When I read this story in the Daily Mail online last April I assumed it was some sort of hoax: a writer left her manuscript on Richard and Judy's doorstep in the hope of getting herself a book deal and as if by magic, she ...
When I read this story in the Daily Mail online last April I assumed it was some sort of hoax: a writer left her manuscript on Richard and Judy's doorstep in the hope of getting herself a book deal and as if by magic, she ...
This is the final part of the talk I gave at this year’s Edinburgh International Book Festival. You can read part I here, and part II here. The Writing Business 44) So, once you’re sure your writing is as good as it can be, you have to work out where to submit it. How can ...
This is part two of the talk I gave at the Edinburgh International Book Festival this week. You can read the first part here, and the final part will appear tomorrow. The Writing Business 25) How hard is it to get an agent? Let’s look at some statistics. 26) At her talk at the Romantic ...
Two days ago I spoke at the Edinburgh International Book Festival (get me!), on the subject of The Writing Business. I'd never done anything like this before, so I was very lucky to share the stage with Keith Charters of Strident Publishing and to have the event chaired by the writer Eric ...
I'm going to be talking at the Edinburgh International Book Festival this year, on Wednesday 25th August. I'll be sharing the stage with Keith Charters, managing director of Strident Publishing, and we'll be discussing how writers can make the most of the publishing opportunities open to them. We'll be discussing such delights as ...
Run a writing competition, and attract as many entries as you can: the internet makes it easy to find writers' groups and message boards where you can advertise your competitions for free. You don't even have to charge an entry fee: just get as many entries in, as quickly as you can. You don't need to ...
There's no doubt that a nice fat dose of fame will help you get your book published: but that's not the only route into publishing. You don't have to be an established author to get published either. If you follow that particular myth to its logical conclusion, the fallacy is easy to see: ...
I'm pleased to welcome M G Harris, my Twitter-friend and author of The Joshua Files series, who concludes her Zero Moment blog-tour here. Ten Things That Helped Me Get Published 1 Writing Fan Fiction In the mid-1990s I took up writing as a hobby. ...
A few weeks ago I corresponded with a frustrated writer who was considering vanity publication. When I advised her against it she replied with words to this effect: “I can see why you don’t like it. But I can’t get my book published any other way. There are millions of writers out there, and only ...
In fiction and in life there are often gatekeepers who guard the entrance to the castle or the enchanted kingdom. Consider St Peter, standing guard at the pearly gates, or those big blokes in dark glasses and wash ’n’ wear suits who stand outside the nightclubs and only let the pretty girls in. In both ...
Daniel Blythe is one of those rare creatures: a writer who makes his living from his writing work. He's also a regular contributor to this blog, and can be found in the comments-streams on many of my posts. His latest book is Autonomy, and ...
I keep reading comments online which insist that you can only get a book deal if you have mysterious connections in the publishing business; and how it's absolutely impossible for new writers to get published at all. The logic of these arguments is fundamentally flawed, and they're just not true; but how to ...
I can understand your frustrations. I can understand your longings to be published. I can even understand you considering calling yourself "prepublished" in an ironic, post-modernist way.But what ever you do, please don't actually do it. It's embarrassing, and will draw the attention of the Point And Laugh Brigade.My thanks ...
If you've self-published then you've already tested your book, as a product, on the marketplace. If it failed to sell in any great numbers, then in the eyes of a lot of publishers, you’ve proved that it doesn't have the potential to sell in sufficient quantities for them to take it on. This might well ...
I have a reasonable amount of experience of the publishing world: I worked as a non-fiction editor for a book-packaging company which gave me direct experience of editing for some of the best publishing houses in the world. In the process, I learned a little about the publishing business; the differences between good and publishable; ...