The Great Love Inspired Author Search
harlequin.submittable.com – Wednesday January 5, 2022
The Great Love Inspired Author Search is back!
The Love Inspired editors are thrilled to announce that we're bringing back The Great Love Inspired Author Search. Love Inspired and Love Inspired Suspense are on the hunt for some fabulous new authors, and we want you! If you think you’ve got the chops to wow us with your inspirational contemporary romance or romantic suspense ideas, we encourage you to pitch it to us!
For this pitch opportunity, the Love Inspired editors are once again on the lookout for fresh talent. We invite you to show us that you’re the total package in these two stages:
Yeovil Literary Prize entries now open
chardandilminsternews.co.uk – Monday January 3, 2022
An annual competition that raises money to support young people in the Chard and Ilminster area training for careers in the performing and creative arts has been launched.
The Yeovil Community Arts Association has also announced a new category in its 2022 international literary prize writing competition, which opened on Saturday (January 1).
Now in its 19th year, the Yeovil Literary Prize continues to attract more entries each year from accomplished and aspiring wordsmiths from all over the world.
Literary festival launching on Ireland's Spike Island will be dedicated to crime writing
irishpost.com – Sunday January 2, 2022
A NEW literary festival is set to take place on Spike Island in Cork in 2022 - dedicated to the theme of crime writing.
The Spike Island literary festival will hone in on the popular genre with a series of author talks and workshops, giving attendees the chance to learn more about the subject.
Agents and publishers from the industry will be on hand giving advice, and those looking to write a book can get invaluable insights into the writing and publishing world.
The event is set to take place at Spike Island, a perfectly fitting setting given its historic past.
The island was used as an island prison on four separate occasions over the last 400 years, with the last prison incarnation that opened in 1985 only closing its doors in 2004.
Inaugural Cheshire Novel Prize launches
thebookseller.com – Friday December 31, 2021
A new writing award, the Cheshire Novel Prize, launches featuring judges such as Juliet Mushens and feedback guaranteed for every entry.
Editorial consultant Sara Cox founded the prize — which includes £1,500 for the winner and a £500 runner up prize — to help unrepresented authors. The judging panel includes Mushens (pictured), of Mushens Entertainment, Penguin Michael Joseph editorial director Clio Cornish, along with Moyette Gibbons, communications manager at Black Girl Writers (which will sponsor five black women writers from low-income backgrounds to enter the Cheshire Novel Prize). Other panelists include RCW’s Honor Spreckley, editor Sally O-J and writer Awais Khan.
Getting Feedback on Writing: Tricks that Help to Succeed
ventsmagazine.com – Thursday December 23, 2021
You have some audience if you are a writer. It is evident that you will get some feedback to your ideas and style of writing. There are different contexts for that: readers’ reviews, editor’s notes, comments from the peer writers, and others. Are you ready to acknowledge that some feedback is going to be negative?
Essay writers are always vulnerable. They are exposed to criticism, judgmental comments, and subjective opinions. It may happen that people will give harsh comments without any explanations. Getting feedback on writing can hurt, and you have to realize this aspect from the very beginning. If you are not ready to deal with negative remarks, you will not feel confident as a writer. Nevertheless, it can be complicated to get the feedback, it is important for you as a writer.
You cannot get an objective picture of what you do without knowing the opinions of other people. Do you want to make your writing more advanced? Then you can focus your primary attention on the areas mentioned in the review.
The Naked Writer by G. Miki Hayden—in Action
By G. Miki Hayden
Instructor at Writer's Digest University online and private writing coach
firstwriter.com – Wednesday December 22, 2021
No matter how gifted a writer you are today, you can become a much better writer than you are now. I know you can because I, myself, have transformed into a greatly improved writer over the years. Recently, I’ve been re-editing a lot of my work from the 1990s, to the mid-2010s; and looking at even more contemporary work of mine to just this year, I see how I’ve grown.
Aspen Words Announces New SF/F Writing Workshop
locusmag.com – Tuesday December 21, 2021
Aspen Words, a longstanding literary program of the Aspen Institute, has announced the addition of a new Sci-Fi/Fantasy Writing Workshop, led by author Fonda Lee, expanding their current workshop offerings into genre literature.
The workshop is sponsored by the General Motors’ Future Fiction Collective, which “aims to decolonize the sci-fi/fantasy genre by increasing the diversity of authors and readers in STEM based literature.” They will provide 10 scholarships for writers to participate in the workshop with a focus of “including underrepresented groups and creating a diverse class.”
How to Start Writing Fan Fiction
bookriot.com – Wednesday December 15, 2021
I began writing fan fiction in around 2008, when I was 11 years old. So, since I’m 24 now, that’s more than half of my life ago! It was then that I loved Twilight and a few other fantasy novels so much that I was desperate to find more stories in that universe and Google searched for that exact thing. And to my surprise, there were tons of them on a magical but now outdated site called “Fan Fiction Dot Net.”
Through middle and high school, I wrote fanfic for a ton of different fandoms but mainly The Avengers. Fan fiction not only helped me practice character development but also come to terms with my queer identity through pairings I enjoyed, especially since I grew up in a fairly conservative area where being queer wasn’t something I could share without losing friends.
These days, I’m a reader of fanfic more so than a writer of it — in part because I have other writing projects that take up more of my time, and a day job, and non-writing hobbies that help me avoid burnout but also take up time, et cetera, et cetera. But I still enjoy reading it for stress relief and a reminder that writing can be purely for joy and personal fulfillment if you want it to be.
Fan fiction became my gateway to writing original stories. I’m adamant that it can play a positive role in practicing things like character development or even just finding a love of writing. These six tips will help you get started writing fan fiction if you’re a beginner and get the most out of your project.
Strange and Janson-Smith join Gleam Futures
thebookseller.com – Wednesday December 15, 2021
Adam Strange has joined Gleam Futures as head of publishing while Oscar Janson-Smith has been appointed as literary agent.
Strange (pictured above) arrives at the titles division of the talent management and influencer marketing company after three years running publishing consultancy Strange Media. Before this, he spent 12 years as publisher of the Sphere non-fiction list at Little, Brown, where he worked with a wide variety of authors including Gwyneth Paltrow, Rafael Nadal, Billy Connolly, Val McDermid, Richard Herring and Kevin Pietersen, and with brands ranging from Candy Crush to "The Great British Bake Off".
In his new role, Strange will represent the publishing activities of the agency’s roster of more than 50 entertainment and digital-first talent, as well as working with new authors from emerging and untapped genres who use digital and social media to build narratives and grow audiences.
New Literary Agency Listing: Gleam Futures (US)
firstwriter.com – Wednesday December 15, 2021
We represent a wide range of fiction and non-fiction writers and are extremely proud to have launched nearly 40 Sunday Times bestselling books to date.
Always on the lookout for original, brave, and exciting new voices who are looking to build and nurture an authentic connection with their audiences across social media and drive long-term value in their books across multiple media platforms.
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