Innehållsförteckning för March 2022 från The Writer

OH, READER, WHAT AN EMBARRASSING confession I have for you this month. I’ve tracked the books I’ve read for the past decade using a very official system called “a really long list in an untitled draft email,” where I record the title, author, and the year it was read. I don’t record my opinions of it or its genre or whether it was written by a debut author. So when I started completing a reading challenge in an app that did track all that, I was surprised to see my most-read genre of 2021 was historical fiction. Huh. If you had asked my opinion of historical fiction earlier in the year, I’d have responded, “Oh, I like it just fine!” Emphasis on “just fine” – I enjoyed it, truly, but…

I met Jane Park during a children’s literature happy hour over Zoom. In one of the breakout rooms, she mentioned that her latest picture book, Juna and Appa, was coming out in 2022. It’ll be her second publication with Lee & Low publishers, and her first book with them, Juna’s Jar, was published as a result of her winning Lee & Low’s New Voices Award, which is given to a children’s picture book manuscript by a writer of color or Indigenous/Native writer. Park’s work is joyful and sensitive, depicting with sharpness and nuance a life lived multiculturally, so I sat down with her over Zoom to talk about everything from endings to political activism. The Writer: When we first met, we had a chat about endings. We talked about how…

YA I Must Betray You by Ruta Sepetys (Feb. 1) Award-winning author Ruta Sepetys’ latest historical YA novel follows a 17-year-old aspiring writer in Romania who is blackmailed by the secret police to become an informant. “Sepetys brilliantly blends a staggering amount of research with heart, craft, and insight in a way very few writers can,” praises Kirkus Reviews in a starred review of this “compulsively readable and brilliant” book. Ophelia After All by Racquel Marie (Feb. 8) This debut novel stars boy-crazy Cuban American teenager Ophelia Rojas, who discovers “the course of love – and sexuality – never did run smooth” when she develops a crush on her classmate, Talia Sanchez. “This touching debut offers an emotional ride that readers will be happy to embark upon,” praises Booklist. Bitter…

A MAILMAN TASKED WITH DELIVERing a potentially life-saving secret formula to a Des Moines epidemiologist finds his life threatened by people determined to steal the information for themselves. A woman befriends the daughter of a homicide victim after a 1945 pogrom in Krakow’s Market Square and swears to do whatever it takes to find the mother’s murderer. A woman with a chronic medical condition begins to question reality and her sanity when specially purchased therapeutic foods in her refrigerator begin to vanish. These are three of the plotlines from Mystery Magazine, a 6-year-old print and digital publication based in Canada. Editor Kerry Carter looks for stories that evoke classic mysteries by Arthur Conan Doyle and Agatha Christie, as well as the pulp fiction stylings of Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett.…

Dear Gigi, The last book in my series will go live soon, so for the past few weeks, I’ve promoted it at $.99 for pre-order with fabulous graphics in my newsletter, on Facebook and Twitter, on my large writers’ group, and in my personal email group…but with disappointing results. The information has gone out to hundreds, perhaps over a thousand, but I only have eight pre-orders. In your opinion, are launches and pre-orders worth the time, effort, and expense? —BAFFLED BONNIE Dear Bonnie, Hey, remember that thing people used to say about party planning? Invite all you want, but only assume 30% of the folks will say yes? That’s what I was thinking about when I read your details, so in general, I think you’re probably in about the right…

FOUR YEARS AGO, SHE WRITES PRESS publisher Brooke Warner sat down in a Berkeley, California, restaurant with Grant Faulkner, executive director of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), and made plans to launch a podcast that would encourage writers at any stage of their career. “We wanted our themes to range from learning to believe in your story and get it down on the page to how to publish,” Faulkner explains. “We view writing and publishing as different stages of a creative journey.” He’d been impressed with Warner’s Green-Light Your Book: How Writers Can Succeed in the New Era of Publishing, with its message of empowerment, so when she suggested that he co-host, he immediately agreed. “That’s what we’re all about at NaNoWriMo as well – empowering people and helping them…

When it comes to getting published, there are many spinning cogs. Here are some of the resources you’ll need to take your work from inside your brain to in front of the eyes of readers. The following listings are a sampling of what the industry has to offer. For a complete guide, visit writermag.com. Agents Information in this section is provided to The Writer by the individual markets and events; for more information, contact those entities directly. F = Fiction N = Nonfiction P = Poetry C = Children’s Y = Young adult O = Other $ = Offers payment C Y ADAMS LITERARY Represents children’s and YA authors and artists with picture books, middle grade, and YA fiction. Submit via online submission form only. Contact: Adams Literary, 7845 Colony…