-
“My sales and readership are continuing to grow”
Jackie Burke explains why she turned down a traditional publisher and decided to self-publish her debut novel instead What led you to write your first novel The Secrets of Grindlewood? I’ve always loved reading and writing and used to “dabble” in writing short stories and poems from an early age. Most of my stories… Read more
-
“The advance was enough to allow me to put off getting a job” – Gilly Macmillan
Gilly Macmillan explains how her debut novel Burnt Paper Sky became Piatkus’ ‘superlead’ title for summer 2015 What led you to write your debut novel Burnt Paper Sky? I began to write Burnt Paper Sky because I found myself at a point in my life where I had a bit of time on my hands for the… Read more
-
“Within days the deal was done. I was overjoyed. Ridiculously happy.”
Dinah Jefferies, whose latest novel The Tea Planter’s Wife has been selected for the Richard & Judy Book Club, talks agents, book deals, and falling in love with writing Read more
-
“Nothing really beats hearing that I was going to be published for the first time” – SJ Watson
SJ Watson on his childhood dream coming true when his agent secured a book deal for Before I Go to Sleep, the psychological thriller that went on to become a phenomenal international success Is it true you started roughly 20 novels while working as an audiologist before writing Before I Go to Sleep? Not exactly! I’d started a few… Read more
-
Kathleen McMahon: “I ended up abandoning that book and starting from scratch with another”
Former RTÉ journalist Kathleen MacMahon found herself in the limelight in 2011 when she landed a €684,000 advance as part of a two-book deal with Little, Brown. Here she talks about coping with the attention, quitting the day job, and overcoming ‘difficult second novel syndrome’. How did you go about getting your agent, Marianne Gunn… Read more
-
“You only need one publisher to love your work” – Eimear McBride
Eimear McBride on getting her critically-acclaimed novel A Girl is a Half-Formed Thing published after five years of rejection Read more