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Comment from the book world in June 2007

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June 2007

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'Anyone can be a publisher now'

25 June 2007

'Anyone can be a publisher now, thanks to readily available blogging software and digital photography. And, just as musicians such as Lily Allen are being discovered via MySpace.com, there are whole new generations of writers waiting to come to the fore via the internet rather than via the traditional route of agents and publishers. And their 'books' may bear little resemblance to what we know and love today. Once these authors become known, the viral effect of building a loyal and vocal fan base online may be enough to sustain the interest of existing fans and entice new ones.'

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'People would think I was a hermaphrodite'

18 June 2007

'I never asked myself whether a 500-page novel about a Greek family told by a hermaphrodite would be the kind of thing people would read. When I was writing Middlesex, my wife told me that people would think I was a hermaphrodite. I told her she was crazy, but in fact I get letters now from people thanking me for the book and for telling my story.'

Jeffrey Eugenides, author of Middlesex, which has just been chosen by the Oprah Book Club, in the Observer

'It's not too late.'

11 June 2007

'Publishing one's first novel at 58 is both wonderful and terrifying. Terrifying, because I feel this sense of urgency now. I have so little writing time left, and so many things I want to write.' Her advice to literary late-starters: ' Keep going, keep going. It's not too late.'

Marina Lewycka, author of A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian whose second novel Two Caravans is just out, in the Sunday Times.