Fiction

Just about every fiction writer understands the need to include elements of rising tension in their stories. But as someone who reads thousands of submissions every year, I know that many emerging writers sometimes don't know quite how to go about this. I see a lot of stories try to tease their way into creating tension.  Read more

Daphne du Maurier is one of the most overlooked writers of the twentieth century, says Oxford University's Laura Varnam. As Rebecca celebrates its eightieth anniversary and du Maurier enjoys a critical renaissance, Varnam explores five works that best highlight this novelist's sheer range and brilliance-from biography and fiction to history and horror.

In America and Britain, fiction is said to be in decline. PW recently called attention to the 16% (or $830 million) decline in the sales of adult fiction reported by the Association of American PublishersThe national trade association of the American book publishing industry; AAP has more than 300 members, including most of the major commercial publishers in the United States, as well as smaller and non-profit publishers, university presses and scholarly societies during the 2013-2017 period. In Britain, the Publishers Association reports a slightly larger drop over a similar period.  Read more

In the publishing industry, adult non-fiction revenues are soaring above fiction revenues and have been widening the gap for the past five years. Adult non-fiction revenue totalled $6.18 billion across the publishing industry in 2017, while adult fiction revenues reached $4.3 billion, according to Penguin Random House, using data from Association of American PublishersThe national trade association of the American book publishing industry; AAP has more than 300 members, including most of the major commercial publishers in the United States, as well as smaller and non-profit publishers, university presses and scholarly societies (AAP), the U.S.  Read more

A lifetime ago, it seems, I used to write fiction. I wrote little stories on scraps of paper as a young kid; throughout grade school, I filled my unused notebooks with attempts at novels; I wrote a few short stories in high school and college. But since I started freelancing full-time a decade ago, I haven't written a single line of fiction.