Genres
Recently, I’ve encountered some challenges with my clients regarding genre. Very often, an editor considering a manuscript will pass if they feel that it doesn’t fit neatly into a specific genre. This...
View ArticleCh-ch-ch-changes
I’m here in New York this week, experiencing the lovely weather. It doesn’t quite feel like fall at the moment, but it’s nice to see some trees changing, and the nights are a bit brisk. It seems...
View ArticleFantasy as a Reading Rite of Passage
Adam Gopnik’s review of the newest addition to the Eragon series in last week’s New Yorker caught my eye (not because I’ve read these books, though as my sons gets older, I look forward to reading them...
View ArticleGenre Trends
Interesting piece in Salon about the (arguable) demise of chick lit that includes a broader survey of genre trends that have come and gone. Laura Miller writes “What kills a genre isn’t always clear....
View ArticleDid your city make the cut?
The Huffington Post came out with a great article today about Amazon’s second annual list of the most well-read cities in the US. This list is, of course, based on Amazon’s sales, and as the Huffington...
View ArticleDiversity
One of the greatest things that publishing has done for me (besides pay my rent, for which my landlord is surely grateful!) is broaden my horizons dramatically. As the DGLM old guard will surely...
View ArticleTypecasting – good or bad?
So last Thursday I read this interesting piece in The Wall Street Journal and it got me to thinking (again) about whether being slotted into a category is a good or bad thing. I say “again” because...
View ArticleDreaming
The other night I had dinner with New York Post columnist Cindy Adams and I told her that I am always having trouble deciding what to write about in my bi-weekly blog entries and I couldn’t imagine...
View ArticleArticle 1
These have been an extraordinary couple of weeks. My home town is still without power in the wake of hurricane Sandy, and my kids are still out of school, making today’s “snow day” a redundancy for my...
View ArticleSomething “new” for me
This piece from last week’s New York Times attracted my attention and although I totally disagree with the notion that just because the facts concerning a non-fiction book have changed since its...
View ArticleLife Stories
The other day I was excited to hear that Neil Patrick Harris is publishing a memoir this fall, and told my friend Brian about it. “What?!” Brian yelped. “Already? He’s only 40!” I was a little...
View ArticleMG vs YA
Two weekends ago, I had the pleasure of attending the Pacific Northwest Writers Association conference in Seattle. At the opening Agent’s Panel, I gave my usual spiel of what I’m looking for–Adult...
View ArticleYouth is wasted on the young. Or is it?
Every “semester” we have an office lunch for the purpose of getting to know our current batch of interns and to answer any questions they might have about the, undoubtedly, bizarre goings-on in...
View ArticleCharacteristics of a great thriller
Publishing is trendy—as in, it’s an industry dominated by trends, like pretty much every other industry. It’s not hard to understand why. Demand for books in a certain genre increases. Publishers...
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Men of constant sorrow
As my colleagues at DGLM know from last week’s staff meeting, I’m somewhat obsessed with the prison break in upstate New York. I think ever since O BROTHER, WHERE ART THOU? entered my all-time top-five...
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A case for military books
I have always had a healthy appetite for military books because they sell. Books—both fiction and non-fiction—about the Civil War, and the two world wars sell particularly well. This weekend, I had...
View ArticleWho is your reader?
One of the critical questions I ask my clients to address in their proposals is who their reader is. They not only need to define them demographically, but also statistically. This is to show the...
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