The American author talks about growing up queer in a family of ‘wolves’, poverty and class in the US, and the 19th-century writers who inspired his latest novelBrandon Taylor writes quickly. “I can type almost as fast as I can think,” he says. The first draft of his debut novel, the Booker-shortlisted Real Life, took him five weeks; last June he challenged a writer friend to a race. The friend had been 30,000 words ahead on his book, with Taylor going from a standing start, but by August, Taylor had finished, while his friend was still ploughing on.Since Taylor says that “everybody in my family dies young”, one might assume that this is a rush to seize the day. But writing, he says, is also “the most fun I’m capable of having”. When he discovered the internet aged 12, via his parents’ dial-up modem in rural Alabama (the web being “this beautiful land that I could only visit temporarily because somebody wouldn’t pay the phone bill”), Taylor used to produce 8,000 words a day, writing five collaborative stories at once on roleplay forums. “That was good training for having stamina as a writer,” he explains, a genial 34-year-old in a blue denim shirt sitting at a table in the Guardian’s London offices. “As long as I have a good sense of scene or character, when I get a good first line there is nothing standing between me and the end.” Continue reading... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2023-06-03 10:00:28 UTC ]
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em>Game of Thrones author George R. R. Martin made a special appearance at the show of comedy musicians Paul & Storm during Comic-Con this weekend, smashing one of their guitars in (faux) outrage after they launched into their song "Write Like the Wind," which admonishes the fantasy... Continue reading at Wired
[ Wired | 2013-07-22 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Glenn Greenwald, the journalist who first reported on a trove of classified documents leaked by Edward J. Snowden, will write a book about National Security Agency surveillance, his publisher announced on Wednesday. Mr. Greenwald’s articles ... Continue reading at Editor & Publisher
[ Editor & Publisher | 2013-07-18 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Fellow bestselling author Stephen King and others in the literary community weigh in on J.K. Rowling's choice to release her latest book, 'The Cuckoo's Calling,' using a pen name. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor
[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2013-07-17 00:00:00 UTC ]
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On Monday it was announced that one juror who had found George Zimmerman not guilty had landed literary agent, Sharlene Martin. By 10 p.m., Martin announced she was dropping Juror B37 as a client.Maybe a book by a juror in the Trayvon Martin murder trial isn't such a good idea after all. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2013-07-16 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Egyptian journalist and bestselling author Ibrahim Issa believes the Arab Spring has added religious oppression to the existing political hardships of the region. Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives
[ Publishing Perspectives | 2013-04-26 00:00:00 UTC ]
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How do you live with the knowledge that your baby is dying? A radiant new memoir chronicles the nine months after a mother's worst nightmare came true.Emily Rapp is not one to sugarcoat hard truths, including the brutal diagnosis she and her husband received in January 2011 when they took their... Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2013-03-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Kobo and Curtis Brown have teamed up to create free scholarships for the Curtis Brown Creative... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2013-03-13 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The Literary Platform and Bath Spa University have partnered on a new bursary for partnering... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2013-02-14 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Baker & Taylor has appointed Sarah Walden to the role of buying director. Walden succeeds... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2013-02-05 00:00:00 UTC ]
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There has lately been a rising backlash against the ubiquity of personal writing. Hamilton Nolan’s anti-confessional diatribe in Gawker claims that journalism students are now taught only to write about themselves, which I can say as a full-time faculty member at a journalism school is patently... Continue reading at Slate
[ Slate | 2013-01-09 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Eoin Colfer has been named as the author of the first of Puffin's eleven Dr Who short stories... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2013-01-07 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Hot Key Books has launched a free interactive writing project, "Fleur Hitchcock's Story... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2012-12-11 00:00:00 UTC ]
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A couple of years ago, I embarked on a quixotic quest: I gave up the Internet. Surfing, emailing, YouTube-watching—it had taken over my life, eating into time I wanted to be spending with my family, my students, and my work. I documented my four-month Internet fast in a series of articles for... Continue reading at Slate
[ Slate | 2012-11-28 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Arundhati Roy, author of The God of Small Things, announced at the Sharjah International Book Fair that she is currently working on a new novel. Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives
[ Publishing Perspectives | 2012-11-13 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Pan Macmillan is the latest publisher to start offering creative writing tutoring. It will begin... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2012-11-06 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Australia's first major literary prize for women's writing, the Stella Prize, said to be... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2012-10-22 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Author JK Rowling has promised fans that her next published book will be for children. Continue reading at BBC News
[ BBC News | 2012-10-07 00:00:00 UTC ]
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When a man routinely hailed as one of America’s “greatest living writers” publishes a new novel, one hardly expects it to draw reviews posing questions along the lines of “Can he do it? Can he actually pull it off?” Because when you’re Michael Chabon, Pulitzer Prize winner, the act of writing a... Continue reading at Slate
[ Slate | 2012-09-19 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Throughout its 17-year history, Amazon has helped change the way that books are sold, the format in which they’re read and how they are published. Now it could change how they’re written. In addition to the Kindle Fire HD and the Kindle Paperwhite, Amazon introduced a subscription book format... Continue reading at Fast Company
[ Fast Company | 2012-09-07 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Pan Macmillan has acquired two novels from Lulu Taylor, previously published by Arrow.... Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2012-09-06 00:00:00 UTC ]
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