Industry News Banned Books Week began yesterday, so pick up a novel by Sue Monk Kidd, Jodi Picoult, or Laurie Halse Anderson—all authors whose books have faced censorship challenges in the past six years according to the National Council of Teachers of English. For a list of books challenged since 2004, go to http://www.ncte.org/library/NCTEFiles/Resources/Anti-Censorship/Titles%20Challenged%202004-2011.pdf At [...]

I’m sending out this post a day early. Tomorrow,  our focus won’t be on the publishing industry but on  the people, pets, and things that comfort and uplift us.  Write all you want tomorrow, and save the angst over agents and editors,  book sales, marketing, and what have you until Monday.  GalleyCat, quoting figures supplied by the Association of American Publishers, reports that adult [...]

Writers who gravitate toward readers’ groups on social media often find themselves connecting with other writers. “We cannot mistake our professional network for our reader demographic,” says author-marketing expert Kristin Lamb. She advises writers to push out of their comfort zones to reach their real demographic, which she defines as  “Anyone in need of informing [...]

In the bad news/good news department, Writer’s Digest contributing editor Jane Friedman won’t add new content to There Are No Rules, the writing blog she launched in 2008 on WD’s website. (The blog’s contents will be archived at WD and at JaneFriedman.com.) Happily, Friedman has unveiled Being Human at Electric Speed, her new writer-centric blog.  There, she [...]

    This Sunday’s post is brought to you by numbers three, four and five—along with other,  random integers. Excuse the clunky URL’s in the post.  No number was to blame. A certain human, ahem, had issues with WordPress this week. Mystery and young-adult writer Randy Russell touts the “Rule of Three” for pitching a novel and staying on [...]

Industry News- June 5 At Writer Unboxed, WF-RWA’s own Jan O’Hara interviews former literary agent Nathan Bransford and asks the questions we’ve wanted answers to since Bransford left Curtis Brown Ltd.  The interview’s a two-parter, so look for the second half soon. Chuck Sambuchino’s Guide to Literary Agents features  a Q & A with Katie Shea of [...]

E-pubs are in the news again. Agent Nat Sobel challenges publishers to hold back e-reprints for six months. He compares e-books to DVDs and hardcover books to newly released movies. He feels that “the future of hardcover publishing is at stake.” Random House is claiming e-rights on backlist books. I hope no one reading this [...]