How do you find writers?

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Collated Answers from WW interviews

Andrew Lownie	With over a hundred and fifty authors, most of them living entirely off their writing, most of my deals are repeat business but I am always looking for new blood – of whatever age. The articles ‘How I Found the Agency’ give some idea of just how I find my authors. Sometimes it’s location ( I’m near the right railway station), sometimes from an acknowledgement in a comparable book, sometimes because of my specialist interests on recommendation from other agents, editors, writers or because of articles about the agency in the media, sometimes through social contact or through the Biographers Club which I set up ten years ago (see www.biographersclub.co.uk), sometimes from reference books such as The Writers’ Handbook but most now come through the website.

Anji Pratap	At the moment, mainly through recommendation. But I have a website - http://www.anjipratap.com – so I hope that will generate some work too.

Backhand Stories	All submissions through the web site. Send the submission in the BODY of an email to submit@backhandstories.com.

Blackberry	We are a small agency and prefer to work with previously published authors, and develop their talent.

Chroma	Most of the work we publish comes to Chroma through general submissions. Other stories and poems come from writers myself or the Poetry Editor, Saradha Soobrayen, has worked with in workshops, or seen perform at literary and performance poetry events around the country. For the first few issues our policy was to keep the journal open to only UK-based writers and artists. I wanted to show readers and other writers that there was a queer literary scene in the UK, and that we didn’t have to turn to the States to find those strong, lyrical, non-mainstream voices. And now that we’ve established that, Chroma is becoming more of an international literary journal. One of the ways of getting a worldwide interest was to launch an international writing competition with big cash prizes and prominent writers like Ali Smith, Mark Doty, and Michael Arditti as the judges.

Earlyworks Press	Through the competitions. At first, we simply waited to see who would find us on the website but it’s been up for over a year now, and is getting a lot of attention. We are a small club by internet standards and the work on the club forum is fairly in-depth. We realised that maintaining an open invitation would lead to too much instability. If people go to the bother of entering a competition and their work gets shortlisted we know they aren’t just casual browsers. We do still consider applications on the site sometimes though. It depends whether people offer work that impresses us and how busy we are in the club.

Fuselit Magazine	For the first issue, DEMO, I sought out people online whose poetry and prose I had enjoyed in the past. I headhunted on deviantart.com, abctales.com and ukauthors.com among others, and the result was great. After that, people began to join the mailing list and send work themselves. Most become repeat contributors, which reinforces the idea of community and gives the magazine character. A lot of magazines tend to shy away from featuring the same author more than once, but we encourage it, because the same person could send two utterly different pieces for different issues. That said, we don’t have ‘favourites’ that bump other equally strong writers and artists out of the magazine through loyalty alone. If a piece is good, we want it, regardless of the author.

Laura Wilkinson	Regular contributors have come from a range of sources. Some are writers that I have worked with on other publications. Others, like Hannah and Anne, I met at creative writing workshops and then there are those who sent in their resumes and asked if they could write for hagsharlotsheroines. I’m always on the look out for new writers with something to say and, of course, style and command of their craft. I am a big fan of online networks and projects, like MySpace (though you have to be very discerning here), Write Words and Writing in the Margins and I have met people this way too. Organisations like Spread the Word and Pulp.net are also terrific and great ways to meet like minds, dynamic new writers and get inspiration and ideas.

Lawrence Bowen

The London Magazine	We actively seek out talent by attending as many poetry events and art exhibitions as possible. We read the other large publications for good work, as well as trawling the web and reading all our submissions carefully. It is as important to us to give someone who has never had work published before a platform, as it is to have big names. For articles and reviews we accept well articulated ideas, and commission based on successful pitches. We are planning 3 themed issues in the year ahead so if your readers are thinking of pitching ideas they should bear this in mind. The April/May 2008 issue is to be an Anglo/Russian issue, June/July will feature Anglo/Arab work, and then an Anglo/Indian issue in August/September. Don’t be afraid to submit ideas. If there is a book of poetry that you have read recently and you feel that it deserves to be reviewed, contact us at admin@thelondonmagazine.net. The most important piece of advice I can give, however, is to have a look at the magazine before pitching. The London Magazine is a serious literary journal and therefore all your work has to be referenced correctly, well thought out, with a critical and sophisticated literary audience in mind. In terms of the poetry and short fiction we only choose that of an extremely high standard. It’s interesting, because if you look at our other publication: Trespass Magazine (http://www.trespassmagazine.co.uk), you’ll see a great difference in the type of work that is accepted. For that we look for a dangerous, louche and witty style—if you have something that is great but that no-one has been brave enough to publish, give Trespass a go.

Long Barn Books	How do you find writers? Books have come my way by being offered to me, or I have an idea and commission a book. I started with non-fiction and that is the way it has been until this year when I have published one first novel and later am doing some children`s books. Agents don`t send me things much because we are a very egalitarian firm and everyone, no matter who they are, gets the same advance of Ł1,000 and the same royalty contract – agents, of course, like to push for huge advances which I can`t and won`t pay, so They don`t make much out of Long Barn.

Macmillan New Writing	How do you find writers? All submissions are unsolicited. The vast bulk (well over 4,000 since we began accepting submissions a year ago) arrive via email (the address is available from our website).

MBA Literary Agents	I am lucky in being recommended by various organisations, including the Romantic Novelists Association and literary consultancies; I also attend writers conferences, university creative writing courses and MBA runs a prize for unpublished fiction called the Harry Bowling Prize. Otherwise we receive lots and lots of submissions, like every agency, from the general public. They all get read of course, but ones directed to individual agents, with a good sense of why they have picked you, are likely to get read quicker and with more attention.

Paines Plough	How do you find writers? Reading unsolicited scripts, going to play readings and fringe productions, talking to other literary managers and people who work with young people, running taster workshops and masterclasses, Future Perfect – our young writers’ programme.

Patricia Cumper	Writers find us. They send their work in to us, they come to our productions, make contact in some way. And we keep an eye out for work that interests us and fits with our aims and objectives.

Sean Costello	At the risk of turning this into a sales pitch, I would strongly advise anyone who is interested in sending us proposals for fiction or memoirs to get hold of Paul’s book or Jess’s books to see the calibre of work we are looking for. We are only interested in work that genuinely excites us and reminds us of why we got into publishing in the first place— believe me, we don’t get a kick out of writing rejection letters. I think you can tell pretty quickly when you are in the hands of a real writer with both the desire and the ability to communicate an experience, but unfortunately that also happens to be the kind of writing you very seldom encounter, whether you’re trawling through the slush pile or browsing for something decent to read in a bookshop. Because Scotland is our primary market we are only considering work with a strong Scottish dimension at present. This could mean that the book has a Scottish setting, or that the author comes from or lives in Scotland.

Shearsman	Three ways: by recommendations from people I trust; from reading around and soliciting work from those whose work I like; and lastly from the mail. The latter is a safety valve, which ensures that I don’t miss poets that I, or my other contacts, don’t know. I’ve published a number of poets in the magazine who came in that way, and have taken on an increasing number of book manuscripts that way. These are still a distinct minority though and will probably remain so.

Smith Browne	So far we have built up our archive through word of mouth, personal recommendation, and a small amount of advertising. We are now trying to cast a wider net, hoping to attract a more steady stream of submissions.

Snow Books 2	How do you find writers? We get all our submissions through our website. We actively encourage manuscript submissions in any genre, except for children’s and poetry – rather than limiting our choice we will read anything, because it’s only in the writing that we can tell if it’s a book we love. I hate synopses – they ruin the plot and, regardless of how good your idea is, if your writing is sub-standard the idea is not enough.

Tumbleweed TV	How do you find writers? In all sorts of ways – recommendations, friends of friends, at festivals or industry events, or from courses. For about a year we’ve been having regular meetings with some writers we met on a course, which is a great way to meet new and exciting writers, get constructive feedback, and hopefully collaborate successfully on projects.

Writer's Muse	They tend to find us. In its time the Muse has published writers from America, Canada, France, Holland, Spain, Greece, Italy, Germany and Kazahkstan! Sometimes they’d tell us how they came across Writer’s Muse and that was worth writing about in itself. Six degrees of separation is a fascinating concept and easy to get your head round when you hear the stories of how people discovered the Muse. The Internet has been a good shop window but I feel I should also mention Light’s List, which many people have quoted as being their first introduction to us. It’s kind of fitting that a hard copy publication points people in the right direction. We have published many writers and I’m sure that they spread the word around as well, so it’s probably like the old image of ripples in a pond. People hear about us, submit to us and if they like what they see they spread the word again. I also used to use my old position of Creative Writing tutor to advertise the small presses and it would have been churlish of me not to mention Writer’s Muse when singing the praises of the small press market!