London Writing Workshops

Archive for the ‘Places to Read New Fiction’ Category

The Bookseller reports that  Bloomsbury is to launch a new imprint called Bloomsbury Circus. The new  list  will be a mix of debuts and more established names:  ”mostly fiction, unashamedly literary, always fresh and sometimes surprising”. In the first year there will be  nine titles, and after that  they will build up to publishing four books a month.

Alexandra Pringle, Bloomsbury’s editor-in-chief, is quoted as saying: “With fiction, you can’t successfully publish more than four titles a month because, selling into the fiction buyer, you have to have your lead, second lead, dark horse and a crime title. If you do more, you lose the focus. If we are going to grow, we have to do it in an exciting, imaginative way. This is a way we can grow, and continue to offer the service we do.”

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26 is a network of professional writers who care about words (the name 26 stands for the 26 letters of the alphabet).

In 2010, they persuaded London’s Victoria & Albert museum to choose 26 objects from its British Galleries and randomly assigned them to 26 writers. Each person wrote exactly 62 words – 26 in reflection – in response to the object. In 2011, 26  took the idea to the National Library of Wales, the Ulster Museum and the National Museum of Scotland, where writers were let loose on objects as disparate as a medieval illuminated book, a beggar’s badge and a 16th century Scottish guillotine. Now they have produced a book of the results, including contributions from Lucy Caldwell, Gillian Clarke, Alexander McCall Smith, Paul Muldoon, Bernard McLaverty and Maura Dooley.

But the book will only be produced if enough people sign up – in advance –  to buy a copy, because 26 have teamed up with the innovative startup Unbound Books and this is the way Unbound runs things. 26 has 35 days to gather enough support to make the book happen.  Click here to visit 26 Objects on the the Unbound site and buy a piece of the future (and the past).

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One of the books on this year’s Guardian First Book Award shortlist is from a brand new not-for-private-profit publisher, And Other Stories, established in 2010 with funding from the Arts Council. Down the Rabbit Hole, by Juan Pablo Villalobos (pictured left), is a darkly comic novel about Latin-American drug-dealers. The other titles vying for the £10,000 prize are Stephen Kelman’s Pigeon English (Bloomsbury), which was also shortlisted for this year’s Booker; Amy Waldman’s The Submission (William Heinemann), a novel about the tensions arising around the building of a 9/11 memorial; Kashmiri author Mirza Waheed’s The Collaborator (Viking); and – the only non-fiction book to make the shortlist this year - American cancer specialist Siddhartha Mukherjee’s The Emperor of All Maladies (Fourth Estate), a biography of the disease. You can read extracts of all the books with introductions by the authors on the Guardian website.

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On Dec 1st at the Free the Word Centre, The Literary Consultancy is hosting a fundraising evening on behalf of The Maya Centre, a charity providing free psychodynamic counselling and group psychotherapy for women in Islington

Novelist, journalist and campaigner Melissa Benn will host an illustrious line-up of writers including Jill Dawson, Margaret Drabble, Helen Simpson and Sarah Waters who will read from their work highlighting a variety of experiences from women’s lives. Tickets include a glass of wine and canapes.

Tickets are £25 but you can donate more if you wish. Click here to book. All proceeds go to the Maya Centre.

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Flash fiction – also known as micro fiction, short short stories or smoke-long fiction (because a story lasts as for long as it takes to smoke a cigarette) – is a form that’s growing in popularity. It exists somewhere between traditional short prose fiction and poetry, combining narrative with economy and intensity.

Writer, editor and creative writing lecturer Calum Kerr has come up with the idea of creating a day in 2012 to celebrate the form. To join the movement you can sign up to the Facebook Page Or follow on Twitter @nationalflashfd

Or visit Calum Kerr’s website for updates.

and its many great creators.

National Flash Fiction Facebook Page

Having publicized the debut novel competition on this site, it’s nice to announce that  independent publisher Route Online have picked a winner – 27-year-old Sophie Coulombeau (pictured) from York. The competition, supported by Arts Council England, was aimed at novelists under 30 living in Yorkshire.

Coulombeau’s book, provisionally titled Rites,  tells the story of a group of four teenagers who make a pact to lose their virginity away from the watchful eyes of parents and priest. Ten years later, they look back on the events and unravel how it all went horribly wrong. Route editor Ian Daley said of the award, ‘We are thrilled to be publishing this book and to be working with Sophie. She’s a great talent, with an exciting future in front of her. The book manages to have that rare combination of being both richly complex and a riveting read.’ The novel will be published in summer 2012.

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Independent booksellers across the country have formed an alliance. On October 1st, with backing from the Guardian newspaper, they are launching their own national loyalty card scheme. Participating bookshops – 114 in total – can be found on the Love Your Indie website.

The other news is that independent booksellers in London have produced a new map showing the location of  87 independent bookshops across the city, including shops selling new, antiquarian, specialist and second-hand titles. The map features a text work from the artist David Batchelor and is available,  free, in bookshops and galleries.  Among the bookshops which have donated money to fund its publication are Housman’s Bookshop in Kings Cross, Woolfson and Tay in Bermondsey and the Atlantis Bookshop in Bloomsbury.

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The Bookseller reports that publishers Gollancz  have agreed a five-figure deal for two books with self-published author Michael J Ward. The books are part of a series called ‘Destiny Quest’ and have similarities with interactive game book series from the 1980s where the reader controls the path of the story by rolling a dice or choosing the next actions of a character. Ward self-published the first book in the series, The Legion of Shadow, in February, and it has sold more than 1,800 copies, according to the publisher. Gollancz will republish in May 2012 as a £14.99 trade paperback, which will include the original self-published version, extra material and a new mini-adventure. Book two in the series, The Heart of Fire, will follow in November 2012. Gollancz is an imprint of the Orion Publishing group.

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The Short Story is a new website designed to showcase the best short stories from around the world. They’re currently running an open submission competition to find the best story of 2011. Three cash prizes will be awarded. The deadline is Sept 15.

More info on how to submit work from The Short Story website.

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 presents Shorelines: Literature Festival of the Sea, a small, intelligent and thought-provoking festival, celebrating  great writing on the theme of the sea. Curated by Lemn Sissay and Rachel Lichtenstein, this three-day event takes place over the weekend 15-17 July at Solomon Monk’s Pump House in Southend, Essex.

Highlights include readings by contemporary cult British authors Iain Sinclair, Jay Griffiths and Robert Macfarlane; a special production of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner performed by Lemn Sissay; Sri Lankan born artist and writer Roma Tearne; Chinese poet Yang Lian; prize-winning Icelandic author Sjon; American artist Thomas Joshua Cooper; an open air production of The Tempest; and an award winning adaptation of Hemingway’s world renowned novella The Old Man and the Sea by Magpie Blue Productions.

Download the full Shorelines programme HERE. For more info and tickets go to:  www.metalculture.com

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