Tom Hiddleston hits right note at 500 Words creative writing final
dailymail.co.uk – Friday May 27, 2016
Tom Hiddleston performed a song from his first acting role as Toad Of Toad Hall as he was joined by the Duchess of Cornwall to honour winners of a children's creative writing competition.
He treated the finalists of Radio 2's 500 Words short story competition to a brief rendition of "Beep beep crackle bang" on stage at Shakespeare's Globe after telling host Chris Evans that Wind In The Willows was the first school play he was in.
After Evans asked for a performance, the star of The Night Manager said: "I walked right into that one" before launching into: "Crackle bang, crackle bang, like a a vintage car, hey!"
Big Publishing is Not as Big Anymore
flavorwire.com – Monday May 23, 2016
Books by self-publishers and small presses are eating the Big Four's market share.
According to Publisher’s Weekly, a report by the Association of American Publishers’ shows that overall publishing industry sales fell by 2.6% last year when compared to figures from 2014. Now that we have a clearer picture of the industry’s struggles in 2015, we can tell that sales declined in five of the seven major markets. The only industry segments to show improvement, in fact, were adult books and books from religious presses, which increased sales by 2.2% and 1.2% respectively. Overall industry revenue fell from $15.82 billion in 2014 to $15.41 billion in 2015.
Job Zone: Editorial Assistant, Peter Lang Publishing
publishersweekly.com – Friday May 20, 2016
Peter Lang is seeking an energetic, highly organized, and independently motivated individual to support our publishing program as a full-time editorial assistant in our New York office. This assistant will be supporting three acquisitions editors in the disciplines of Education, Media Studies, and Cultural Studies/History/Literature.
Staff Pick: ‘Literary Publishing in the Twenty-First Century’ edited by Kurowski, Miller and Prufer
publishersweekly.com – Friday May 20, 2016
Literary Publishing in the Twenty-First Century is an unusual anthology. It’s a collection of 20 essay by literary tastemakers, publishers, writers, and what might be called “thought-leaders” about the ways publishing has changed since the turn of the millennium. It has been, as you’ll recall, a big sixteen years, with the rise of Amazon, the economic downturn, the closure of many, many bookstores, the popularization of e-books, and much more. These are all topics we’ve been discussing and debating within the book biz for years, and covering here at Publishers Weekly. But this isn’t a book about that discussion, exactly; it’s about that discussion from a particular perspective: that of the “literary” publisher, writer, and reader.
YA Authors Sound Off on Plotting vs. 'Pantsing' and Other Writing Concerns
publishersweekly.com – Wednesday May 18, 2016
YA authors John Corey Whaley, Sabaa Tahir, Jennifer Niven, and David Arnold dished about their research techniques, thoughts on social media, and preference for plotting vs. “pantsing” (as in writing by the seat of their pants) during a Q&A held at the Book Stall in Winnetka, Ill., on Friday night, May 13.
Hollywood Banks on the Underdog, Pushes Indie Book Publishers Into the Mainstream
prnewswire.com – Wednesday May 18, 2016
BOWIE, Md., May 17, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Jennifer Barnes and John Lawson, owners of publishing company Raw Dog Screaming Press, find themselves receiving international attention after news that 20th Century Fox will make a novel of theirs into a major motion picture. Writer/filmmaker S. Craig Zahler's Wraiths of the Broken Land, published in 2013 by RDSP, will be director Ridley Scott's entry into the western genre. Hoping to recreate its success from The Martian 20th Century Fox is again pairing Scott with screenwriter Drew Goddard. Producers Simon Kinberg, Michael Schaefer, and Aditya Sood are returning to work on Wraiths, completing The Martian's creative team. This move continues last year's trend of turning to small publishers when planning blockbusters.
BookCon 2016: Too Short for Readers, Just Right for Publishers
publishersweekly.com – Monday May 16, 2016
The biggest complaint from attendees at this year’s BookCon literary fanfest was that it was too short. Held the day after BEA in Chicago’s McCormick Place, on May 14, attendees were thrilled to be in Chicago, and very happy with the venue, the programming, and the show’s logistics, but disappointed that this year’s event had been downsized to one day from last year’s two-day event. As for the participating publishers, many of whom had spent three days previously exhibiting at BEA, they were very satisfied with how the show went, but happy that for them it meant only one more day inside McCormick Place rather than two.
Publishers Database upgraded
firstwriter.com – Sunday May 15, 2016
Following last month's upgrade of the Magazines Database, firstwriter.com's Publishers Database has now also been upgraded.
The new-look Publishers Database features the same enhancements to the search, navigation, and listings as was introduced for the Magazines Database, making finding the right publisher for your work easier than ever.
For full details of all the new features, see the news item on the launch of the Magazines Database at https://www.firstwriter.com/news/?New-Magazines-Database-launched&GUID=584
To try out the new database yourself (anyone can try it out – you don't need to be a subscriber), go to https://www.firstwriter.com/publishers
Publishers Say E-Book Sales Fell in the U.K. Last Year
fortune.com – Saturday May 14, 2016
The U.K. Publishers Association has released its latest annual sales figures, recording the first fall in e-book sales (at least, those from traditional publishers) in the seven years they’ve been tracked.
E-book sales fell 1.6% from £563 million ($811 million) in 2014 to £554m in 2015. Over the same period, physical sales rose 0.4% from £2,748 million to £2,760 million—the first rise in physical sales in four years.
What you read affects your writing – so choose carefully
news.ufl.edu – Saturday May 7, 2016
Educators have studied the processes of reading and writing, and the development of skills in each area, but never how one influences the other. In a groundbreaking study in the May issue of the International Journal of Business Administration, University of Florida associate professor Yellowlees Douglas and graduate student Samantha Miller discovered strong correlations between the complexity of graduate students’ reading and their writing.
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