The Reading Agency launches call for submissions for Quick Reads 2025
readingagency.org.uk – Thursday November 23, 2023
The Reading Agency is pleased to announce that it is seeking publisher submissions for consideration for its life-changing 2025 Quick Reads programme.
Quick Reads are short, high-quality books that engage adult readers who lack reading confidence or have fallen out of the reading habit. They play a key role in getting the nation to read, especially those who find reading challenging. The challenge we face today is that one in three adults do not regularly read for pleasure and one in six adults find reading difficult. The titles are written by popular authors using accessible language and plots. And it works; over 5.3 million Quick Reads titles have been distributed since the program began in 2006.
This year, in addition to working with our existing publishing partners, The Reading Agency is also actively seeking submissions from SME (small and medium-sized enterprises) and independent publishers. This new development has been made possible with funding support from The Foyle Foundation. It will enable smaller independent publishers to take part in the programme for the first time by helping to remove some of the barriers that often prevent them from participating.
Northern Writers’ Awards open for entries in 25th anniversary year
newsroom.northumbria.ac.uk – Wednesday November 22, 2023
The Northern Writers’ Awards will celebrate their 25th anniversary year in 2024, with many of the award categories now open for entry until 12 February 2024.
Founded and produced by New Writing North, with support from Northumbria University and Arts Council England, the Northern Writers’ Awards are the largest and longest-running writer development programme of their kind in England, with a reputation for identifying some of the country’s best unpublished writing. Previous winners include Katie Hale, Kit Fan, Benjamin Myers, Okechukwu Nzelu, Andrew McMillan, Helen Mort, Sharma Walfall and Hannah Hodgson.
By supporting writers at an earlier stage than most literary awards – usually before an agent or publisher is involved – the Northern Writers’ Awards offer crucial support for writers at a pivotal stage of their careers, as well as providing a pipeline of new talent to the publishing and broadcast industries.
Submissions for the Bournemouth Writing Prize 2024 are now open
bournemouth.ac.uk – Monday November 20, 2023
Poets and short story writers are invited to submit their entries to this year’s Bournemouth Writing Prize, run by Fresher Publishing at Bournemouth University.
The international writing competition offers the opportunity to win a cash prize and record a reading of your work at BU’s recording studios. All entries will also be considered for inclusion in the anthologies that Fresher Publishing produces each year.
This year’s judges include Ansa Khan Khattak – Editorial Director at Spectre, Antony Dunn – a published poet and Julia Silk – an agent at Greyhound Literary
Indie Press Network launches to connect small indie publishers
thebookseller.com – Tuesday November 14, 2023
The Indie Press Network has launched with the aim of connecting independent publishers with each other, as well as with booksellers and readers.
The open network will offer promotion opportunities for established presses’ titles and authors, as well as free, open-access resources for those starting out.
The Indie Press Network was founded by Will Dady of Renard Press, and is launching with an inaugural cohort of 10 member presses. It is open to all small publishers with five or fewer employees and aims to encourage and support new "would-be" publishers.
According to Renard Press, the network seeks to build on the work being done by other membership organisations to "decolonise publishing and to raise the profile of smaller presses who don’t have big marketing budgets".
Loch Long crime writing residency launched
thelochsidepress.com – Friday November 10, 2023
A new two-week residency for crime writers has been launched by Cove Park.
The fully-funded programme is for Scotland-based writers developing new work in crime fiction and scheduled to run in late March next year.
The writer will receive a total residency fee of £1,100 (£550 per week) and a travel allowance of up to £75 from the arts centre on the Rosneath Peninsula.
To apply, writers must be based in Scotland and have published at least one book with a traditional publisher.
Demand for creative writing courses outpaces supply
stanforddaily.com – Tuesday November 7, 2023
It might seem that putting words to paper is hard, but for those interested in creative writing classes, it might be more difficult to get into a class.
Many creative writing courses are known for their long waitlists and enrollment caps, but the root of the issue lies with a low supply of lecturers and courses to meet the high student demand for courses. The low supply of lecturers stems from an even larger problem: funding.
For Kathaleen Mallard ’25, it was incredibly difficult for her to get into the creative writing classes she wanted, even as an English major with a creative writing emphasis.
“I feel like the demand was obviously much greater than the amount of classes that there were, so it was hard to get into anything,” Mallard said. Some of her courses required course enrollment forms, but seniority remained a large factor of selection, making it difficult to enroll into the classes that were part of the core major requirements.
Mallard believes that this could affect students in the future who wish to pursue an English major with a creative writing emphasis or a creative writing minor, who may not get to explore classes in the department because of low enrollment caps. She also raised the waitlist experience for creative writing courses. Since most people are unlikely to drop their spots in class, it’s really hard to get off the waitlist for these classes, Mallard said.
Amazon Sues Scammers Targeting Authors
publishersweekly.com – Wednesday November 1, 2023
Amazon this week announced that it has filed a lawsuit in the Northern District of California against some 20 individuals scamming authors by falsely claiming an affiliation with Amazon Publishing and Kindle Direct Publishing. According to the suit, the scammers run fake Amazon knockoff websites designed to lure would-be authors into paying a fee to publish, and then deliver either substandard or no service at all.
“Defendants use the Amazon Marks in their domain names and on their websites to divert victims from Amazon’s genuine websites to Defendants’ websites that purport to offer services to help authors create, edit, and publish their works through [Amazon Publishing or Kindle Direct Publishing],” the suit states, adding that, “to further the ruse of affiliation with Amazon” the websites often have chat boxes or advertise phone numbers to call that provide “false and misleading representations of affiliation with Amazon.”
Kindle Direct Publishing Will Beta Test Virtual Voice–Narrated Audiobooks
publishersweekly.com – Wednesday November 1, 2023
In a post today in the Kindle Direct Publishing community forum, the self-publishing giant announced that it has begun a beta test on technology allowing KDP authors to produce audiobook versions of their e-books using virtual voice narration. The ability to create an audiobook using synthetic speech technology is likely to result in a boom in the number of audiobooks produced by KDP authors. According to an Amazon spokesperson, currently only 4% of titles self-published through KDP have an audiobook available.
Under the new initiative, authors can choose one of their eligible e-books already on the KDP platform, then sample voices, preview the work, and customize the audiobook. After publication, audiobooks will be live within 72 hours, and will distributed wherever Audible titles are sold. Prices can be set between $3.99 and $14.99 and authors will receive a 40% royalty. All audiobooks created by virtual voice, the post says, will be clearly labeled and, as with any audiobook, customers can listen to samples.
Outside Frankfurt’s LitAG: A New Report on Agenting
publishingperspectives.com – Thursday October 19, 2023
A new survey on American literary agents’ experience surfaces concerns about the business model’s viability, diversity, and burnout in a demanding job.
‘An Industry in Flux’
This year’s Literary Agents and Scouts Center has been a quick success, with all 584 tables sold out long before the fair opened.
With its tables and chairs turning quickly between rights meetings, a lot of lore—almost a romanticism—has made itself part of the mystique of Frankfurter Buchmesse.
Easily one of the biggest smiles in the LitAg this year will be on the face of Gina Winje, the literary agent whose Winge Agency in Porsgrunn, Norway, represents Jon Fosse, who recently won the Nobel Prize in Literature. Winje was touched, she said, to be hearing from co-agents, scouts, co-publishers and others in the industry: “I’m overwhelmed by the warmth and happiness,” she told Publishing Perspectives.
But as much as the industry understands and appreciates the LitAg as “the beating heart” of the world’s largest international book fair, a report that arrived early this month indicates that many literary agents may be struggling in their work as the industry evolves, many markets’ economies go into flux, and making ends meet gets harder.
Literary agents—so critical to the international industry’s viability and health—could use some attention, as members of the profession report they’re experiencing more burnout than before, not least because the job entails so much “invisible labor,” for which agents aren’t paid.
Frankfurt-Bound Nermin Mollaoğlu Opens a Press in the UK
publishingperspectives.com – Saturday October 14, 2023
It’s not every day that a literary agent tells you she’s opening a publishing house. But that’s the case today (October 12), with a message from one of the best-known regulars in Frankfurter Buchmesse‘s (October 18 to 22) sold-out Literary Agents and Scouts Center, the “LitAg.”
Nermin Mollaoğlu—who tells Publishing Perspectives that her Kalem Agency in Istanbul now has 13 team members—is working with Tasja Dorkofikis and Geraldine D’Amico to establish Linden Editions in London, a publishing house with a mission to promote translation, internationalism, and “cross-cultural understanding.”
“It came out of our joint desire to publish outstanding literary works of fiction, narrative nonfiction, reportage, and essays, as well as some modern classics primarily in translation from Europe, the francophone world, and the Mediterranean region.”
In an exchange with us today, Mollaoğlu says, “I will definitely go on with Kalem. I love working as an agent.”
But the new press, she says, “will give me more opportunity to try another side of agenting, as we’ll buy some titles for the world rights and I’ll be selling them to the world, as well.”
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