“Victoria Barnsley, one of the most powerful figures in British publishing, has unexpectedly announced that she is leaving the company at the end of this week” – Jon Stock, The Guardian. This surprise resignation has followed the ‘radical’ change in structure of publisher HarperCollins and its parent company News Corp. News Corp has “split in …
More Changes to the Publishing World – HarperCollins CEO Resigns Read More »
Many throughout the publishing industry were shocked to find that today, the merging of two major players became official. Penguin and Random House united under one roof today, now dominating the publishing world as one and preparing to take on e-giant Amazon’s growing power. More on this later!
It’s taken a while, but our verdicts are finally in on Lurman’s Gatsby. With its pumping Jay-Z-meets-The Charleston soundtrack and its visual feast of dazzling costuming, sky scraper fly overs and A-list cast, the 2013 Great Gatsby was always bound to impress loyal Lurman fans. It seems to have blown the minds of the rest …
“In Lionel Shriver’s novel Big Brother, a woman puts her marriage on the line to help a drastically obese sibling lose weight.” Admittedly, the topic of Lionel Shriver’s new novel surprised us after the traumatic and serious nature of We Need to Talk About Kevin. However, with the promise of a “writerly trick late in (the …
In the week before her 82nd birthday, short story writer Alice Munro has revealed “I’m probably not going to write any more” to a newspaper interviewer. For those of us who’ve studied Munro’s work and heard her hailed “our Chekhov”, this is indeed a sad day. “There will be no more books after Dear Life,” she …
Ever need an extra push with your writing? Writer’s Edit is dedicated to helping you get there. Check out the first of our weekly writing prompts below and get started! If you’re working on an ongoing fiction project: Take a small instance or moment within your story – make it big! Explore your protagonist’s feelings …
There’s been a hell of a lot of buzz about this year’s Miles Franklin award, particularly due to the all-female shortlist. Well, the winner has finally been announced – Questions of Travel by Michelle de Kretser. Congratulations! Accompanied by the announcement was the press release below: “The Miles Franklin Literary Award, recognised as Australia’s most …
We introduce you to a book that make your prose ready for publishing…
It’s a glamourous time of year for us readers and writers with the Australian Book Industry Award winners having just been announced. A couple of highlights: Taking out the categories: Book of the Year, Literary Book of the Year and Newcomer of the Year was M.L. Stedman’s The Light Between Oceans, published by Random House. General …
If there’s one McCarthy book to read after you’ve recovered from the emotional trauma of The Road, it’s The Border Trilogy.
Are you aspiring to write great literature? Wondering what the classics are all about? Check out the snippet below from Julian Barnes’ ‘The Sense of an Ending’ to see what his characters think about it. Do you share the same fear? This was another of our fears: that Life wouldn’t turn out to be like …
With the announcement of the Miles Franklin Award Winner coming up in less than a month’s time, attention has turned to the all-female short-list. For the first time in the Award’s 57 year history, women have dominated the long-list by a 4:1 ratio and have gone on to take the entire short-list. Simon Lewis, who …
Full of inspiration for every writer pursuing a dream, Beatrix Potter will not disappoint.
Are book club members as qualified as trained editors when it comes to assessing an unpublished, unedited manuscript?
Galgut remains true to his style, rewarding his readers with some tender observations on humanity and complex portrays of human interaction: “I wondered then whether people don’t need their secrets. Lives are meant to be separate and apart; when the borders break and we overflow into one another, it only leads to trouble and sadness.”
