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Category Archives: Editorial Process

Update on the Gollancz Direct Submissions

First, of all, thank you for your patience! Second, we hope you have just a little more left in you and ask that you bear with us for a little longer. Gollancz’s direct submissions period was an outstanding success in numbers terms with around 1800 submissions received in the three weeks we were open. However, this success has translated into a rather longer sorting and reading period than we’d initially estimated. Which is why we appreciate your patience! If you’re wondering how on earth it could take a crack editorial team like Gollancz four or more months to get through…

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Somewhere, Over the Rainbow

This was originally written for the British Fantasy Society Journal, and is re-posted here with their kind permission. If you’re interested in joining the BFS, or learning more about the society, you can get in touch with them through their website. At every literary convention in the world there is a panel devoted to one variation or another of the eternal question ‘How to Get Published’. An assortment of editors, agents and authors (often new authors who can speak from fresh experience) show up and answer what are – if we’re honest – the usual questions. ‘Do I need an…

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A Modern Day Fairy Tale, by Graham Joyce

Some Kind Of Fairy Tale has been optioned by a Hollywood studio so we asked Graham what it was like to sell to the film industry. This is what he told us. Once upon a timely time a fine young fellow sat upon a large toadstool and wrote himself a story, he did. And no sooner had he written those holy words The End than did the Feather-giver appear in a puff of smoke from nowhere and handed him a feather. And what a feather it was! Luminous and beautiful, so he stuck it in his cap. Then the next…

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Orion/Gollancz Charity Auction for the Samaritans

This year the Orion Publishing Group – of which Gollancz is a part – has chosen the Samaritans as our Charity of the Year. Most people in the UK will know of their work, but for those that don’t (or are overseas), this is how they describe themselves: Samaritans is a confidential emotional support service for anyone in the UK and Ireland. The service is available 24 hours a day for people who are experiencing feelings of distress or despair, including those which may lead to suicide. They’re a fantastic and important service, run by volunteers, and a worthy recipient…

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Don’t mention Terry Pratchett! Or: How to submit your comic fantasy novel . . .

With this week’s publication of Snuff, it seems a perfect moment to talk about comic fantasy. There are few submissions that I dread more than the ‘brilliant comic fantasy novel’. If I’m honest, it’s a pitch that makes my heart sink when I see it, because the pitch is always the same: ‘This is my hilarious comic fantasy novel. All my friends have read it, and they think I’m as funny as Terry Pratchett’. For most of the comic fantasy submission letters I see, that’s the only thing they tell me about the novel. Some pitches have promised ‘as funny…

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