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Now, last week, in Feedback Friday, we were looking at your mysteries – not detective novels, for the most part, just places in your book where a mystery intrudes, presses itself at the characters.

And one of the things I noticed was that there’s very often a sense of something sacred about the actual places or artefacts involved in these mysteries. So a letter, written in 1944 and being read by people in 1948, can have the quality of some treasured relic – a saint’s bone, a lock of Mary Magdalene’s hair.

Place too can acquire this sense of being close to something magical – inhabited by spirits. As though a deserted house gathers some of the spirits you might expect to find at Stonehenge during Solstice, or Glastonbury Tor, or Tintagel Castle.

That sense of powers that lie beyond the ordinary and known can enter any book at all. You’re likely to find those passages:

• In portal scenes – any time that your character steps from one world into another, less known, world where the rules seem shifted. This could be a really ordinary type transition – a working class student entering some high end and ancient university for the first time, for example – in which case, the sense of the sacred clearly exists in the character’s head alone. Or it could be more clearly linked to the spiritual – a Western adventurer entering some tribal burial ground, for example – in which case, the sense of the sacred is at least partly ‘owned’ by the space itself. Either way though, there’s a transition which needs marking.
• Where you have some kind of relic. That could be a Dark Ages sword, obviously, but is more likely to be a family letter, or a heavy iron key, or a set of war medals. But the meaning and history attached to that relic can give it weight, no matter how ordinary the object or how (relatively) recent its past.
• Where you have a place around which some special sense hangs – a mystery, the past presence of someone important, a place heavy with memories from a different time.
• Where you have a person that – even just temporarily – seems to shimmer with something a bit unworldly: a tiny flash of superpower, a hint of the mage.

Once you find these moments in your book, I think it’s good to ask yourself the question, ‘Am I making the most of this?’ If you’re not writing fantasy, you can’t jump straight into magic, but you can borrow some of the tones of magic. You can introduce a note of the strange and perhaps the sacred too.

A very talented kids’ author, who used to work as an editor for us, once told me that whenever he wrote a portal scene in one of fantasy novels, he always wrote it as poetry first, before tucking it back into prose. It’s that sort of attitude that I think any of us can use.

Here, by way of example, is a chunk from my The Deepest Grave. Th characters are in a remote Welsh church. They have just interrupted a robbery and are trying to figure out what the thieves had been looking to find. So far, they’ve found nothing. Then:

The light now has failed almost completely. The two men won’t be found unless they’re the stupidest or unluckiest criminals this side of Oswestry.

The uniform goes. The forensic guy goes. The church lighting somehow just emphasises the darkness. It thickens the air into something yellowey-orange. Gluey.

We regather in the vestry, just because Katie’s left her coat there.

Bowen lifts the 1953 fish-restaurant newspaper out of the wooden wall box.

‘I suppose that can go.’

He looks glumly at the mess behind the cupboard, knowing that it’ll be his job to clean it. Katie looks into the box, now missing its newspaper floor.

Glances once, then looks more sharply.

‘No, that’s not right,’ she says, and starts picking at the bottom with a fingernail.

I already looked under the newspaper and saw just the pale, bleached colour of old pine – pine that has never seen the sun – but that was me being dumb. Me not knowing how to see.

Katie picks at the bottom and it comes away.

A sheet of paper, blank on the upper side, but with writing in clear purplish-black ink on the lower.

Latin text.

A hard-to-read medieval hand.

Bowen stares. I stare. We all stare.

‘Katie,’ I say, ‘This paper? We can get it dated, presumably?’

In the gluey light, she shakes her head.

‘No. No, we can’t.’

‘We can’t?’

There’s something about this light, this thickened silence which makes everything seem slow, unnatural.

‘We can’t test this paper, because it isn’t paper. It’s vellum. A dead sheep, basically, scraped clean and stretched out thin.’

On the one hand, this is a cop and archaeologist just doing their job. But those comments about the ‘gluey’ light and ‘this thickened silence’ give the moment the quality of something like the discovery of a sacred relic – as though some other, more ancient, world were suddenly touching this. That’s sharpened up, I think, by a sense of these layers of history: from a 1953 newspaper to Latin text, from a sheet of paper to a sheet of vellum.

Those are the signals that, if you like, lie in some external reality. But the characters’ reaction also expresses their sense of transition: ‘Bowen stares. I stare. We all stare.’ The way everything come to ‘seem slow, unnatural.’

Because the characters are feeling that, the reader does too. And what could have been an ordinary moment in a detective novel, temporarily at least, wears the clothes of something deeper, older, stranger and perhaps more magical.

Poetry, then prose. The magical, in the ordinary.

That is a power you can seize, if you choose to seize it. I hope you do. There’s another chunk from the same book that operates as a proper portal moment: a transition that, in this case, involves a literal door. Again, I didn’t write that passage thinking about portals and fantasy and magic … but those things are present nonetheless. I’ve popped that chunk into the relevant Feedback Friday forum, so you can see it for yourself.

Don’t forget about that How To Write Course. I’ve done all-new videos for it, and the feedback from the first viewers has been all positive. You can take the first lesson for free now, the rest is available for Premium Members only. Details on how to join here.

FEEDBACK FRIDAY: Fantasy / Magical

Three weeks back, inspired by historical fiction, we looked at research. Two weeks ago, inspired by romance, we looked at the Absent Beloved. Last week, inspired by crime, we asked you to find mystery. This week – inspired by fantasy or any kind of magical realism – I want you to find a moment where some sense of the magical or sacred intrudes into your book. That could be:

• Discovery of a ‘relic’
• A portal moment
• Some shifting sense of a character possessed of a not-quite explicable power
• A place that has a touch of something beyond the ordinary

If you are writing out and out fantasy, then those moments will be easy to find, obviously. If you’re note writing fantasy, then those moments still probably exist.

What I will say is that you may well find (let’s say) a portal moment in your book that slightly misses or underplays its sense of magic. So do please feel free to edit / rewrite those moments before uploading them to Townhouse. Try pushing the magical gas pedal a little and see if people like the results. You could even try writing the scene as poetry first, before putting it back into prose.

I think Sofia Samatar talking about ‘the strange, the weird, the speculative’ is quite inspirational here. It almost feels more fun to me finding the strange in a book that is basically not strange.

So what I’m after this week is:

Title

Genre

1-2 sentences of explanation, as needed

250 words where something a bit like magic intrudes into your book. Some sense of a dimension beyond the ordinary. I really don’t mind if what we’re seeing here is a trace – a hint – a suggestion and nothing more. Just something to suggest that dimension beyond.

I’m kind of interested to see what you make of this task. I’m quite interested to think what I’d find in my own books too.

That’s it from me. We’re getting our one week of English summer this week – with actual sunlight – and the kids are celebrating by running around half-naked and building barricades in the garden. Teddy told me, quite peaceably, that he needed a better weapon, and marched off (mostly naked) to find one. He came back with an eight-foot fencepost. I didn’t intervene, but am mildly worried as to what will happen next. Post yours here.

Til soon.

Harry

We had a nice exercise on Feedback Friday last week – all about finding the romance between him and her, when one of the two is not present. 

This week we’ll be dealing with mystery – more about that below. But as of July, we’ll be devoting ourselves, for six weeks, to a complete course in writing a novel. Every week, there’ll be a (roughly half hour) video from me guiding you through particular aspects of writing. Each week, I’ll give you a task. Then we’ll all meet on our regular Feedback Friday form to upload our tasks and exchange feedback. The modules will cover: 

Week 1 Planning 

Week 2 Character 

Week 3 Plot 

Week 4 Prose 

Week 5 Tools (points of view, etc) 

Week 6 Self-editing 

If you are a Premium Member already, you don’t need to do anything at all – you’ll have access to the material automatically. That said, if you want a plump little video from me to plop into your inbox trussed up like a fat little partridge with bacon on top, you can register for the course here. 

If you’re not a Premium Member, you won’t get the course videos (or feedback from me), but you can join us here. (The cost is as little as £12.50 / about US$16 per month.) 

Okie-doke. Enough of that. 

Pigeons. 

I came across a great phrase the other day, from someone frustrated by a particular issue – they said it was like ‘playing chess with pigeons.’ 

So you think: OK, I’ll get a ready for a game of chess. I’ll brush up my knowledge of openings. I’ll play a few practice matches. I’ll push for territorial advantage early one, maybe get slightly ahead in terms of pieces, then I’ll move in for checkmate. 

You go to the park, lay out the chessboard – and find that your opponent is a pigeon. 

So you make your move. Perhaps the pigeon starts by making a few somewhat random-n-wild moves of its own. 

You get ahead in the game earlier than you had expected. And yes, perhaops, you find yourself picking up pieces from the ground and resetting them on the board perhaps a little more often than if you were playing a FIDE grandmaster. But you make allowances. This is a pigeon, after all. 

And then – ha! – you still have your queen and both rooks. You command one file completely. The pigeon’s king is trapped behind its own pawns. You are ready to move in for the kill. 

You make your move and say ‘Check!’ 

The pigeons flaps its wings and knocks over a piece. 

You put the piece back where you think the pigeon maybe intended to move it and – another move. One more and you’ll be ready for mate. 

At which – the pigeon flaps its wings, knocks everything over, pecks crisps from a litter bin, craps all over the board, and flies away. 

So: have you won? Or not won? Was this even chess at all? 

Now, I really don’t want to exaggerate, and there are plenty of really great author-publisher interactions and loads of really excellent author-agent relationships, but … 

Well, there are also far too many episodes where authors – trying really hard to play a disciplined and professional game of chess – discover that they have ended up playing with a pigeon. 

For example: 

• The agent who gushingly requests your full manuscript, then never replies to you again. 

• The agent who wants to take you on, but asks for some edits, which you do and send, but then the agent never responds meaningfully again. 

• Or the agent claims to have sent your book out to editors, but never tells you who has seen it and there’s something unsettlingly vague about the nature of any feedback received. 

• Or publishers who take your work on with mwahs and champagne, but then the marketing seems absent or just never really thought about 

• Or your editor is changed on you, without you getting a say, and you feel that your new person is basically totally uninterested in your or your book 

• Or your book gets published, but you get very little data on sales and very little to tell you if those sales are above or below expectation, and you relly don’t know if your authorial career is basically dead – or just stalled – or doing pretty much fine, actually. 

There are a million variants on these basic stories and you don’t need to hang out with professional authors for long to encounter them. 

What’s more: neither agents not publishers ARE pigeons, but they can exhibit pigeon-like behaviour for perfectly rational reasons. Take that change of editor issue: the new editor didn’t acquire your book. Maybe they don’t like it. That editor has a heap of other books to publish. He / she might perfectly rationally think they’d do well to concentrate their attention on what they see as their more likely wins. That’s tough on you, but no one has been an idiot. 

Or a publisher goes from mwahs and champagne to chilly silence? Well, OK, maybe the sales team pushed your book hard with retailers and just didn’t make sales in the expected volumes. So that publisher, has now ratcheted down its expectations from X to maybe one tenth of X. So you are now getting the treatment standard to an X/10 author. Again, that’s hard on you, and not your fault, but that’s just how it is. 

And? People often come to us looking for solutions. We offer (I hope) sensible, intelligent, experienced advice. 

But … 

Well, you can’t play chess with pigeons. Or, if you do, you’ll find they crap on the board, knock the pieces over and are more interested in pecking at crisps than exploring what its knights could do in a more advanced position. 

In the end, if others don’t act professionally, you need to do whatever you can (in terms of mitigation, trying to rescue things, etc) but accept that maybe there’s nothing much to be done. Except of course, write another book, find another publisher, sign up with another agent – or, of course, self-publish. The more omni-skilled you are (writing craft, industry knowhow, author-led marketing competence), the more your career can rest in your hands, not those of others. 

Meanwhile – chess with pigeons? A bad idea. Or rather, one that doesn’t necessarily offer any winning strategy. I’m playing chess with 8-year-olds at the moment, and that’s strange enough. 

Squawk! Flutter! Yikes! 

FEEDBACK FRIDAY: mystery 

Two weeks back, and inspired by historical fiction, we looked at research. Last week, inspired by romance, we looked at the Absent Beloved. Today, inspired by crime, I want you to find mystery in your novel. We want any moment where your character encounters a puzzle – about the past not the future – and feels its mystery. 

Crime fiction, more or less by definition, will have these moments, but almost any novel will – no matter how big or small the mystery, how temporary or how permanent. What I want from you is a sense of that mystery: especially the atmosphere in the room, the character’s reaction, etc. 

Take inspiration from these four great crime writers, and plunge in. I want: 

Title 

Genre 

1-2 sentences of explanation, as needed 

250 words where your character is toying with mystery, where we feel that mystery present in the room. This is an especially good task for anyone not writing crime fiction – that is, where the mystery may not already be at the heart of the book. 

Til soon. 

Harry 

We think romance is about him and her, right? That it’s Lizzie and Darcy dancing at a ball, emotions pushing at each other. Scarlett O’Hara and Rhett Butler. Anna Karenina and Alexei Vronsky.

And, OK, that’s true. But there are two sides to romance and they both matter.

There’s romance when the two protagonists are on the page together. And the romance that happens when they’re apart. They both matter – and I want to do a little bit of dissection of both.

Him and her

So here, to start with, is a chunk of early Fiona, with her at an early stage of her first important relationship. The two not-yet-lovers are both coppers. In this scene, they’re sharing a moment on the office stairs. My comments in square brackets.

The door at the top bangs and Brydon’s tread starts to clatter down. He’s both heavy and light. Heavy because he’s a biggish lad, and light because he has a natural athleticism, a bounce that carries through into every movement he makes.

[In any decent romance, the physical presence of the other is a note that wants to carry through into most encounters. The constant awareness plus a good splash of attraction.]

‘Hey.’

‘Sorry to grab you. I just had to see you. Sorry.’

Brydon is on the step above me and I’m talking somewhere in the region of his belly button. ‘First things first, Fiona,’ he tells me. He comes down a step, then hoists me up to where he’d been standing. We’re still not eyeball to eyeball, but we’re a lot closer.

[This shows the man being manly – taking control, lifting his girl. She’s accepting of all that – in effect playing a very traditional female role here, though she is not in general very traditional at all.]

‘Do I see DC Griffiths in a dress?’ he says. ‘Have all relevant authorities been notified?’

That’s Brydon humour for you, like it or lump it.

‘And heels,’ I say. ‘Look.’

[Here, we see both Fiona’s inner and outer worlds. The inner one notes Brydon’s rather ponderous joke – affectionately, yes, but without admiration. But she doesn’t give Brydon that ‘rather ponderous joke there’ memo. Instead, she flirts in a tiny way, by calling attention to something prettily feminine. The fact that she chooses the soft route here, not the more abrasive one, tells you a lot about her choices, her inner emotional state.]

He smiles at me. A nice smile, but I know that half his mind is occupied by the clock. He needs to get off to London as soon as he can […]

‘I just wanted to tell you I might need to take things slow.’

‘OK.’

‘It’s just . . . things can get a bit crazy in my head, and slow tends to be better than fast.’

‘OK.’

‘I don’t want you to think that because I—’

I’m not sure what I’m trying to say, so I end up not saying anything.

‘You don’t want me to think that, although you almost walked out into a line of cars on Cathedral Road last night, you’ve got some kind of death wish.’

‘That’s it,’ I say. ‘That’s exactly what I was trying to say.’

The scene closes with female, emotional awkwardness and a male rescue – a rescue notable for the simple directness of Brydon: he physically moves her to a better position, he makes dad-jokes, he says ‘OK’ when she signals emotional complexity, and so on. That simple directness isn’t a limitation of Brydon: it’s what Fiona seeks and needs. (And what, ultimately, will prevent their union.)

What I really notice about this scene, reading it back, is that Fiona adopts, for the purposes of this early romance, the posture of girlfriend. She simplifies herself and feminises herself. It’s not fake, that. She’s flirting. She’s in love. But nor do we see the full Fiona here – the one who is quite likely to throw a bad guy off a cliff, or smoke a joint, or expose others to her abrasive humour.

I think that, probably, in any early romantic scene, we’ll feel the presence of the physical, the jostle of traditional male / female roles, and self adapting to the presence of this lovely other.

Her without him

Now none of this is at all unexpected. But I do especially want to point out that the romance continues – and is just as intense and maybe even more so – when one of the parties is absent. Here’s how the scene above plays out once Brydon has gone:

He’s off. Up the steps. Heavy and light. Thumping the door at the top open so hard that it whacks against its doorstop. The stairwell echoes with the noise of his departure… [A big male departure in other words. Even the sound of his going carries his physical presence.]

I sit on the step, getting my head into shape again. My pulse rate is high, but it’s steady. I count my breaths, trying to bring my breathing down to a more relaxed range …

This isn’t love and this isn’t happiness. But it’s like I’m in the hallway and can hear their music spilling out of the living room. Their laughter and candlelight. I’m not there yet. I do know the difference. I’ve had just a single date with Dave Brydon. Nothing that remotely constitutes a relationship. These are early, early days and anything could happen from here. But for once in my life, for once in my hopeless crackpot life, I’m not just in the same timezone, I’m actually shouting-distance close to the love-’n’-happiness twins.

I feel the feelings, piece by miraculous piece. Bum on a concrete step. Heart thumping. A floaty green dress and sandals with two-and-a-half-inch heels. A man who hoisted me up a step because I was talking into his belly button. This is what humans feel like when they are getting ready to fall in love.

I get up from my step and walk slowly back upstairs to my desk.

I’ve compacted this scene quite a bit for reasons of length. (Fiona’s relationships with her own feelings is odd, so it takes her awhile to figure out her own thoughts.) But what you feel here is the huge presence of Dave Brydon, even when he’s not there. I almost want to say: especially when he’s not there.

When the two of them are together, Fiona can’t get into the detail of her feelings too much: there isn’t the space to do it. With him gone? The world opens up: “I’m in the hallway and can hear their music spilling out of the living room. Their laughter and candlelight.” She can start to review those feelings in detail. Her review of the situation still includes all the elements necessary to the start of a hot (and hopeful) relationship:

• Self as feminine. (The floaty green dress and sandals.)
• Self as physically embodied. (Bum on a concrete step. Heart thumping.)
• Physical and masculine presence of the other. (A man who hoisted me up a step.)
• Feelings as rare and precious (piece by miraculous piece.)

Him and him, her and her

If you only felt the romance on the page when the two people were present, that romance would fail to ignite. It would be incomplete. It’s the two things together – romance with, and romance without – that gives you your complete brew.

I’ve never really written a gay relationship, so I can’t speak with authority there. But I think the basic principles remain the same. In the chunks we’ve just read, we see Fiona self-simplify, into someone more feminine than she really is, in order to get her man. That process of self-simplification will, I think, happen in gay relationships too, just not necessarily along classic masculine / feminine lines. If you have insights here, do please share them!

Romance with a lower case r

I’ve only once written something that would be classified as a real Romance novel – it was longlisted for a romance award and a German publisher wanted to publish it under the name Emma Makepeace. But all my novels have had the flutter of romance somewhere, and nearly all novels need them. There’s a particular pleasure, in fact, in interweaving romance and action. Both elements shine the brighter. Just don’t forget all about the romance when the action happens. If the Beloved leaves the Lover’s thoughts too long and too often, it’s not much of a romance at all.

Feedback Friday: Romance

Last week, we relished an excursion into hist fic. This week, it’s all smooochy kissing and close dancing. Or actually – the opposite.

Here’s a useful masterclass on romance in all its different manifestations – from a woman so prolific, she needs two names. Please don’t ignore that video if you don’t write capital-R romance. We all need to know how to write about love.

The exercise this week involves scenes where your character is thinking about their beloved, when their beloved is not present. It’s your version of the ‘her without him’ bum-on-a-concrete-step scene.

Specifically, I want:

• Title
• Genre
• 1-2 sentences of explanation, as needed
• 250 words where your character is thinking about their loved one, without that person being physically present.

I’m going to be looking for physical awareness, strong feelings, and some sense of the way that the character is being squashed into a different shape (perhaps just temporarily) as a result of their passion. Off you go – and ah! My heart beats faster, my cheeks are a little pinker …

That’s it. Feedback in Townhouse as per usual. If you aren’t a Premium Member, you can’t access the masterclass. 

That’s it from me. Post here.

Til soon.

Harry

Have you heard? Innovative digital-first publishers are changing the landscape of the industry. Any savvy writer on the lookout for a way to get their books into the hands of readers would benefit from keeping their eye on this exciting new frontier. We've put together everything you need to know about digital-first publishing, including which publishers are accepting submissions.

What is a digital publisher?

A digital publisher is a publisher like any other, but they tend to bring books to market in purely digital formats, like eBooks and audiobooks.

A digital-first publisher works slightly differently. Whilst they tend to prioritise digital formats, they also publish books in physical formats such as hardbacks and paperbacks.

What's the difference between a digital-first publisher and a traditional publisher?

The clue is in the name! A traditional publisher (like one of the Big Four: Penguin, Hachette, HarperCollins and MacMillan) tend to prioritise publishing a book in a physical format (like a hardback or a paperback) over other formats, though there is usually a variety of formats available for each of their titles titles.

The important word here is prioritise. Ask any published author and they'll tell you that marketing and publicity can be instrumental in a book's success. While a traditional publisher might put their efforts into selling physical copies, there are other successful ways publishers sell books.

Digital-first publishers prioritise selling digital formats (which have grown in popularity in recent years, especially in certain genres), this means their business model is slightly different to what a trade publisher usually offers their authors.

There is no one size fits all approach and it's important for authors to be well-informed of the options available to them.

If we take a step back from the nuts and bolts of the industry's inner workings, you'll find that digital-first publishers aren't that different to traditional publishers! In many cases, pre-conceptions about traditional publishing being the more enticing option for authors are often disproved when talking to digital-first published authors about their experience.

What are the benefits to working with a digital-first publisher?

In short, there are many! If you care about reaching readers, removing barriers that prevent them from getting your book into their hands and the business of book-selling is important to you: digital-first publishing is worth your consideration.

For one, digital-first publishers tend to be more open to unsolicited submissions from un-agented authors. That means you don't need to be represented by a literary agent to send them your submission! However, many still accept submissions from agents on behalf of their writers. It's worth noting that a small number of the digital-first publishers we found were only accepting submissions from agents, but this doesn't seem to be the norm.

To dig deeper into the benefits of working with a digital-first publisher, we thought we'd let author and our very own Head of Membership Becca Day talk about her experience being published by Embla, a digital-first imprint of Bonnier Books. Turns out, one of the main benefits is how their fresh approach invests in their authors' careers.

'The digital first strategy focuses on building your audience. My books were listed as 99p eBooks that were FREE for anyone with Kindle Unlimited or Amazon Prime. That’s a lot of people getting my books for free. But you know what? I still got paid. The way Kindle Unlimited and Prime Reading works is you get paid a (tiny) amount per page read. While the pay per page is tiny, the amount of people you can reach with a publisher who knows what they’re doing is not. Digital first publishers are typically much more ‘on it’ when it comes to advertising, and they have a much bigger budget for advertising because they’re not wasting it on printing costs. My debut has now been read by nearly 1 million people. How NUTS is that? 1 million x a tiny amount = a substantial paycheck.' - Becca Day, author of THE SECRETS WE BURIED

But, what if you still want your books to be published in physical formats - and end up in bookshops?

That is an understandable goal, one that many authors share, Becca included. The good news is, Becca's books are published in multiple formats, including paperback. Let's hear what she has to say about it...

'The reason I suggest digital-first publishing to debut authors is because it’s the perfect jumping off point. It’s a way to build your audience and your readership so that when your books do eventually get into bookstores and you do eventually move to that more traditional publishing model (it took me three books to do it, but I got there) you’ll have that audience who know you and are willing to spend the money to get a hard copy.'

'And you know what? My books are now in bookstores and I still don’t make nearly as much from paperbacks as I do from eBooks. Not even close. The world is changing.'

These quotes were taken from a blog post Becca wrote about her experience of digital-first publishing, read it in full here.

Vanity Publishers and Hybrid Publishers

We should probably also include a note about vanity publishers. These guys are the snakes and serpents of publishing. They essentially pretend to be a real publishing company contemplating the commercial publication of your book. Inevitably, however, you’ll be told that the “editorial board” or something other fictional entity decided they couldn’t quite afford the risk of going it alone. So you’ll be invited to spend some quite large sum of money on “partnership publishing”, or something like that. If it smells bad, it is bad. Just say no – with emphasis. If you feel like adding a cuss-word or two when you say so, then we won’t be offended

Hybrid publishers are a somewhat cleaner version of the same thing. They’ll ask for money to get you published, but be more candid about likely outcomes. If you encounter honesty and openness, the publisher may well be trustworthy. If you encounter heavy selling and a lack of candour, then avoid, avoid, avoid.

How can I find a digital-publisher?

Drum roll please... We've pulled together a list of active, reputable digital-first publishers. We've included as much key information as possible about each publisher, from what they publish to whether they accept submissions from un-agented writers, but please be aware that this information is only accurate at the time of writing. Make sure to check with the publisher directly if you have any specific queries about their submission process.

Digital-first publishers

Below, we've shared a variety of reputable and thriving digital-first publishers. Whilst this list is accurate at time of writing this article, we're sure more and more will pop up in the future. If you do spot a new digital-first publisher, let us know by sending us an email. Don't forget, before you trust any publisher with your submission, make sure to read our guide on how to spot vanity publishers and hybrid publishers.

Got it? Great! Let's dig into some digital-first publishers. All of the following tend to publish general fiction (which means they cover most genres) but be sure to check out their websites for specific details about their titles and their submission guidelines.

Boldwood

Boldwood are one of the most exciting digital-first publishers in the industry. We were lucky enough to be joined by Nia Beynon from Boldwood Books for our Ask A Publisher Anything event. Premium Members can catch up on the replay now. Not a Premium Member? Join now and get access to masterclasses, events, video courses, AgentMatch and so much more.

Boldwood accept submissions during specific windows, so make sure to follow them on social media or check their website for any future openings. They publish commercial fiction in all sorts of genres.

Avon

A commercial fiction division of HarperCollins, Avon publish across multiple genres and often with a digital-first approach. We can't find their submission details, but we think it's likely they only accept agented submissions. We did find a handy Author Testimonial page on their website that is worth checking out if you are interested in being published by Avon.

Bookouture

Bookouture is another leading digital-first publisher making change in the industry. We love that they cover most genres in commercial fiction and that their submission guidelines are super clear and easy to follow. Find out more here.

Embla

Embla publishes our very own Head of Membership Becca Day and so they hold a special place in our hearts. They specialise in commercial adult fiction, covering thrillers like Becca's and compelling stories across all popular genres. Head to their website for more.

Hera

The publisher of our Managing Director Sophie Flynn! Another publisher dear to us at Jericho Writers. Hera specialise in crime and thrillers, romance and sagas, but they publish most popular genres. Agented and un-agented writers can submit to them directly, more details on their website.

HQ Digital

HG Digital are a leading digital-first imprint of HarperCollins, publishing commercial fiction. We believe HQ Digital accept submissions from un-agented writers. Keep an eye on their submissions page for updates.

Joffe Books

Joffe are an independent digital-first publisher that boasts bestsellers. They publish across all general fiction genres, but specialise in crime and mysteries. Joffe kindly joined us for a panel event that Premium Members can rewatch here. Joffe accept submissions from un-agented writers, find out more here.

One More Chapter

A digital-first imprint of HarperCollins, One More Chapter publish 'page-turning' fiction across most genres and accept submissions from un-agented writers. Find out more about their submission guidelines here.

Orion Dash

Orion Dash is a digital-first imprint at Orion, part of Hachette. They publish commercial fiction and in their submission guidelines specifically mention that they are looking for women’s fiction, romance, saga, historical, crime and thrillers. Head over to their website for more information.

Digital-first publishers by genre

It's no secret that certain genres seem to thrive in digital spaces. We've compiled digital-first publishers that specialise in their chosen genres.

Crime and Thrillers

Many of the biggest and most prolific digital-first publishers we've already mentioned specialise in crime and thrillers, even if their list of titles spans all genres. We recommend scrolling back up this page and checking out the digital-first publishers listed above.

Sci-Fi, Fantasy and Speculative Fiction

Speculative fiction is another area of the market that seems to perform well digitally. If you're writing sci-fi, fantasy or anything speculative, consider submitting your manuscript to one of these publishers:

• Baen - an independent digital-first publisher of sci-fi and fantasy books. Accepting submissions from un-agented authors, find out more about their submission guidelines here.
• Berkley - during a recent open submissions call (in 2024), Berkley included romantasy in the genres they were looking for. We recommend keeping an eye on their website and following them on social media for information about how to submit to them.
• DAW Books - an imprint of Astra, DAW publishes widely across the sci-fi and fantasy genres, they also mention on their website that they aim 'to publish a wide range of voices and stories, because we believe that it is the duty of the science fiction and fantasy genres to be inclusive and representative of as many diverse viewpoints as possible.' We can't find details on how to submit to DAW at this time, which leads us to believe they accept submissions through agents only.
• Second Sky Books - this digital-first publisher is actively accepting submissions. Check out their submission page, and what they are looking for.
• Solaris Nova - an imprint of Rebellion publishing, Solaris Nova have detailed guidance on what they are looking for in their open submissions. As well as accepting sci-fi and fantasy, they are also looking for horror submissions!

Romance

Romance is booming in digital spaces, whether it's on BookTok or in the Amazon Kindle charts, so it's no surprise to see so many digital-first publishers specialising in this genre. As one of the most popular genres out there, devout are always on the hunt for the next sweeping love story, and digital formats allow them to find new books in an instant. If you're a romance writer, don't discount working with these publishers.

• Carina Press - Harlequin's digital-first imprint accepts both agented and un-agented submissions. From their clear submission guidelines, we can see that in rare circumstances, they will also consider previously self-published works.
• Entice - publisher of BookTok romantasy hit Fourth Wing, Entice clearly have the power to help a book become an overnight hit. Unfortunately, at time of writing, they do not accept submissions from un-agented writers.
• Evernight Publishing - specialising in romance and erotica, Evernight Publishing accept submissions from all writers. Bonus points for clearly stating their submission preferences.
• Forever Yours - an imprint of Hachette, Forever Yours impressed us with their clear submission guidelines. They accept submissions from both agented and un-agented writers.
• Mills & Boon - a staple in the romance space! The iconic Mills & Boon seem active in their search of new and un-agented writers to work with.
• SMP Swerve - whilst this publisher specialises in romance fiction, at the time of writing, we couldn't find specific details on how to submit to them but we believe they only accept submissions from agented authors.

How do I submit to a digital-first publisher?

Usually, digital-first publishers ask for the same materials you would expect a literary agent to request in a submission. These are typically the opening section of your manuscript (up to a certain number of words, pages or chapters), a synopsis and query letter. Some might forgo the query letter and instead ask you to complete a form and include your information.

When can I expect to hear back from a digital-first publisher with the results of your submission?

It's difficult to say - but within the digital-first publisher's submission guidelines they usually offer a rough estimate of how long it takes for them to respond to submissions. If that time has elapsed since you have submitted to them (and you've double checked your email inbox and spam folder!) then reaching out is usually acceptable. We recommend keeping in mind that open submissions tend to be popular and it can take a considerable amount of time for editors to read, and make a judgement, on the submissions they receive.

Disclaimer: this article seeks to compile information for writers interested in digital publishing. We do not have direct affiliations nor do we endorse any publishers mentioned in this article. If you have experience working with any digital-first publisher and would like to share this with us, or if you think we've missed out a digital-publisher, please send an email to info@jerichowriters.com. We'd love to hear from you.

This week marks the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings. And yes, the military significance of those landings looms a little larger in Anglo-American eyes than it does in German / Slavic eyes, but still – golly. That invasion involved what was by far the largest invasion fleet in history. In one single day, 133,000 men landed in France, under fire. By the end of June 1944, almost a million men had been put ashore, along with 150,000 vehicles and an infinitude of supplies.

Now, I happen to have one of those little author soft-spots for this bit of history. I wrote a historical novel once about the oil industry, and D-Day featured in the climax of the book. It was all very well to land 150,000 vehicles (in less than a month) – but how were those vehicles to be fuelled? There’s no oil in Normandy and slow-moving oil tankers were desperately vulnerable to attack. So … PLUTO: The PipeLine Under The Ocean. It had never been done before, but, eighty years ago, it was done, because it had to be done. A pipeline unrolled on the ocean bed to feed petrol through to the liberating army. Wow.

I’m always moved by those things, but also – listening to voices and memoirs on the radio – I’m struck by the precision with which ordinary language captures the fleeting moods of history.

If you had people today talking about a similar venture, they’d sound different. They’d use different language, pick out different details, have slightly different humour, and so on.

For example, I heard an account of the moment, written by someone then only 8 or 9. Some American soldiers were camping out in Hampshire. And they had this ‘big bit of lamb stew’ cooked up in ‘great tin pot’. The soldiers (‘very generous’) offered the boy some of their food, and the boy, used to sparse wartime rations, clearly revered the memory of that meal.

My kids are the same age now as that boy then. They might talk about a lamb stew, but they wouldn’t talk about a ‘great tin pot’ and I think they’d be a lot less likely to talk of a ‘big bit’ of stew. And obviously, they don’t even know what ration cards are or were.

Now I say this, with both a narrow focus and a broad one.

The narrow focus is simply this: if you’re writing historical fiction, you need to get as close as possible to the words and experiences of the people who were there. So yes, you need your grand history books: the military histories which tells you about what the US 1st Army achieved, how fast or slowly the British and Commonwealth 2nd Army advanced, and so on.

But that’s background – of secondary value almost. The closer you can get to the texture of life, the better. That means letters and diaries. Scraps of newsreel. Any opportunity you get to hear or read actual dialogue of the era. What did those soldiers eat? Did they have tents? Bivouac bags? Nothing? What? Those things don’t matter much to military history, but they made up the experience of life on the day. How heavy was a Bren gun? How was the ammo for it carried? Did it jam? What noise did it make? The closer you can get to accuracy there, the better. There’s no substitute for as much real-life memoir as you can get.

That’s the narrow focus, but the issue is broader too – one that affects every novelist and, indeed, any memoirist too.

The presence of (actual, or very well faked) authenticity matters hugely.

If you’re writing about, let’s say, ad industry execs in London, or New York, or Paris – do you have their voices right? Do you have their attitudes right?

Another bit of memoir I heard on the radio today came from a (then) young woman who had parachuted into France to support the Resistance. Her job was to transmit coded messages back to England. She landed in a wood, feeling understandably anxious, but her memoir commented, ‘I thought, well, I’m here now, so I might as well get on with it.’

You can just feel the 1940s matter-of-fact spirit oozing from those words. How does a modern-day, urban-elite ad exec talk? What attitudes do they unwittingly convey in everything they say / do / feel? I’m not too sure – it’s not my world – but the perfect ad-land set book will nail those things. The vocab, the attitudes, the minutiae of life.

With historical fiction, the need for a certain kind of precision is clear: you can’t get History wrong. But it’s the same thing with all other story-telling too. You need to be true to your world, not just in big ways (Spitfires? Or F-22s?), but in little ones – great tin pots and the ‘might as well get on with it’ attitudes.

That’s all true, even if your world is utterly imagined. You might be writing a book about a mining colony on Mars, and it would still matter what people eat, what attitudes they evince, what they call a ‘great tin pot’, what kind of footwear they have, and so on.

My mother-in-law was born in Poland in 1942, to a German-speaking (and Protestant) father and a Polish-speaking (and Catholic) mother. She survived, and might not have done. Her family survived, and might not have done. They all, in time, made it to Munich and the glorious, beautiful safety of the American zone. Thank you, D-Day. Thank you, generous American soldiers and their big bits of lamb stew.

Feedback Friday: Catching the mood

This month, we’re going to be tackling projects attuned to specific genres … but will also make sure that the disciplines we focus on will be applicable to most writers.

Today, I’d love you to take a look at one of our hist fic classes – here - on researching your book. That has a huge relevance, of course, to historical writers, but it’ll affect loads of others too. (Even, say, people writing about mining-on-Mars. I mean, what minerals does it have? What are the Mars-specific extraction challenges …? Those things really matter.)

What I want this week:

• Title
• Genre
• 1-2 sentences of context if needed
• 250 words that show your research in action. Everything from tone of voice to the specifics of (guessing, here) Martian molybdenum mining.

The thing that will please my soul here are things like “Well, I’m here now, so I might as well get on with it.” The tone there is just perfect for the age and the historical moment. These things are hard to pin down, but they matter so much …

That’s it. Feedback in Townhouse as per usual. If you aren’t a Premium Member, you can’t access the masterclass. So um, you could join us – or invade France – or make a really big ball out of rubber bands.

...

That’s it from me. Post here. 

Til soon.

Harry