March 2008
The website for writers
News Review
- Won’t anyone stick to what they’re good at? London literary agency PFD is setting up an agreement with print on demand printer Lightning Source to bring their authors’ work back into print. News Review reports.
- Less successful writers’ income is under increasing pressure from the focus on bestsellers and the Internet. News Review finds some more positive trends.
- Half of all book sales in the UK are at a discount but 6% more books were sold in 2007 than in 2006. News Review also has good news on book sales and the Internet.
- Do reading promotions work? News Review looks at the UK's World Book Day and the National Year of Reading.
- C S Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is the best children’s book of all time, according to a recent poll conducted by the British charity Booktrust. News Review looks at how old favourites live on.
Comment
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'Skellig was taken by the first publisher to read it, won a string of prizes, and has been published in 30 languages. I was an overnight success after almost 20 years.' David Almond in The Times
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'My aim, as a poet in the community, is always the same: to make people go away thinking ‘Is that what poetry is? I can do that!’' Ian McMillan in his article on The Poet in the Community: A little adventure on 57 Productions’ website.
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'Why pay £16.99 ($35) for a novel by someone you've never heard of when you could buy three or four paperbacks for the same price?' Scott Pack of the Friday Project comments on the hardback/paperback debate in the Bookseller.
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'We whine a lot, but it's not so hard. You stay in fancy hotels, and go to signings where people buy your books and want your autograph and tell you lots of nice things…' Harlan Coben on authors on the road in Publishing News.
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'I tell them to forget about the business… They'll figure it out in the end. If they haven't got talent, you're not going to give it to them, but they will have it because you've chosen them.' Peter Carey on teaching creative writing in The Times
Writers' Quote
‘There’s a lot of tasteful writing out there – nice, tidy, clean – but sometimes it’s excess, rawness and the unpolished that work.’
Dan Vyleta, author of Pavel & I
Help for Writers
Check out this page to find links to the huge number of useful articles on this site.
The ABC Checklist for New Writers: Professionalism
This the fifth of six extracts from The ABC Checklist for New Writers: How to Open Doors and Get Noticed the First Time Around by Lorraine Mace and Maureen Vincent-Northam, published by Orana Publishing. This useful book gives succinct answers to the many problems writers face, making it an indispensable reference for the budding writer.
This week - the importance of a professional approach: 'If you come across as an amateur, you’ll sabotage any chance of seeing your work in print.'
1 Agents - when and how to approach them
2 Editors: Who they are and what they do
Links update
Our 21 sections of links reviews and listings - from Writers Organisations to Writers' Web Resources - have been updated with some useful new sites.
Google Placemarks
Google’s wonderful earth mapping offers you a way to supply a graphic to mark a particular location, say a venue for an event you are organising, or where you live. And it’s all free.
Chas Jones shows you how to use it.
A second article shows you how to add overlays to Google Earth, using photos or creating a tour of your chosen location.
Our Editorial Services for writers
Check out the 16 different editorial services we offer, from Reports to Copy editing, Typing to Rewriting.
An Editor's Advice
This new series is based on the advice Maureen Kincaid Speller, a long-serving WritersServices freelance editor, has given writers over the years. The series covers dialogue, doing further drafts, genre writing, planning, points of view, autobiography and presentation.
We Watch the web for writers
Our huge section on technology and the web, and how writers can make use of them.
See also Making submissions for how to approach publishers and agents.
Choosing a Service
Are you having difficulty deciding which service might be right for you? This useful new article by Chris Holifield offers advice on what to go for, depending on what stage you are at with your writing.
Changes in the book trade
This new series by Chris Holifield looks at the book trade and investigates how fundamental changes in how it works are affecting writers.
The second article deals with Publishing.
The first article: Bookselling
Creative Commons explained
When WritersServices first covered Creative Commons in Inside Publishing, we felt that we hadn't explained how it worked as clearly as we'd hoped to do. Now Frances Pinter, who works as a consultant on the project, explains this highly significant new approach to the licensing of rights.
Writer's success story
Russell Ash's entertaining book Potty, Fartwell and Knob, Extraordinary but True Names of British People has been promoted by a website which shows how the admittedly amusing material in the book can be used to good effect online.
The 2007 Diagram Prize
Here is the announcement of the winner for the oddest book title of the year - a barmy winner from a vintage crop.
Entering competitions
Have you ever wondered whether there’s any point in entering competitions? Someone must be winning, but why is it somehow never you? Our checklist helps you to review how you approach competitions, to see if you can achieve a better result.
International Book Fairs 2008
Our newly-updated list of 2008 book fairs around the world.
Bob's Journal goes into its 8th volume
Bob's last column for WritersServices reflects on writing and the Internet:
'Still haven’t broken through my writer’s block. No longer even sure I want to. Why write? What’s writing for? Have absolutely no idea. How can one add anything worthwhile to the work of writers like Oscar Wilde? Yet the internet grows more vast by the minute with the words of the millions who are certain their opinions are worth airing.'
WritersPrintShop
We have revamped our WritersPrintShop website with lots more information. If you're thinking about self-publishing, this is the place to find out what's involved. If you're ready to go ahead, our high quality service is second to none and there's an economy version for those who want to tackle some of the work themselves. You can estimate the cost for yourself.
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Previous serials & extracts
WritersServices.com Magazine March 2008