• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Get published
    • How to publish a book
    • How to write a novel
    • How to Edit a Novel
    • How to write a nonfiction book proposal
    • Writing advice
    • Book publishing glossary
    • Writing and book publishing FAQs
    • Blog Directory
  • Find an agent
    • What literary agents do
    • How to Find a Literary Agent
    • How to write a query letter
    • Literary agent etiquette
    • The Basic Query Template
    • How to write a synopsis
    • How to handle an offer of representation
  • How to self-publish
    • How to self-publish a book
    • Should You Self-Publish or Traditionally Publish?
    • How to decide where to self-publish
    • How to choose a cover
    • How to Determine Your Price Point When Self-Publishing
    • How to make the leap from self-publishing to traditional publishing
    • How to market a book

Nathan Bransford | Writing, Book Editing, Publishing

Helping writers achieve their dreams!

  • My books
  • Need editing?
  • About Nathan

Stephen King’s turning his house into a writers retreat (This week in books)

October 18, 2019 by Nathan Bransford 4 Comments

Rice harvest. Photo by me. Follow me on Instagram!

This week! The books!

You still have until 7pm tonight to enter the 6th Stupendously Ultimate First Paragraph Challenge! There is pride at stake. Also prizes. Enter now for a chance to win a $100 gift certificate from your favorite independent bookstore!

Meanwhile, the publishing world did not grind to a halt for our contest and I collected some links for you.

Literary hearts were aflutter with the news that Stephen King won approval to turn his classic Maine house into a museum and writers retreat. No word yet on any specifics but a thousand writers just raised their hands.

Author Aleksander Hemon (Nowhere Man) makes the case in the New York Times that Peter Handke, recently awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, is an apologist for Serbian genocide and Slobodan Milosevic. Hoo boy.

In other award news, the Booker Prize couldn’t make a final decision so they awarded a joint prize to Margaret Atwood for The Testaments and Bernardine Evaristo for Girl, Woman, Other.

Bowker released their ISBN statics for 2018, which showed that CreateSpace issued 1.416 million self-published titles print-on-demand editions in 2018, which Publishers Lunch notes (subscription link) is up more than 52 percent from 2017. But as Nate Hoffelder notes, this may be less of a boom than it appears, as many authors may have taken advantage of the merging of CreateSpace and Kindle Direct Publishing to bring their books out in print.

The Sky Is Everywhere by Jandy Nelson is one of my all time favorite YA novels, and I’m psyched it’s getting the movie treatment by Apple and A24!

Ever wonder why some hardcover books have retro rough page edges? It’s called deckle edges, and BookRiot takes a deep dive into the history at play.

Pitching for film is not at all the same as pitching books! They have different customs and you shouldn’t mix the two. As agent Jessica Faust points out: A logline is not a hook.

And how much creativity is too much creativity in creative nonfiction? Eileen Pollack, former director of the University of Michigan MFA Program, dives in to explain.

This week in bestsellers

Here are the top five NY Times bestsellers in a few key categories. (All links are affiliate links):

Adult print and e-book fiction:

  1. The 19th Christmas by James Patterson and Maxine Paetro
  2. What Happens in Paradise by Elin Hilderbrand
  3. Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens
  4. Child’s Play by Danielle Steel
  5. Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo

Adult print and e-book nonfiction:

  1. Blowout by Rachel Maddow
  2. Talking to Strangers by Malcolm Gladwell
  3. Witch Hunt by Gregg Jarrett
  4. The United States of Trump by Bill O’Reilly
  5. Educated by Tara Westover

Young adult hardcover:

  1. Wayward Son by Rainbow Rowell
  2. The Secret Commonwealth by Philip Pullman
  3. The Beautiful by Renée Ahdieh
  4. Hocus Pocus and the All-New Sequel by A.W. Jantha
  5. The Fountains of Silence by Ruta Sepetys

Middle grade hardcover:

  1. A Tale of Magic… by Chris Colfer
  2. Look Both Ways by Jason Reynolds
  3. Diary of an Awesome Friendly Kid by Jeff Kinney
  4. Wonder by R.J. Palacio
  5. The Complete Cookbook for Young Chefs by America’s Test Kitchen Kids

This week on the blog

Don’t forget that you can nominate your first page and query for a free critique on the blog:

  • Nominate Your First Page for a Critique on the Blog
  • Nominate Your Query for a Critique on the Blog

In case you missed them, here are this week’s posts:

  • The 6th Not-quite-as-annual-as-it-used-to-be Stupendously Ultimate First Paragraph Challenge!!
  • ON SALE NOW: 2nd Edition of my guide to writing a novel!
  • 6th SUFPC update!

Comment! of! the! week! will be back next week. This was contest week!

And finally, can you honestly imagine cleaning out a storeroom and finding a lost chapter from The Tale of Genji? Well. It happened.

Have a great weekend!

• Need help with your book? I’m available for manuscript edits, query critiques, and coaching!

• For my best advice, check out my guide to writing a novel (now available in audio) and my guide to publishing a book.

• And if you like this post: subscribe to my newsletter!

Share this:

  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)

Filed Under: This Week in Books Tagged With: Aleksander Hemon, Jandy Nelson, Nate Hoffelder, Self-publishing

Subscribe to the blog!

Receive the blog directly in your inbox when there are new posts!

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. JOHN T. SHEA says

    October 18, 2019 at 12:59 pm

    But the rice harvest looks very much like a barley or wheat harvest! No paddy-fields? Mind you, paddy-fields would probably require the John Deere harvester to be ambhibious!

    As for the latest Nobel controversy, Hoo-boy indeed! Sounds like dynamite (pun intended). 1,4 million new POD titles? I’m tempted to change my life-long ambition to be a published author to becoming the only person on Earth to NOT publish a book!

    Reply
    • Nathan Bransford says

      October 18, 2019 at 1:51 pm

      That is a rice paddy, they drain the water a few weeks before harvest to let things dry out.

      Reply
      • JOHN T. SHEA says

        October 18, 2019 at 5:46 pm

        Thanks, Nathan! I never guessed!

        Reply
  2. abc says

    October 21, 2019 at 11:21 am

    Could not be more excited about the Jandy Nelson movie!

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

About Nathan

Hi, I’m Nathan. I’m the author of How to Write a Novel and the Jacob Wonderbar series, which was published by Penguin. I used to be a literary agent at Curtis Brown Ltd. and I’m dedicated to helping authors chase their dreams. Let me help you with your book!

My blog has everything you need to know to write, edit, and publish a book. Can’t find what you need or want personalized help? Reach out.

Learn more about me

Need Editing?

I'm available for consultations, edits, query critiques, brainstorming, and more.
Learn more!

My Books

How to Write a Novel
Cover of How to Publish a Book by Nathan Bransford
Jacob Wonderbar and the Cosmic Space Kapo
Jacob Wonderbar for President of the Universe
Jacob Wonderbar and the Interstellar Time Warp

Subscribe!

Receive the blog directly in your inbox when there are new posts!

Follow Nathan on the social media

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • Instagram

Forums

Need help with your query? Want to talk books? Check out the Nathan Bransford Forums

Peruse the archives

Affiliate Disclosure

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Amazon links are usually affiliate links.

Nathan Bransford © 2019 · Log in

loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.