-
'An article in a recent edition of the Bookseller
has highlighted the ongoing pressure on acquisitions in publishing houses,
which has now become acute.
Helen Garnons-Williams, Bloomsbury fiction editorial
director said: "Our entire business is based on confidence, whether among the
publishers or the agents, and pretty much everyone is wobbling because no one
knows what will sell." Auctions have often faltered because the recession is
causing a massive loss of confidence and publishers are becoming increasingly
risk-averse.' News Review has the story.
-
'A major recent study led by Nevada University has
showed that regular access to books in the home had a direct effect on
children’s long-term educational achievement. Involving 70,000 people in 27
countries, it showed that the effect of having 500 books in the home was to
increase by three years the length of time that these children subsequently
spent in education.' News Review reports.
-
'The excitement surrounding the arrival of the i-Pad
in countries outside the US has caught the attention of the media, reinforcing
the idea that a mass audience is waiting to buy one and start using it to read
e-books. The arrival of the Kindle aroused similar expectations and many
articles presaging the end of the printed book... ‘Reading the Future’, the Bookseller’s third annual survey into what
readers and book-buyers are thinking, contradicts this view and shows that
the publishing world is much more focused on e-books than book-buyers are.
-
'Stieg Larsson notwithstanding, what are the chances
of a translated author selling well in the big English-speaking markets of the
US and the UK? The received wisdom has always been that translations into
English are tough going financially, with it proving virtually impossible to
make the figures work without an English-language publisher on both sides of the
Atlantic to pay for the costs of translation.' News Review looks at writers
in translation in the headlines.
-
'I've always loved short stories. The process is
probably less anxious than writing a novel. There's something about the
intensity of a short story that I love... You can reinvent them all the time
(whereas) with the novel there's the huge weight of tradition. There's something
about modern life that suits the short story. It's a bit snipped up and jagged
and raw and I think stories are like that...' Michele Roberts, author of Mud,
in the Bookseller.
-
'Books are not dead.
They may appear besieged, ever more so as fragile retailers hunker down to
re-examine their own business models. There may be fewer new titles published
over the next several years... but I am confident that the book business
will evolve, as it has done for hundreds of years, and will occupy a
considerable position as a ongoing and valued medium.' Laurence Orbach, CEO
of Quarto, in the Bookseller
-
'I do try and remember
what it was like writing books in the void, back when I had to worry about
whether they were even going to see print. That was not a good place. I am very
grateful not to be there. I feel I not only narrowly escaped obscurity but also
having to give up writing novels altogether, which would have broken my heart.
It is easy to be blase about having a bigger audience. I don't take it for
granted.' Lionel Shriver, whose new book is So Much For That, in the
Sunday Telegraph's Seven.
-
'I know it's somewhat of an unpopular opinion, but I
think it's unrealistic to expect that you can support yourself solely as a
writer in this economy... In the end, the
better you make the book, the better the chances that you'll get a healthy
advance, and the harder you work with your publisher to promote the book by
publishing stories or nonfiction essays to raise your profile, by blogging and
keeping your website active, by thinking outside of the box in terms of
marketing and publicity, the better your book will do. But at the end of the day
it's the quality of the work that matters the most.' US agent Julie Barer on
mediabistro
'Almost anyone can be an author; the business is to collect money and fame
from this state of being.'
A A Milne
|
John looks at the recent decision by
Rupert Murdoch to take the Times Online private. But will
this work, or are we all just too used to getting things for free
online?
Chas Jones looks at technical issues
relating to WiFi, explains how it works and investigates the security
issues which are involved.
Charles Jones looks at the fascinating
subject of the dark web and asks why you might want to make your website
invisible.
USB
Chas Jones guides us through this useful
gadget:
| 'Released in
April of the millennium year, this connection has been a part of
a revolution in the way we connect items to our computers.
Before USB connecting was an unreliable process but coupled with
the arrival of USB we had versions of Window that could support
'plug and play' which made the business of attaching things to
your computer at least an order of magnitude simpler.... '
|
The Digital
Rights Management debate
Chas Jones looks at the way the views on
digital rights management are changing. Is generosity a good sales
strategy and what about piracy?
Chas Jones looks at the tricky subject
of defamation, the defences against it, defamation and free speech, and
how it works in different parts of the world. It's all too easy to
defame someone, so authors should be wary about the risks.
If you want to write a memoir you’re in good
company – lots of writers want to try their hand at this category. In the latest
in our new Categories series Chris Holifield looks at how to set about
writing your memoir and how to publish it.
Other articles in the series:
Writing
Historical Fiction
Writing Romance
Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy
Writing Crime Fiction
Writing non-fiction
John looks at how to kickstart writing a
biography or family history, now a very popular thing to write and
something you can easily set out to do. His May column shows how to get
yourself started with websites, books and magazines.
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.
|
Our reviewer, Maureen Kincaid Speller,
said: 'Many people want to write about someone’s life, perhaps their
own, and there are courses to suit every level of interest, from
university masters degrees to local college qualifications.' and
concluded that it was: 'a brisk and helpful guide on how to set about
writing a life story... It is a sensible account of life writing from
experienced practitioners of what is both art and craft, and I recommend
it!'
Amanda Pollard, illustrator of An
Illustrated History of 1066, attends a London Book Fair Masterclass
to find out what part authors can play in organising their own bookshop
events.
Our brand-new, up-to-date agents'
listings have been compiled from agents' own websites and other
information they publish about what they're looking for. You can use
them to research which agents to submit to.
The listings cover UK and US agents,
with separate listings for children's agents in the UK, and
international agents from all over the world.
Chas Jones looks at how writers can
benefit from using the web as an advertising medium, including using
Google ads and display ads to promote your book online.
In the seventh part of this series, Chris Holifield
looks at the subject of Creative Commons and how these special licenses
might transform authors' capacity to the license use of their books for all
sorts of purposes.
First article:
Bookselling
Second article: Publishing
Third article: Print on Demand and the
Long Tail
Fourth article: Self-publishing - career
suicide or 'really great'
Fifth article:
Writers' Routes to their audiences
Sixth article:
Copyright
Improving your writing, Learning on the job, New
technology and the Internet,
Self-publishing - is it for you?,
Promoting your writing (and yourself), Other kinds of writing, Keep up to date
and Submission to
publishers and agents
Our Editorial
Services for writers
Check out the 17 different editorial services we offer, from Reports to
Copy editing, Typing to Rewriting.
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.
Our huge section on technology and the web, and how writers can make use of
them, takes you from beginner-level articles to advanced technology.
Check out this page to find links to the huge number of useful articles on this site,
including Finding an Agent
and Making Submissions.
|
