantasy novel, for hours. At some point, she gets the familiar itch to check her email: She can’t think of what to write next. She stares at the screen. She’s lost her words. She could bang her head against the wall, or maybe turn to a favorite book for inspiration, or lose her momentum to distraction. But instead she turns to an AI writing tool, which takes in her chapter so far and spits out some potential next paragraphs. These paragraphs are never quite what she wants, though they sometimes contain beautiful sentences or fascinating directions. (Once it suggested a character sings a song, and also generated the lyrics of the song.) Even when these paragraphs fail, they make her interested in the story again. She’s curious about this computer-generated text, and it reignites her interest in her own writing.
New Publisher Listing: Guppy Books
firstwriter.com – Friday December 2, 2022
A small and independent publisher of children’s fiction. No nonfiction or picture books. No submissions from unagented or published authors.
More than 150 literary agents to stop submitting books to HarperCollins US in support of striking workers
thebookseller.com – Thursday December 1, 2022
More than 150 literary agents have signed an open letter pledging not to submit new projects to HarperCollins US in support of workers at the company who are on strike.
Negotiations between management and the union began in December 2021 and in October 2022 union members overwhelmingly voted for another strike, following a one day walk-out in July, to take place from 10th November.
Chelsea Hensley, an associate assistant at the KT Literary Agency, organised the open letter in support of the striking workers, and the signatories include a number of other KT Literary Agency staff including founder and senior literary agent Kate Testerman, a number of Aevitas Creative Management staff, including director of foreign rights Erin Files and senior agent Jen Marshall and several people from Janklow & Nesbit, including agents Melissa Flashman and Mina Hamedi.
Astra House Shuts Its Literary Magazine
publishersweekly.com – Wednesday November 30, 2022
Astra Publishing House announced that its literary publication, Astra Magazine, is being shut down. The magazine published the first of its two issues in April, and the company said there will be no third issue. All operations, including web publication, will be closed by the end of the year.
The magazine was led by editor-in-chief Nadja Spiegelman, deputy editor Samuel Rutter, and managing editor Medaya Ocher. Its first two issues included prize-winning fiction, essays, poetry and comics from authors around the world. The magazine’s website featured criticism and personal essays, and promoted the work of emerging writers and artists. It had attracted 50,000 unique visitors each month.
New Magazine Listing: MQR Mixtape
firstwriter.com – Wednesday November 30, 2022
An eclectic, online zine guest curated by university graduate students.
New Publisher Listing: Unify
firstwriter.com – Wednesday November 30, 2022
Imprint publishing health and philosophy titles.
Introducing Two Vocal Writing Contests
medium.com – Monday November 28, 2022
I recently joined Vocal Media and posted an article about my experience with this interesting platform. Those who missed it can view the article via the following link.
In this post, I’d like to mention another benefit of Vocal Media for writers. It is called writing challenges. After looking into them, I was surprised by the prizes.
Currently, Vocal has two challenges. I’d like to briefly introduce them.
The first one is called the Mystery Box Challenge.
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