If you are like me, then reading is a necessity of everyday life. However, if you are still like me, this can be difficult sometimes as life fluctuates in how busy it keeps you. There is nothing worse (figuratively speaking when it comes to books) than starting a new book, finding out it’s a series, and not having the time or mental energy to dedicate to it.
It’s Saturday night in Portland. I’m sitting at a small table decorated with garlands of marigolds and small tea cups. Sweet incense mixes with the last breath of a candle. A wash of red light covers the room. Around a rectangular table, eight other people I have never met sit listening as once-local author Nick Jaina alternates between reading from his book Spektrum and winding melodies through the room with his guitar and voice.
Next time you’re on an adventure through the friendly skies, stop by an airport bookseller. They may not have the title you’ve been searching for, but they’ll somehow have exactly what you need.
Drawing from folklore, oral tradition, and real-life horrors, contemporary Latina writers like Enríquez are transforming the genre, offering powerful commentary on colonialism, capitalism, gender violence, autonomy, power, and more. If you’re a fan of horror, you’ll want to add these books to your reading list.
In a genre that has predominantly featured stories by men about men, the rise of sapphic fantasy in the mainstream is long overdue. Readers are demanding more women with swords falling into adventure (and love) with other women. This fresh subgenre expands fantasy with new voices and stories, but it also empowers and validates the LGBTQIA2S+ readers who have been a fan of the fantasy genre for years.
An effective hook gives readers a taste of what the book is about and why they should read this particular book, as compared to any other book on the shelf. An effective hook might shock a reader or get them to ask questions, leaving them wanting more.
When it comes to publishing, there’s quite a bit that goes on behind the scenes, unseen even by other people in the industry. Literary (or book) scouting is a very specific niche of the industry that often gets overlooked—even as a publishing student, it wasn’t until I got a job with a scouting agency that I fully started to understand what the job actually entails. Over the past few months, I’ve gotten an inside look into the world of scouting and the impact that scouts have on an international level. So, in the spirit of more transparency in the industry, here’s a quick run-down on scouting.
A university press is, generally speaking, a publishing company that is housed inside an academic institution. In contrast to the “Big Five” multinational corporations in publishing, university presses are nonprofit and mission centered, although not always small.
One of the most carefully considered decisions in the early stages of the publishing process is how to classify and categorize a book. These decisions are often the cornerstone of how a book finds its way home to readers who will most appreciate it. It’s a delicate balance between enticing readers to pick up just the book they’ve been waiting for, and gently signaling what readerships might not enjoy the book so that readers don’t end up feeling tricked into purchasing something that isn’t what they wanted.
The acceptability clause allows publishers to determine whether a submitted manuscript is acceptable. For authors who don’t have any legal knowledge or literary agent to help them negotiate the contract, they are often left to do their own research or accept what’s offered to them. This leaves the author with very little power over the development of their work, resulting in a generally unfavorable opinion of the clause.