This news about the site was published by Bookbrunch on 18 July 2013
Relaunch for WritersServices from Bookbrunch
18 July 2013
WritersServices has launched a revamped website with more than 4,000 pages of information for writers. The service also offers a weekly update and a monthly magazine. Read more
Reading is the paradigm of mobile entertainment. The home, in transit and in work-breaks are all seized as opportunities to turn a few pages. Alarmingly, a dozen respondents read in their cars. One must hope they were passengers. Read more
With schools and colleges around the world heading back, WritersServices has provided over 80 papers in their Education resource Centre to help those running. The pages can be used freely by any student or course tutor. Read more
The image of a writer bashing away at a clunky typewriter is dead. Only two people admitted to employing a typewriter in the January survey of writing habits conducted by WritersServices. The desktop computer and laptop have taken over as the preferred way for writers to set down their words Read more
This article by Chris Holifield was published in the May issue of Writers' Forum magazine. It provides a history of the setting-up and development of the
Where to find 1,300 pages of advice for writers
WritersServices.com
It was the height of the dotcom boom. Made redundant in spring 2000, by early 2001 I was keen to set up my own business. A website seemed an obvious idea and what better target than aspiring writers? I had always thought publishers’ slush piles a barrier for authors. Read more
WritersServices had another mention in the trade press in the UK weekly Publishing News dated 14 March 2003
'WritersServices, the writers' website, now offers an increased range of services, including assistance with scriptwriting and children's writing and, for non-English speakers, a 'manuscript polishing' service. Read more
WritersServices was mentioned in the trade press in the Bookseller dated 21 February 2003, in an article about the websites of 2003 book fairs which was part of the series Bookworm on the Net written by Anne Weale.
WritersServices was mentioned in the trade press in the Bookseller dated 11 October 2002, when Chris Holifield wrote a letter to the Editor as a contribution to an ongoing debate about the slush pile and what writers can do to get published:
'The continuing correspondence about the slush pile has prompted me to write to you about WritersServices.com. Our website is dedicat Read more
WritersServices, the website for writers, is pleased to announce that it has reached agreement with Pan Macmillan to publish the UK and US literary agents' listings for the 2002 edition of The Writer’s Handbook. Over 300 agents are listed with advice on the type of work to send and how to approach each agent. Read more
'I was trained by poetry where you can just write ambience and atmosphere. But in a novel, if there's not a story that people are interested in, with characters that they care about, they'll close the book.'
In the third in a series on the implications of AI for publishing, Nadim Sadek argues that effective advertising is now feasible for everyone, and for all kinds of titles
A publishing friend of mine recently told me about a sales report they'd received from a major retailer in which some of their books had zero sales. It turned out that there had been plenty of sales, however-they just all went to counterfeiters. In case you think this is an outlier, it's not. Counterfeiting is a serious, nontrivial problem facing the industry.
If you read the recently unsealed materials from the federal antitrust lawsuit against Amazon, you'll see why the company wanted to keep them under wraps. According to the unredacted notes from one meeting, Jeff Bezos directed his team to stuff more ads into search results, even if it meant accepting more ads internally categorized as irrelevant to what users were looking for. Read more
The U.K. Publishers Association (PA) was established in 1896 and is a cornerstone of the British publishing industry, working with a diverse array of companies to promote innovation, collaboration, and commercial success. Read more
With English as a shared language, there is a natural relationship between the American and British publishing industries. Most of the world's top publishing companies, be they conglomerates or independent publishers, have operations in each country, typically in New York City and London. Literary traffic travels both ways across the Atlantic.
The UK is experiencing a boom in book clubs, according to new data from event listing companies.
Book club listings on the ticketing site Eventbrite increased by 350% between 2019 and 2023 - a "much stronger" growth than the overall increase in UK-based listings over the same period. Between 2022 and 2023 alone, book club listings on the site rose by 41%. Read more
"We don't understand the consequences of AI with regards to copyright," Brazil's Karine Gonçalves Pansa, president of the International Publishers Association (IPA), said, when asked to name the most important issues facing publishing right now. "We can say, very easily, that our content is being used, without permission, and without license, by AI."