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'The troubled British book chain Borders went into administration last
week. The chain, which had been the subject of a management buyout in July,
proved unable to trade its way through the recession. It was already in the
process of closing down its Book Etc stores when the end came.' News Review
reports on further turmoil on the high street.
-
So what's the Google Settlement all about? You may be thoroughly bored with
it, but this is a battle of the titans as Google and Amazon square up to each
other and the Settlement has a significant impact on authors’
rights. News Review looks at what both sides have been claiming.
-
'The New Google Settlement
looks like a reasonable resolution of a thorny set of problems. Bowing to
pressure from foreign governments and the US Department of Justice, the
revised Settlement presented to the district Court in New York shortly before
midnight on Friday limits the scope of the scheme to works registered with the
US Copyright Office and books published in the UK, Canada and Australia.'
News Review reports.
-
News Review looks at 'the tragic saga of a bestselling author', the story
of Stieg Larrson, who died suddenly just as he was becoming a megaseller His
girlfriend of 30 years has been disinherited and it is just like an episode out
of one of Larsson’s own books.
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'These are nervous times in the book world. Too much seems to be happening
too fast and no-one is sure what it means or where we’re all going to end up.'
News Review looks at the the pace of change in e-books and internet selling.
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'The main thing the music business didn’t realise at first is that
digitalisation isn’t about distributing the same content in another way.
It changes the way people consume content and what is consumed.' Danny Ryan, intellectual property specialist at LEGC, in the Bookseller
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'In his essay Politics and the English Language George Orwell set out
a series of rules for writing that are worth repeating in full... I would add three more tips:
3. Write. As much as you can. The more you do the better you'll get at
it. Damian Whitworth in The Times
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'It's my belief that the relationship between writer and reader is a love
relationship. How do you make someone love you? You present
yourself at your best, your most alive, your fullest, your most considerate.
An author must be love-flushed: you must give them you most comfortable
chair; you want to give the reader the seat nearest the fire, the best wine and
food. It's a sort of hospitality gesture.' Martin Amis in the Sunday Times
-
‘I’ve always felt that I have tried to give women of a particular
generation a voice. I do think chick list has potentially been very
powerful as it has looked at things like our awful relationship with our bodies,
our relationship with food, with the beauty industry, our relationship with work
– the fact that we’re still not equal…' Marian Keyes, author of The
Brightest Star in the Sky, in the Bookseller
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'But, actually, I think the most significant thing about the Reader
is not the issue of convenience, but its potential for transforming non-regular
readers’ relationship with books... We know there is a problem with
literacy rates in the UK. If we are to solve it, we need to be more
imaginative. We need to accept that the tools are not what matters –
voice, print, audio – but the narrative itself. And acknowledge that, for
some, a resistance to the physical book itself is a problem.’ Kate Mosse in the Bookseller
'Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart.'
William Wordsworth
|
New Categories series
So you want to write historical fiction?
Well, your timing is good, because historical fiction is fashionable
again after many years in the doldrums. In fact it’s so popular that it
has virtually reinvented itself as a category.
Our latest article in this series explores the market and approaches
to writing historical fiction.
Writing Romance
Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy
Writing Crime Fiction
Writing Non-fiction
This year's competition has come up with some entertaining shortlised titles,
including this excerpt from Philip Roth.
Booker winner Mantel deserves the accolades
John dismisses the Booker judges but applauds their choice: 'Many good – and
many great – writers go through life without ever getting close to the Booker
award. It’s nice to see one winning who thoroughly deserves it.'
He looks at Mantel's Tudor subject-matter and the hard slog of her eleven
previous books: 'Her secret as an author? To keep a notebook and to write every
day that she possibly can.'
We feel very honoured that the British Library has asked to archive
www.writersservices.com in its web archive.
The UK Web Archive is a corpus of websites selected by leading UK
institutions for their historical, social and cultural significance in the UK.
Also listed in this article on their
archive are other international web archives.
How to kickstart a biography
Four reports by Chas Jones from
Edinburgh:
At the Edinburgh Book
Festival
The Edinburgh Fringe
Edinburgh Fringe
comedy - no laughing matter?
Edinburgh snippets
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.
Check out this page to find links to the huge number of useful articles on this site,
including Finding an Agent
and Making Submissions.
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 book review section
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.
|
Zoe Jenny, who was born in Switzerland but is shortly publishing her
first book written in English:
'Now that I am writing in English I have to start all over again, earning
my credentials in a new market. I am essentially back to square one. But
maybe that is the most exciting place to be.'
My Say 7: Timothy Hallinan on the Writing
Session.
My Say 8: Jae Watson on the magic formula which
enables writers to 'cross that fine, elusive line dividing unpublished and
published writers'.
In the fourth part of this series, Chris Holifield gives an update on
developments relating to Self-publishing and discusses how the possibility
of publishing your own book is transforming authors' routes to publication.
First article:
Bookselling
Second article:
Publishing
Third article: Print on Demand and the
Long Tail
Fauzia Burke is founder of a an Internet marketing firm specializing in
creating online awareness for books and authors. Her article shows how
successful niche publishers are reaching communities of readers on the web.
Maureen Kincaid Speller reviews this useful new book and concludes that:
'It is true the handbook asks for a lot from the reader in terms of
participation and active thought, but for those writers who are extremely
serious about improving their work, it provides a valuable course in how to
think about the art and craft of writing.'
'Very few works of non-fiction can do without an index of some description...
If the reader is lucky, the index will allow them to find the term they seek and
take them immediately to a relevant and useful mention of that term or
concept... So why can’t a computer programme achieve this?
Joanne Phillips' article on Indexing looks at why non-fiction books need
them, why it's a specialist job and why computers can't achieve the same result
as a skilled indexer.
A professional index is essential for any work of non-fiction. Readers expect
to find a useful, well-presented index at the back of a book, and can get very
frustrated if the index doesn’t quickly lead them to the information they seek.
- Are you an author planning to compile your own index?
- Have you been asked by your publisher to provide an index for your
book?
- Are you self-publishing your work? If so, don’t let your readers
down by offering them a sub-standard index.
A professional index will set your work apart from other self-published
books. Indexing need not be expensive – and an effective index is the key to a
good non-fiction book.
It’s a common enough fantasy for writers: maybe now I can leave that dreary
job and devote myself whole-heartedly to writing... Perhaps you’ve even been
indulging in it as you lay on the beach this summer, or more likely spent your
precious holiday working on your latest novel.
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
Our Editorial
Services for writers
Check out the 17 different editorial services we offer, from Reports to
Copy editing, Typing to Rewriting. |
