From Richard Osman and Millie Bobby Brown to the upcoming book by Keanu Reeves, celebrity novels are everywhere. What's behind the boom? And how do non-famous writers feel about it?
Writers are calling on parents and grandparents to buy a book by a non-celebrity this Christmas as authors such as David Walliams are set to top the festive charts. Read more
Another day, another celebrity announces they are to "pen" a children's book. Already this week, Jamie Lee Curtis has announced a "selfie-themed" tome, Chelsea Clinton a picture book about inspirational women and the Black Eyed Peas a graphic novel featuring zombies. Read more
At the Observer, Tom Lamont (a writer and commissioning editor for the Observer) and Robert Muchamore (author of the best-selling Cherub series of books, and of Henderson's Boys) sat down to discuss a very important topic: Should celebrities stop writing children's books? Read more
‘I always quote Kurt Vonnegut. He said in the early part of his career he was dismissed as a science fiction writer and that critics tend to put genre books, including sci-fi, in the bottom drawer of their desk... It's true. I get the New York Times every Sunday. In 37 novels, I've never had a stand-alone review. I'm always in the crime round-up.
A survey of 787 members of the Society of Authors (SoA) has found that a third of translators and a quarter of illustrators have lost work to generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems. Translators are also more likely to use AI to support their work, with 37% of respondents saying they have done so, followed by 25% of non-fiction writers.
The author Lynne Reid Banks, known for her novel The L-Shaped Room and her children's book series The Indian in the Cupboard, has died at the age of 94.
I launched my podcast Making It Up nearly three years ago with the goal of interviewing writers not for any particular work of theirs, but to talk to them about their lives. I didn't want to ask them what famous author they want to have dinner with or what their top five favorite books are ... yech. Read more
Until we have a mechanism to test for artificial intelligence, writers need a tool to maintain trust in their work. So I decided to be completely open with my readers
'Some writers achieve great popularity and then disappear forever. The bestseller lists of the past fifty years are, with a few lively exceptions, a sombre graveyard of dead books.'