Chicagoan Charlie Donlea on Writing Best-Selling Mysteries
classicchicagomagazine.com – Monday January 27, 2025
With titles like Don’t Believe It, Some Choose Darkness, and The Girl Who Was Taken, you know that you are in for a thriller where surprises lurk around every corner. No wonder Chicagoan Charlie Donlea is a USA Today and a number one best selling author internationally. Along with a Charlie Donlea mystery to get me through this week’s artic cold I added a further stay-at-home pleasure of speaking with the Chicago best-selling author himself about his craft.
Writing the manuscript for his tenth thriller is keeping Donlea indoors this week as well as working with a team to develop his Twenty Years Later into a television series. He may will have news to share soon. His newest hardcover Guess Again will be released in August 2025.
Not only do we love the plot twists that keep you guessing until the final pages, the clever red herrings we fall for and the great destinations where Donlea’s novels are set (including Chicago and Door County as well as faraway places like St. Lucia) we find characters you care for, something lacking in many mysteries.
Here’s what we learned from Donlea on a day when it was two degrees in Chicago.
Writers' Handbook 2025 now available as an ebook
firstwriter.com – Saturday January 25, 2025
Following last month's release of the print edition of firstwriter.com's 2025 edition of its Writers' Handbook, the digital editions are now also available from various outlets around the world. These include:
New Media Writing Prize open for entries
bournemouth.ac.uk – Saturday January 25, 2025
The 2024/5 New Media Writing Prize is now open for entries, with cash prizes for the best in interactive digital narrative, literature, and journalism.
The NMWP is seeking original works of “born-digital” storytelling (fiction or non-fiction): works created on digital devices, for digital devices. These include hypertexts, participatory films, i-documentaries, Twine stories, transmedia novels, and more.
The competition is free to enter. The main prize of £1000 is sponsored by if:book, with £500 prizes for best journalism (sponsor: FIPP media) and a “people’s choice” category (sponsor: Wonderbox Digital). Winner of the student prize will win a year’s membership from sponsor Writers Online.
Why do editors 'ghost'
bukiebooks.substack.com – Saturday January 25, 2025
I saw some recent discourse about this on the Substack app, but it’s been a topic of heated conversation within publishing, between writers and agents, and between agents and editors for the past few years. Some of you may recall Jonathan Karp’s infamous mandate that editors must respond to agent submissions within a month1, after he learned about ghosting.
In the past few years, there have been more instances of editors simply not responding to submissions from agents. They will respond to the pitch, but after receiving the manuscript, neither reject nor ask for a call, even after multiple follow-ups and sometimes even after calls and auction rules are set.
If you are an editor I work with who follows me here, this isn’t about you. You are all perfect. Also, thanks!
Why is this happening?
Julie Finidori joins Aevitas Creative Management UK
thebookseller.com – Saturday January 25, 2025
French agent Julie Finidori has joined Aevitas Creative Management UK (ACM UK). She will be based in Paris, representing French-language books in France and English-language books internationally. Findori joins ACM UK from her own agency in Paris, where she represented a roster of authors including Pauline Harmange (I Hate Men), Fania Noël (Ten Questions on Black Feminisms), Nora Bouazzouni (Eat the Rich) and Pınar Selek (The Turkish Military Cauldron).
Before becoming an agent, Julie managed foreign rights at Albin Michel, living all over the world, including Indonesia, Sweden, the United States, Canada and Turkey.
Finidori said: "I’m very happy to be joining such a dynamic and exciting international agency and learning and growing with all my new partners. I’m already amazed by the support and opportunities this collaboration is generating and I feel very lucky to be a part of the Aevitas community."
Sir Ian Rankin announced for key role at crime writing festival
heraldscotland.com – Thursday January 23, 2025
Rebus author Sir Ian Rankin has been announced as a guest programmer for the Bloody Scotland International Crime Writing Festival later this year.
The best-selling novelist has sold more than 35 million books and was awarded a knighthood in 2023 for services to literature and charity, and becomes the first ever guest programmer invited to join the team.
Bloody Scotland will run from September 12 to 14 in Stirling and Sir Ian will join fellow authors Abir Mukherjee, Lin Anderson, Craig Robertson and Gordon J. Brown as part of the programming team.
They will bring a ‘world-class’ line-up of authors and special guests to the festival with the programme to be launched in June this year.
Sir Ian Rankin said: “Bloody Scotland manages to remain the world’s friendliest and most inclusive crime fiction festival while also attracting the biggest and brightest names in the business to the city of Stirling. It’s epic!”
New Literary Agent Listing: Analia Cabello
firstwriter.com – Thursday January 23, 2025
Looking to represent picture book illustrators, authors, and author-illustrators; middle grade fiction; and young adult fiction. In all categories, she is a fan of characters who feel in-between in any sense (identity, friend groups, transitional period of life, etc.); stories of self-discovery and character growth; explorations of sibling relationships and intergenerational families; and stories from creators whose voices have been traditionally underrepresented in the industry. She values cultural specificity and stories borne from personal experience.
Bournemouth Writing Festival returns this April for weekend of panels, workshops & networking
dorsetbiznews.co.uk – Wednesday January 22, 2025
Tickets are now on sale for the third Bournemouth Writing Festival to be held over the weekend of 25 to 27 April at locations throughout the town centre.
The three days will be packed with around 100 events and activities – some free – to inspire writers of all ages, backgrounds, abilities and experience.
There’ll be walks, talks, panels, workshops, informal networking breakfasts, lunches and dinners, and literary agent one-to-ones.
The popular Writing on the Beach will make its return, along with special evening events from the Outsiders Project and Bourn Jammy.
That’s on top of a poetry hub, free workshops for marginalised members of the community, children’s activities at newly opened co-working space Patch, and an author’s marketplace for local writers.
Closing the festival on Sunday night will be Making Waves – a showcase for new and emerging writers hosted by Arts University Bournemouth.
Publishers and Authors Wonder: Can Anything Replace BookTok?
nytimes.com – Friday January 17, 2025
With a ban looming, publishers are hoping to pivot to new platforms, but readers fear their community of book lovers will never be the same.
Two years ago, Jeneane O’Riley self-published her fantasy romance novel, “How Does it Feel?,” an enemies-to-lovers tale about a woman who meets a handsome, unhinged fairy prince. Without a publisher to help market her novel or get it into bookstores, she decided to promote it herself on TikTok.
Pretty soon, TikTok users started posting their own viral reactions to the book, and sales shot up. One post from a reader shocked by the novel’s plot twists got more than six million views. The book hit No. 1 on Amazon.
“That type of free marketing for a small, independent author is unheard-of,” said O’Riley, who later signed a deal with Bloom Books, a romance imprint at Sourcebooks.
Now, with a law banning TikTok in the United States set to take effect on Sunday, O’Riley and other authors are scrambling to keep their networks of fans intact. O’Riley, who has more than 52,000 followers on TikTok, has been urging people to find her on Instagram, Threads and Facebook. But she’s concerned that her close-knit TikTok audience will disperse.
Bournemouth Writing Festival announces 2025 line-up
buzz.bournemouth.ac.uk – Friday January 17, 2025
Bournemouth Writing Festival have announced their line-up for this year’s festival.
The festival takes place from 25th-27th April 2025 at a range of venues in the area.
It features a range of free and ticketed events, aims to inspire writers to write with practical and hands-on events, workshops, talks, writing activities and networking opportunities.
The three-day festival is a carefully curated selection of self-published, published and writing professionals who share their knowledge and advice to writers of all ages and experience levels.
Amongst the professionals attending, there are best-selling authors like Alex Stone (The Good Patient), BAFTA award-winning playwright and screenwriter John Foster (Emmerdale) and creative collaborator and Curator for Wilkswood Reggae Festival, poet Kim West.
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