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News
The 2024/5 New Media Writing Prize is now open for entries, with cash prizes for the best in interactive digital narrative, literature, and journalism.
The NMWP is seeking original works of “born-digital” storytelling (fiction or non-fiction): works created on digital devices, for digital devices. These include hypertexts, participatory films, i-documentaries, Twine stories, transmedia novels, and more.
The competition is free to enter. The main prize of £1000 is sponsored by if:book, with £500 prizes for best journalism (sponsor: FIPP media) and a “people’s choice” category (sponsor: Wonderbox Digital). Winner of the student prize will win a year’s membership from sponsor Writers Online.
French agent Julie Finidori has joined Aevitas Creative Management UK (ACM UK). She will be based in Paris, representing French-language books in France and English-language books internationally. Findori joins ACM UK from her own agency in Paris, where she represented a roster of authors including Pauline Harmange (I Hate Men), Fania Noël (Ten Questions on Black Feminisms), Nora Bouazzouni (Eat the Rich) and Pınar Selek (The Turkish Military Cauldron).
Before becoming an agent, Julie managed foreign rights at Albin Michel, living all over the world, including Indonesia, Sweden, the United States, Canada and Turkey.
Finidori said: "I’m very happy to be joining such a dynamic and exciting international agency and learning and growing with all my new partners. I’m already amazed by the support and opportunities this collaboration is generating and I feel very lucky to be a part of the Aevitas community."
Rebus author Sir Ian Rankin has been announced as a guest programmer for the Bloody Scotland International Crime Writing Festival later this year.
The best-selling novelist has sold more than 35 million books and was awarded a knighthood in 2023 for services to literature and charity, and becomes the first ever guest programmer invited to join the team.
Bloody Scotland will run from September 12 to 14 in Stirling and Sir Ian will join fellow authors Abir Mukherjee, Lin Anderson, Craig Robertson and Gordon J. Brown as part of the programming team.
They will bring a ‘world-class’ line-up of authors and special guests to the festival with the programme to be launched in June this year.
Sir Ian Rankin said: “Bloody Scotland manages to remain the world’s friendliest and most inclusive crime fiction festival while also attracting the biggest and brightest names in the business to the city of Stirling. It’s epic!”
Articles
I saw some recent discourse about this on the Substack app, but it’s been a topic of heated conversation within publishing, between writers and agents, and between agents and editors for the past few years. Some of you may recall Jonathan Karp’s infamous mandate that editors must respond to agent submissions within a month1, after he learned about ghosting.
In the past few years, there have been more instances of editors simply not responding to submissions from agents. They will respond to the pitch, but after receiving the manuscript, neither reject nor ask for a call, even after multiple follow-ups and sometimes even after calls and auction rules are set.
If you are an editor I work with who follows me here, this isn’t about you. You are all perfect. Also, thanks!
Why is this happening?
With a ban looming, publishers are hoping to pivot to new platforms, but readers fear their community of book lovers will never be the same.
Two years ago, Jeneane O’Riley self-published her fantasy romance novel, “How Does it Feel?,” an enemies-to-lovers tale about a woman who meets a handsome, unhinged fairy prince. Without a publisher to help market her novel or get it into bookstores, she decided to promote it herself on TikTok.
Pretty soon, TikTok users started posting their own viral reactions to the book, and sales shot up. One post from a reader shocked by the novel’s plot twists got more than six million views. The book hit No. 1 on Amazon.
“That type of free marketing for a small, independent author is unheard-of,” said O’Riley, who later signed a deal with Bloom Books, a romance imprint at Sourcebooks.
Now, with a law banning TikTok in the United States set to take effect on Sunday, O’Riley and other authors are scrambling to keep their networks of fans intact. O’Riley, who has more than 52,000 followers on TikTok, has been urging people to find her on Instagram, Threads and Facebook. But she’s concerned that her close-knit TikTok audience will disperse.
I’m a TV writer by profession, and when I’m not staffing a show, I develop TV series adaptations with the goal of selling one to a buyer. My favorite novel genres to adapt are mysteries and thrillers because I love suspenseful, propulsive storytelling and because thrillers make damn good TV.
TV shows demand action and surprises that compel a viewer to keep watching, and since suspense novels are built around twists, with chapters that end on cliffhangers, they lend well to adaptation. In the Age of Streaming, where thousands of TV shows across 400 networks compete for attention, it’s incredibly difficult for a series to gain traction, but a delicious thriller can quickly amass an audience.
If I spark to a novel, I develop my “take”—a 20-minute pitch on how I would adapt the book into an on-going series. When pitching a series, the most important question I need to answer is Why Now? A thriller novel with a strong hook and a juicy twist is great, but one that has something to say, that sparks discussion around a timely, compelling theme, is undeniable. Think Big Little Lies, with its examination of domestic violence among the elites, or Codename Villanelle (the source material for Killing Eve), with its rare depiction of female obsession.
As we look ahead into 2025, the ongoing realities of global instability and economic uncertainty are not going away any time soon. Adaptation will be essential as we navigate these persistent issues, demanding resilience and innovative solutions from individuals and communities alike.
In the creative realm, we are witnessing a significant shift toward authenticity. There is an increasing desire among audiences to trust the true identities of those who created the work – writers, artists, illustrators and actors.
In a time where digital imagery and AI often raise questions such as: is that real, did it actually happen or is it fake? The importance of knowing the voices behind the work becomes paramount. As a result, we can anticipate a celebration of transparency and trust in creative expression. What that means is a striving towards building an artist’s name, audience and credibility to own the copyright so they can be recognised as the original creator of their work across all platforms.
In today’s screen-filled world, we are not just selling books, we are promoting the act of reading itself. We advocate for its transformative power in shaping young minds, fostering empathy and enhancing mental health. This is a responsibility we cannot take lightly. It is one that requires all the creativity and collaboration between agents and publishers to create new formats with retailers who are confident in how to sell these non-traditional formats.
We need to get bold. We need to push the boundaries of what a book can be. Here is how I think this might look in the year to come.
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