The concept behind a manuscript display site is simple: provide writers with a forum in which to display their work, in the hopes that an editor or agent will come browsing and discover a literary gem hiding among the HTML. Over the years plenty of these sites have come and gone so that now, new versions are often referred to as a YADS: “yet another display site”.
Some display sites are just that: no frills, no extras, just a shop-window for manuscripts. Others have writers’ message-boards attached; some have review systems coupled with complicating rating systems. Authonomy comes to us courtesy of HarperCollins, and offers a manuscript display site, comment facility and message-board; while YouWriteOn offers vanity publishing in conjunction with Legend Press, which has put many people off what might otherwise be an excellent peer review facility.
These sites all have a couple of things in common.
The standard of writing on such sites ranges from good to poor, with that latter end making up the vast majority of the work on show. And despite what you might read online, I’ve only heard of a single book being published as a result of a browsing editor or agent spotting it in these electronic slush-piles: apart from that one title, the successes that have happened have all come about because the writers involved submitted their work in the usual way.
If you want to find out more about the history of manuscript display sites, then go to this post at Writer Beware's blog and make sure you read all the comments that have been made: there’s a fabulous discussion attached to it.
Showing posts with label manuscript display sites. Show all posts
Showing posts with label manuscript display sites. Show all posts
Monday, 14 September 2009
Thursday, 14 May 2009
Manuscript Display Sites: What Are The Chances?
On Authonomy’s message-board a while ago, a writer commented that she thought that HarperCollins would probably find one manuscript on Authonomy each month that was good enough to publish.
One a year might be a more reasonable hope.
When I was an editor I’d have been thrilled to find one publishable submission a month. But the vast majority of submissions I received weren't even readable, let alone publishable. Perhaps 10% were coherently written and showed a reasonable understanding of spelling, grammar and punctuation: but we considered very little of that 10% for publication because most of it just wasn’t suitable for our lists. We published non-fiction but fiction made up about half of the submissions we received; and the non-fiction that was submitted rarely fitted into the genres we worked within.
Based on what little I’ve read on Authonomy I’d say that a lot of the writing showcased there would come in the top 10%, so is already ahead of the game. But most of it is still a fair distance away from being publishable, as is perhaps evidenced by the fact that so far, just one book has been picked up for publication from the many that appear there.
One a year might be a more reasonable hope.
When I was an editor I’d have been thrilled to find one publishable submission a month. But the vast majority of submissions I received weren't even readable, let alone publishable. Perhaps 10% were coherently written and showed a reasonable understanding of spelling, grammar and punctuation: but we considered very little of that 10% for publication because most of it just wasn’t suitable for our lists. We published non-fiction but fiction made up about half of the submissions we received; and the non-fiction that was submitted rarely fitted into the genres we worked within.
Based on what little I’ve read on Authonomy I’d say that a lot of the writing showcased there would come in the top 10%, so is already ahead of the game. But most of it is still a fair distance away from being publishable, as is perhaps evidenced by the fact that so far, just one book has been picked up for publication from the many that appear there.
Friday, 27 March 2009
Authonomy Signings: Another Update
Edited to add: I jumped quite firmly to the wrong conclusion here. Miranda Dickinson very kindly added her own comment to this piece and cleared up my confusion: I apologise to her for being so foolish, I freely admit to having screwed up, and I hope that she’ll forgive me.
I did think of just deleting this whole post but I've decided against it: instead, I'm going to leave this post up because I don’t like to pretend that I never make mistakes; and Miranda’s explanation was so very good-natured and courteous that she deserves for it to remain in place.
You might remember how Authonomy announced a couple of months ago that HarperCollins was going to publish three books which had spent time on Authonomy's shelves. When it was discovered that only one of the books had actually been discovered in the Authonomy slush-pile, and that the other two had been taken on via more usual routes, outcry ensued.
The single book which was reportedly discovered on Authonomy's shelves was Coffee at Kowalski's, by Miranda Dickinson. But in a post on the Authonomy blog today Dickinson writes,
I did think of just deleting this whole post but I've decided against it: instead, I'm going to leave this post up because I don’t like to pretend that I never make mistakes; and Miranda’s explanation was so very good-natured and courteous that she deserves for it to remain in place.
You might remember how Authonomy announced a couple of months ago that HarperCollins was going to publish three books which had spent time on Authonomy's shelves. When it was discovered that only one of the books had actually been discovered in the Authonomy slush-pile, and that the other two had been taken on via more usual routes, outcry ensued.
The single book which was reportedly discovered on Authonomy's shelves was Coffee at Kowalski's, by Miranda Dickinson. But in a post on the Authonomy blog today Dickinson writes,
Having said that, submitting my manuscript for the second time was ridiculously scarier than it was the first time. I think this is because when I sent Kowalski’s to Avon last year I honestly didn’t think that I would hear back from them – let alone anything else. This time, much more is relying on the structural edit being good enough – and I felt the weight of that responsibility resting heavily on my shoulders throughout the process, although this was entirely self-imposed!Bolding mine. Avon is an imprint of HarperCollins. Draw your own conclusions.
Tuesday, 24 March 2009
How To Make The Authonomy Top Five
Thanks to the customarily articulate Nathan Bransford for alerting me to this story.
As I’ve discussed in my previous reviews of HarperCollins' interactive writers' site Authonomy, the books which rise to the top of its rankings are not the best ones, necessarily, but the ones whose authors are the most successful at networking. And over this last weekend, this has proved to be true in quite a spectacular fashion.
Last Friday Vineet Bhalla (also known as Klazart), a newcomer to Authonomy, put his book Lesser Sins up for review there and it rose up the rankings spectacularly quickly. He avoided the usual Authonomy route of courting lots of other Authonomists and plugging his book on the message board there: instead, he recruited his 800 or more of his online gaming Facebook friends to join Authonomy and vote for his book. It quickly reached the number one position on the weekly charts: there followed an explosion of message board victory cries from his supporters, and accusations of cheating from some of Authonomy's more regular users.
The organisers of Authonomy have now stepped in and confirmed that he has broken no rules. Despite the continuing protests it now looks likely that the book will grab one of those coveted top five reviews from the HarperCollins editors at the end of the month. Meanwhile, many more regular Authonomists are not pleased, and some are even threatening to leave as a result of Bhalla's alleged manipulation of the charts: not only have the book charts been affected by this, the status of many of Authonomy's top talent spotters has also been affected as few of them reviewed this particular book. As a result, some of the renegade author's friends now have talent-spotting rankings way above people who have spent months cultivating their reputations by writing thoughtful, insightful reviews and backing books which they felt had a degree of literary merit.
I'm not surprised that someone has at last worked Authonomy's system in this way (although I am surprised that it's taken so long for this to happen). But this just proves my point about Authonomy, and the books which do well there. Does Bhalla's book have any literary merit at all? I have no idea; but literary merit clearly isn't a deciding factor when it comes to reaching the top of Authonomy's charts.
Edited to add: Authonomy has now discussed the fun and games on its own blog. The outrage continues in the comments thread.
As I’ve discussed in my previous reviews of HarperCollins' interactive writers' site Authonomy, the books which rise to the top of its rankings are not the best ones, necessarily, but the ones whose authors are the most successful at networking. And over this last weekend, this has proved to be true in quite a spectacular fashion.
Last Friday Vineet Bhalla (also known as Klazart), a newcomer to Authonomy, put his book Lesser Sins up for review there and it rose up the rankings spectacularly quickly. He avoided the usual Authonomy route of courting lots of other Authonomists and plugging his book on the message board there: instead, he recruited his 800 or more of his online gaming Facebook friends to join Authonomy and vote for his book. It quickly reached the number one position on the weekly charts: there followed an explosion of message board victory cries from his supporters, and accusations of cheating from some of Authonomy's more regular users.
The organisers of Authonomy have now stepped in and confirmed that he has broken no rules. Despite the continuing protests it now looks likely that the book will grab one of those coveted top five reviews from the HarperCollins editors at the end of the month. Meanwhile, many more regular Authonomists are not pleased, and some are even threatening to leave as a result of Bhalla's alleged manipulation of the charts: not only have the book charts been affected by this, the status of many of Authonomy's top talent spotters has also been affected as few of them reviewed this particular book. As a result, some of the renegade author's friends now have talent-spotting rankings way above people who have spent months cultivating their reputations by writing thoughtful, insightful reviews and backing books which they felt had a degree of literary merit.
I'm not surprised that someone has at last worked Authonomy's system in this way (although I am surprised that it's taken so long for this to happen). But this just proves my point about Authonomy, and the books which do well there. Does Bhalla's book have any literary merit at all? I have no idea; but literary merit clearly isn't a deciding factor when it comes to reaching the top of Authonomy's charts.
Edited to add: Authonomy has now discussed the fun and games on its own blog. The outrage continues in the comments thread.
Monday, 16 February 2009
Authonomy and Blurb
When HarperCollins’s manuscript display site Authonomy announced last month that it was going to add a self-publishing option to its site, there were some people who were not pleased. Authonomy’s implication that self-publishing could be a stepping-stone to commercial success was seen by some as misleading because, while it's true that some writers have done well by self-publishing, the majority of self-published authors flounder in relative obscurity and fail to make any significant sales.
What wasn't picked up on was Authonomy's odd choice of bed-fellow: the POD provider Blurb.
Blurb first came to most people's attention when it teamed up with Chronicle Books in 2007. Chronicle is a well-regarded mainstream publishing company with exacting standards: I know, I've edited for it (and we all know how good I am, right?). I was astonished when I heard that Chronicle was directing some of the books it rejected towards Blurb, as this seemed to me to represent a direct conflict of interests.
Blurb was set up to produce heavily illustrated books: showcases for illustrators and photographers, collations of photojournalism, and personal collections. Its focus on quality is admirable: but combine that with its bias towards full colour printing and you end up with very high unit prices which, while only to be expected for full-colour books, are simply ridiculous when applied to novels and memoirs—which is what makes up the bulk of Authonomy's members’ books. And while it’s recently set up a text option for the books it produces, I’m still waiting to be convinced that it’s the best option for Authonomy’s many members.
What wasn't picked up on was Authonomy's odd choice of bed-fellow: the POD provider Blurb.
Blurb first came to most people's attention when it teamed up with Chronicle Books in 2007. Chronicle is a well-regarded mainstream publishing company with exacting standards: I know, I've edited for it (and we all know how good I am, right?). I was astonished when I heard that Chronicle was directing some of the books it rejected towards Blurb, as this seemed to me to represent a direct conflict of interests.
Blurb was set up to produce heavily illustrated books: showcases for illustrators and photographers, collations of photojournalism, and personal collections. Its focus on quality is admirable: but combine that with its bias towards full colour printing and you end up with very high unit prices which, while only to be expected for full-colour books, are simply ridiculous when applied to novels and memoirs—which is what makes up the bulk of Authonomy's members’ books. And while it’s recently set up a text option for the books it produces, I’m still waiting to be convinced that it’s the best option for Authonomy’s many members.
Saturday, 14 February 2009
Authonomy
In the spring of 2008, HarperCollins opened the doors to Authonomy, its new online manuscript display site. I was one of the first people to test it.
Authonomy allows writers to post their writing, and to comment on each other’s work. It’s possible to post anything from a single paragraph to a complete book, although extracts of under 10,000 words remain invisible to everyone but their authors.
I’m curious why HarperCollins started Authonomy, and in this form. HarperCollins has made a big investment in the design and development of the site; and by hiding all extracts under 10,000 words they’ve made certain that the site is going to be large and flabby. As it stands they’re making no money from Authonomy: might they introduce a joining fee in the future? Or is HarperCollins treating Authonomy as its own personal electronic slush-pile? If so, I can see a few problems.
While HarperCollins claims that the best of the work posted will rise, cream like, to the surface, I’ve seen little evidence of that happening. While some of the work there is good, the work which is the most commented-upon is the work from the most active writers, regardless of its quality.
I’m not sure that it’s a good thing for writers, as the only way to get your work noticed there is to spend a great deal of time networking and promoting yourself there: and for most aspiring writers, that’s going to cut into their writing time quite hard.
There’s also the problem with its size: with new work being added to the site daily, Authonomy is soon going to start staggering under its own weight. It’s already slow, and makes for cumbersome browsing for people like me, who live in an area without broadband access.
Good old-fashioned slush-piles can be monsters, but at least they are subjected to periodic culls as work is rejected. Is HarperCollins planning on ever culling any of the work on Authonomy? Or does it intend to let Authonomy lumber on unchecked, eating up bandwidth until it collapses under its own weight?
Authonomy allows writers to post their writing, and to comment on each other’s work. It’s possible to post anything from a single paragraph to a complete book, although extracts of under 10,000 words remain invisible to everyone but their authors.
I’m curious why HarperCollins started Authonomy, and in this form. HarperCollins has made a big investment in the design and development of the site; and by hiding all extracts under 10,000 words they’ve made certain that the site is going to be large and flabby. As it stands they’re making no money from Authonomy: might they introduce a joining fee in the future? Or is HarperCollins treating Authonomy as its own personal electronic slush-pile? If so, I can see a few problems.
While HarperCollins claims that the best of the work posted will rise, cream like, to the surface, I’ve seen little evidence of that happening. While some of the work there is good, the work which is the most commented-upon is the work from the most active writers, regardless of its quality.
I’m not sure that it’s a good thing for writers, as the only way to get your work noticed there is to spend a great deal of time networking and promoting yourself there: and for most aspiring writers, that’s going to cut into their writing time quite hard.
There’s also the problem with its size: with new work being added to the site daily, Authonomy is soon going to start staggering under its own weight. It’s already slow, and makes for cumbersome browsing for people like me, who live in an area without broadband access.
Good old-fashioned slush-piles can be monsters, but at least they are subjected to periodic culls as work is rejected. Is HarperCollins planning on ever culling any of the work on Authonomy? Or does it intend to let Authonomy lumber on unchecked, eating up bandwidth until it collapses under its own weight?
Thursday, 5 February 2009
YouWriteOn and Arts Council England: What's The Connection?
There’s a lot of confusion over who runs YouWriteOn, and how it’s related to Arts Council England. People seem to think that YouWriteOn is run by Arts Council England, organised by Arts Council England, or part of Arts Council England in some other nebulous way, but this is not the case: YouWriteOn’s only apparent connection with Arts Council England is through the substantial funding it has received from that organisation.
Arts Council England’s funding has forged a link between Arts Council England and YouWriteOn which many people perceive as a stamp of legitimacy. When the YouWriteOn publishing scheme was first launched, there were writers who saw it as a chance to get published by Arts Council England; others felt reassured that the scheme had to be above-board because of Arts Council England’s apparent involvement. However, when Arts Council England was asked for clarification of its involvement in the publishing scheme it replied:
You’ll find Arts Council England’s letter reproduced in full in comment number 5 to this blog post. Soon after that letter appeared on the blog, a disclaimer was posted on YouWriteOn’s home-page which stated that its vanity publishing arm was separate from the Arts Council England-funded area of the site: that disclaimer has since been edited, but at the time of writing it reads,
Despite YouWriteOn apparently being taken to task by Arts Council England and instructed to distinguish between the Arts Council England-funded and vanity-funded areas of the site, the Arts Council England logo still appears at the top of every one of YouWriteOn’s web pages—including the pages which offer the vanity publishing packages.
Some writers have now contacted Arts Council England (and here's a handy list of its chief executives, just in case you were considering doing the same) to ask why it funds a vanity publisher, but have received what they consider to be less-than-satisfactory replies: while I’ll not reproduce them here, I suspect that anyone with a complaint would do better to contact the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, the Government department to which Arts Council England reports: one of the ministers there is the rather effective Barbara Follett, who also happens to be married to a writer called Ken something-or-other.
It’s widely felt that it’s inappropriate for Arts Council England to be associated with a vanity publisher in this way: vanity publishing doesn’t support writers, it exploits them, and Arts Council England has apparently stated independently that it does not and will not condone such schemes. While I’ve been unable to find written evidence of this stance, it seems likely considering Arts Council England’s remit to support and encourage the arts. My opinion is that YouWriteOn should either accept funding from Arts Council England or continue its vanity publishing operation, but that it shouldn’t run the two projects side by side: there are too many conflicts of interest between them. But YouWriteOn is unlikely to give up its Arts Council England funding just because I think that it should, because there's too much at stake: it's received nearly £85,000 from Arts Council England in the last three and a half years (the following links will download PDFs when you click on them):
June 2005: £29,896
February 2007: £24,000
2007-8: £10,000
February 2008: £10,000
October 2008: £11,000
Total Arts Council funding received by YouWriteOn since June 2005: £84,896
I’m particularly interested by the £11,000 paid last October: the grants information form states that this amount was paid to Edward Smith of YouWriteOn.com to fund “A major new writing competition in partnership with Random House. This will give new writers the opportunity to have their books published by a major publisher”. I’m intrigued to know more about this competition: this funding was approved four months ago, and yet no announcement of any competition has yet been made. I wonder what Random House will have to say about that?
This Arts Council England funding, plus the £11,000 or so which YouWriteOn has received as a result of its vanity publishing operation, works out to a rather nice turnover of around £27,400 each year—impressive for a start-up business which seems to be run by just one man. It’s worth noting that there are a few layers of potential income that I’ve not included here:
Arts Council England’s funding has forged a link between Arts Council England and YouWriteOn which many people perceive as a stamp of legitimacy. When the YouWriteOn publishing scheme was first launched, there were writers who saw it as a chance to get published by Arts Council England; others felt reassured that the scheme had to be above-board because of Arts Council England’s apparent involvement. However, when Arts Council England was asked for clarification of its involvement in the publishing scheme it replied:
YouWriteOn.com receives funding from Arts Council England to run its website forum and professional critique service for writers.
Arts Council England has not funded, and has not endorsed, the separate Print-on-Demand self-publishing service offered through the site.
As with any self-publishing service, Arts Council England would encourage writers to read the terms and conditions carefully and make an informed judgement about the service on offer. If in doubt, you should contact the Society of Authors http://www.societyofauthors.org/ who have information sheets and guidance about self-publishing and vanity publishing.
We have asked the site moderator to make this absolutely clear, so that there is no confusion about the involvement of Arts Council England.
You’ll find Arts Council England’s letter reproduced in full in comment number 5 to this blog post. Soon after that letter appeared on the blog, a disclaimer was posted on YouWriteOn’s home-page which stated that its vanity publishing arm was separate from the Arts Council England-funded area of the site: that disclaimer has since been edited, but at the time of writing it reads,
The Arts Council fund critiques for new writers from leading publishers each month on YouWriteOn.com.YouWriteOn also offers its own book publishing initiative, funded solely by us.
Despite YouWriteOn apparently being taken to task by Arts Council England and instructed to distinguish between the Arts Council England-funded and vanity-funded areas of the site, the Arts Council England logo still appears at the top of every one of YouWriteOn’s web pages—including the pages which offer the vanity publishing packages.
Some writers have now contacted Arts Council England (and here's a handy list of its chief executives, just in case you were considering doing the same) to ask why it funds a vanity publisher, but have received what they consider to be less-than-satisfactory replies: while I’ll not reproduce them here, I suspect that anyone with a complaint would do better to contact the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, the Government department to which Arts Council England reports: one of the ministers there is the rather effective Barbara Follett, who also happens to be married to a writer called Ken something-or-other.
It’s widely felt that it’s inappropriate for Arts Council England to be associated with a vanity publisher in this way: vanity publishing doesn’t support writers, it exploits them, and Arts Council England has apparently stated independently that it does not and will not condone such schemes. While I’ve been unable to find written evidence of this stance, it seems likely considering Arts Council England’s remit to support and encourage the arts. My opinion is that YouWriteOn should either accept funding from Arts Council England or continue its vanity publishing operation, but that it shouldn’t run the two projects side by side: there are too many conflicts of interest between them. But YouWriteOn is unlikely to give up its Arts Council England funding just because I think that it should, because there's too much at stake: it's received nearly £85,000 from Arts Council England in the last three and a half years (the following links will download PDFs when you click on them):
June 2005: £29,896
February 2007: £24,000
2007-8: £10,000
February 2008: £10,000
October 2008: £11,000
Total Arts Council funding received by YouWriteOn since June 2005: £84,896
I’m particularly interested by the £11,000 paid last October: the grants information form states that this amount was paid to Edward Smith of YouWriteOn.com to fund “A major new writing competition in partnership with Random House. This will give new writers the opportunity to have their books published by a major publisher”. I’m intrigued to know more about this competition: this funding was approved four months ago, and yet no announcement of any competition has yet been made. I wonder what Random House will have to say about that?
This Arts Council England funding, plus the £11,000 or so which YouWriteOn has received as a result of its vanity publishing operation, works out to a rather nice turnover of around £27,400 each year—impressive for a start-up business which seems to be run by just one man. It’s worth noting that there are a few layers of potential income that I’ve not included here:
- Its original vanity-publishing package, which it runs in association with Legend Press, costs £399, £699, £899 or £1,499, depending on which package you choose.
- YouWriteOn runs a paid-for critiquing service: prices start at £75 for a short story of up to 3,000 words, and then increase with your page count: a report on a 400-page novel would set you back £550. Writers are asked to state which three advisors they'd prefer to comment on their work: while the people who provide these reports do seem reputable and experienced (although I haven't checked out any of the names), I could find no guarantee that anyone would get the advisor(s) they requested.
- It’s not yet clear how many books YouWriteOn/Legend has vanity-published at £39.99 each and it seems that not all books have yet been published, so the initial income from this will almost certainly reach a figure higher than the £10,906.35 I quoted yesterday.
- YouWriteOn will continue to earn money from every one of the sales of those vanity-published books as their writers work to sell them.
Meanwhile, I’ve found this quote about YouWriteOn and the man who runs it, Edward Smith, buried in the depths of this PDF from Arts Council England:
Edward Smith, YouWriteOn’s director, provided the design spec for the site, and manages it from day to day, with some support from web company ZARR. In terms of user experience, the site is clunky, full of broken links and difficult to navigate, with forums that mysteriously open at particular hours only. Nonetheless, YouWriteOn.com has 6,000 members, and receives millions of page views a month. There is clearly a hunger for these services. (Edward used to work in a Citizens Advice Bureau and sees his work as being about information and empowerment.)(Bolding mine: I added the link to YouWriteOn's "web company", too: perhaps it knows what's happened to the forum.)
Just yesterday, Tom Chalmers of Legend Press told The Bookseller that the project has "largely been a success". Meanwhile, there are many writers who Smith promised to publish in time for Christmas who, despite making numerous attempts to contact Smith, have still heard nothing from him, several weeks later. Many don’t know whether or not their books will even be published; and while several have now cancelled their contracts, few have received any confirmation of their cancellations, leaving them worried about the future of their books.
I wonder just how empowered they feel right now.
Friday, 23 January 2009
Authonomy Signing Update
Two days ago, I blogged about the three Authonomy authors who have been signed to HarperCollins. One of the books signed was represented by Andrew Lownie (for whom I have a very soft spot--he's a wonderful agent) and I wrote,
The ever-vigilant Sally Zigmond has this morning spotted this comment from the man himself over on Galleycat:
(Now, if Sally could just find out for me if the authors of the other two books are represented, I'd be very grateful indeed.)
ETA: Here's a news story which explains how HarperCollins made its offer for the book in December, nearly a month before Authonomy announced the sale.
...it's probable that they were picked up following Lownie's submission of their book to HarperCollins, rather than through the Authonomy site.
The ever-vigilant Sally Zigmond has this morning spotted this comment from the man himself over on Galleycat:
My agency submitted Never Say Die by Melanie Davies and ghosted by Lynne Barrett-Lee in the normal way. The fact the authors had put it on Authonomy may have helped in Collins's decision but the editor was only aware of the script being on Authonomy after the submission. Andrew LownieGod, I'm good.
(Now, if Sally could just find out for me if the authors of the other two books are represented, I'd be very grateful indeed.)
ETA: Here's a news story which explains how HarperCollins made its offer for the book in December, nearly a month before Authonomy announced the sale.
Wednesday, 21 January 2009
Authonomy Authors Sign With HarperCollins
In a move perfectly timed to complement my blog post from earlier today, Authonomy has just announced that HarperCollins has signed three of its authors.
Steven Dunne, who had previously self-published his detective thriller, The Reaper, gets a two-book deal; Miranda Dickinson, author of a romantic comedy called Coffee At Kowalski's, has a three-book deal; and Melanie Davies and Lynne Barratt-Lee have signed up their co-written memoir Never Say Die.
It's not made clear on the Authonomy blog if these signings came as a direct result of the authors' presence on Authonomy: mention is made of Davies' and Barratt-Lee's representation by literary agent extraordinaire Andrew Lownie, so it's probable that they were picked up following Lownie's submission of their book to HarperCollins, rather than through the Authonomy site. But I'm sure that full details will emerge over the coming weeks.
I wish all four writers the best of success with their books, and will be watching their progress closely.
Steven Dunne, who had previously self-published his detective thriller, The Reaper, gets a two-book deal; Miranda Dickinson, author of a romantic comedy called Coffee At Kowalski's, has a three-book deal; and Melanie Davies and Lynne Barratt-Lee have signed up their co-written memoir Never Say Die.
It's not made clear on the Authonomy blog if these signings came as a direct result of the authors' presence on Authonomy: mention is made of Davies' and Barratt-Lee's representation by literary agent extraordinaire Andrew Lownie, so it's probable that they were picked up following Lownie's submission of their book to HarperCollins, rather than through the Authonomy site. But I'm sure that full details will emerge over the coming weeks.
I wish all four writers the best of success with their books, and will be watching their progress closely.
Manuscript Display Sites
There are all sorts of manuscripts display sites available on the internet, like the infamous YouWriteOn, and HarperCollins’ Authonomy. Anyone can register with these sites and download a chunk of their work which might then be reviewed by other members; in return, you review their work and everyone gets a little feedback.
Both YouWriteOn and Authonomy run a rankings scheme whereby each month the ten most highly-scored pieces of work are read by editors and/or agents, and offered criticisms. This is an opportunity not to be sniffed at: I’ve read several of the professional critiques alongside the displayed work and they all offered good, solid advice which the writers would be wise to act on.
There is a downside, though. In order to attract enough reader-attention to make it to the top ten, Authonomy writers have to network their socks off—and that’s very time-consuming: frankly, I’d rather spend that time writing and have my agent work on getting it seen by the right editors; while over at YouWriteOn there have been accusations of vote-rigging, and some writers claim not to have received the editorial reports that they were promised.
Never mind, say the members: there’s still a chance that the books will get seen by an agent or an editor trawling the site, looking for talent. After all, the review process ensures that the work is of a much higher standard than most of the slush-pile, so they’re bound to be looking.
Well—no. The review process does improve the work but there are several limiting factors working here. The only people offering advice to the majority of the members are the other members who, while perfectly literate, tend not to be very experienced writers and so some of the advice that they offer is of limited value. In many cases, the criticism they offer doesn’t get beyond the level of pointing out errors in punctuation, grammar or spelling; and there doesn’t seem to be much in the way of the stringent structural work that most books require. Structural editing is made almost impossible by the medium in which the work is displayed: it’s incredibly difficult as an editor to have a good impact on a full manuscript if you’re only considering a short extract from it.
But the biggest reason that agents and editors are unlikely to plough through the work that is on offer at such manuscript display sites is that these people already have far too much slush of their own. Every day, new submissions drop on their desks in far greater quantities than can ever be published. Reading through their own slush is bad enough: why would they want to go and read through everyone else’s?
Writer Beware has blogged about Authonomy, and this particular post provides a very useful history of manuscript display sites (make sure you read the comments to get the full value).
Both YouWriteOn and Authonomy run a rankings scheme whereby each month the ten most highly-scored pieces of work are read by editors and/or agents, and offered criticisms. This is an opportunity not to be sniffed at: I’ve read several of the professional critiques alongside the displayed work and they all offered good, solid advice which the writers would be wise to act on.
There is a downside, though. In order to attract enough reader-attention to make it to the top ten, Authonomy writers have to network their socks off—and that’s very time-consuming: frankly, I’d rather spend that time writing and have my agent work on getting it seen by the right editors; while over at YouWriteOn there have been accusations of vote-rigging, and some writers claim not to have received the editorial reports that they were promised.
Never mind, say the members: there’s still a chance that the books will get seen by an agent or an editor trawling the site, looking for talent. After all, the review process ensures that the work is of a much higher standard than most of the slush-pile, so they’re bound to be looking.
Well—no. The review process does improve the work but there are several limiting factors working here. The only people offering advice to the majority of the members are the other members who, while perfectly literate, tend not to be very experienced writers and so some of the advice that they offer is of limited value. In many cases, the criticism they offer doesn’t get beyond the level of pointing out errors in punctuation, grammar or spelling; and there doesn’t seem to be much in the way of the stringent structural work that most books require. Structural editing is made almost impossible by the medium in which the work is displayed: it’s incredibly difficult as an editor to have a good impact on a full manuscript if you’re only considering a short extract from it.
But the biggest reason that agents and editors are unlikely to plough through the work that is on offer at such manuscript display sites is that these people already have far too much slush of their own. Every day, new submissions drop on their desks in far greater quantities than can ever be published. Reading through their own slush is bad enough: why would they want to go and read through everyone else’s?
Writer Beware has blogged about Authonomy, and this particular post provides a very useful history of manuscript display sites (make sure you read the comments to get the full value).
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