From the desk of ... the Extreme Agent

Hellooow.

Thought I needed to clear somethin' up. When I featured a few writers I met at the ACFW conference, some thought they were the only writers being considered for the one spot I have open. Not so! I still haven't reviewed everything submitted from the RWA conference I attended at the end of July, and I have other misc. submissions like recommendations from clients, etc., as well as other ACFW applicants I didn't feature.

Truthfully, this isn't like a position at a company that I have to fill. I might not sign anyone from any of the submissions I currently have. Just wanted y'all to know that if you didn't see your name, you're not "out,'' and those who thought they only had a few people as competition, sorry, more than whom I listed.

Now that I've brightened your day, here's the newsletter. Sorry, stalker story has to wait. Had too much darn work to do!

Major Congrats to Debra Holland, who went to a Bill Phillips seminar where he challenged 500 writers to follow his guide to a healthy life, then write about their experience. Debra was one of ten writers whom Bill picked as having a winning entry. What did she win? TEN THOUSAND BUCKS, plus an equal amount to her favorite charity, and her story will be pubbed in some form, just not sure how yet. Way to earn the bucks, Deb!

Christian Fiction Online Magazine

Don't forget to subscribe (FREE!) and read my column under "Buzz," on "Branding." They're countin' the hits, so get on over: http://www.christianfictiononlinemagazine.com/  

New Day; New Blog

Hey Gang,

Well, my blog has a new look, a new name, and a new purpose. Welcome to My Worlds: A Bipolar Christian Tells All (No, the 's' isn't a typo.) is named in honor of the humorous narrative non-fiction proposal I'm writing of the same title.

It's my blog, and I'm gonna write what I want, when I want, how I want. No list host to answer to. No politically correct stuff. Some of you may not know, but I have opinions in a lot of areas. I'm gonna be blunt. No, I don't wanna hurt anyone's feelings, but I'll state the truth according to Kelly. Take it or leave it; like it or not. You'll leave knowing who I am.

I look forward to posts that agree, and disagree, with mine. I don't hold anyone's opinions against them when it comes to my literary life. Trust me, you can have polar- opposite views, and I'd still fight for ya as hard as for anyone else. If you wanna hold my views against me, feel free, but I'll warn ya, it could give ya nasty wrinkles...

Sign up for the blog at my new Web site: www.welcometomyworlds.com  (Note: If you've already signed up for the Perils blog, you're already signed up for this one.)

Mortimer Literary's Mentorship Award is Here!

Well, it isn't here. It's not a tangible award...

Here are the directions to apply for Mortimer Literary's Mentorship Award. What is the Mentorship Award? I designed it to take a newbie writer, and in one year, teach said writer what it takes to get published. This includes my advice, and line edits, but you gotta have the idea. At the end of 12 months, I hope to represent this writer and sell their manuscript.

You must have at least 50 pages written in order to apply, and must follow the entry instructions to the letter. If ya don't, you're out.

I have a lot of friends, and I wanna keep 'em, so this is blind for me, like a contest entry. Any hint of who you are, and you're out. Don't send something I've read before. Your directions are below. Away we go...

Submit: Three pages as attachments in a single e-mail. Subject of the email should be:    Kelly's Competition - (Title of Your Entry)

·        A cover page in Microsoft Word  (.doc). Cover page includes: entrant's name, mailing address, telephone number, fax number (if you have one), e-mail address, and the entry title. Name the file: cover.doc .

·        The first page of your completed manuscript or work-in-progress. Font must be in either Times New Roman or Courier New, 12 pt. Page must have 1&#xu201D; margins, and no more than 300 words. The only identification in the header is the genre/sub genre. (eg: Paranormal Romance, Inspirational Historical, etc.) All genres accepted except Romantic Suspense, Inspirational Romantic Suspense, (Have enough great authors in these areas. Sorry!) and Erotica or Romantica).
The entrant's name must not appear anywhere in the entry file. There must
be no language, symbol, or other information on the page that indicates the entrant's identity. Name the file: entry.doc .

·        A one-page essay on why I should choose you as the winner of the Mentorship Award. If you give me a clue as to who you are, you're out. Seems harsh, but y'all are writers. Be ingenious! Same formatting rules for this page as for the entry page. Name the file: essay.doc .

Send submission to: gv@brandhomework.com no sooner than midnight, September 30, 2008, Pacific Time. (My bloggers got the info last night.) DO NOT SEND YOUR SUBMISSION TO ME OR YOU WILL BE DISQUALIFIED!

Entries limited to the first 100 who follow all the rules, or close on November 15, 2008, whichever comes first. I'll call the winner on Christmas Day (I know, but I love to be dramatic.), and offer the writer a Letter of Intent (meaning it's my intent to represent this work if it's up to snuff at the end of the year, and you can't submit the work anywhere else until the year is up).

Work starts after my birthday, which is January 10^th, and will run until I feel the work is ready to submit to publishers, or December 31, 2009, whichever comes first. If the work ain't ready by December 31, 2009, you'll still be in better shape than you were. There's no cost to enter. You have my permission to put this info on any loop or newsletter.

Direct any questions to the e-mail address you submitted to.

May the worst writer with the best voice win! (No, I ain't kiddin'. This award is for someone who doesn't have a shot at publication without more help than anyone else is willing to give. I'm willing.)

by Matthew Thornton -- Publishers Weekly

Tami Hoag has just signed a two-book deal with Dutton, with publisher Brian Tart acquiring North American rights via Andrea Cirillo at the Jane Rotrosen Agency. Dutton senior editor Ben Sevier will edit the novels. The books are linked stories involving the family of a serial killer; the first of the two, Deeper than the Dead, will come out in December 2009, and NAL will publish the mass market edition one year later.

This is the first time Hoag has switched publishers in her 20-plus-year career; all of her previous novels, including The Alibi Man and Prior Bad Acts, were published by Bantam. Hoag had reupped with Bantam in July 2007 for three new suspense novels, and Deeper than the Dead, the first title in that deal, was to be due out from Bantam in December 2008.

In a press release, Hoag said, "I am at a point in my career where making a change to a new publisher is very exciting for me. I'm very pleased to be taking this step with the team at Dutton/NAL and I'm looking forward to a great and successful partnership."

Hoag first appeared on the New York Times bestseller list with Night Sins, which was also a mini-series success for CBS, and she rose to #1 with the paperback edition of Kill the Messenger. Her work has appeared in more than 30 countries.  

Who Won't Win the Nobel? An American [What a shock!!!]

Permanent secretary of the Swedish Academy Horace Engdahl has tipped his hand when it comes to considering an American for the Nobel prize for literature. He told the AP in an interview, "Of course there is powerful literature in all big cultures, but you can't get away from the fact that Europe still is the center of the literary world [What a pompous %&#!] ... not the United States.'' [Mayhap, but we beat the pants off ya in every war you weren't our ally in.] Our writers are ''too sensitive to trends in their own mass culture.'' [Does this guy speak English? Hey, buddy, what's with the reflexive pronoun use?!] He added, ''The U.S. is too isolated, too insular. They don't translate enough and don't really participate in the big dialogue of literature." [But we do participate in the big dialogue of every other genre of writing-you know, the books that make MONEY.]

Nobel announcements start next week. As usual, no date for the literature prize has been confirmed yet. Engdahl "said the 16-member award jury has not selected this year's winner, and dropped no hints about who was on the short list." [These people are on my short list of those I can't tolerate, and I'm of European descent. I'm almost embarrassed to admit it. Sheesh!---This is the kind of commentary you'll see on my new blog, so if it offends ya, unsubscribe now, before it's too late and I corrupt your isolated, insular little lives....]

While the defeat of the $700 billion bail out package by the House of Representatives drew worldwide headlines, Congress did manage to pass two bills supported by most segments of the publishing community, although it was unclear if either would be signed into law during the current Congressional session.

On Saturday the House passed a bill that would make it harder for libel tourists to threaten American authors and publishers with foreign libel suits aimed at undermining their First Amendment rights. The bill, H.R. 6146, would prohibit U.S. courts from recognizing a foreign defamation judgment "based upon a publication concerning a public figure or a matter of public concern&#xu201D; unless the court determines that the foreign judgment satisfies the free speech and free press protections guaranteed by the First Amendment.

AAP president and CEO Pat Schroeder thanked members of Congress for focusing attention on the serious problem of libel tourism, and called passage of H.R. 6146 a "strong and encouraging step forward.'' "Libel tourism is an insidious threat. It seeks to intimidate and silence American authors and deprive us of vital information on issues of public concern. I hope we can build on H.R. 6146 with hearings in the new Congress that will shine a light into this dark corner, '' Schroeder said.

The AAP also praised the Senate for passing the "Shawn Bentley Orphan Works Act of 2008" (S.2913) which would address the problem of "orphan works'' - works under copyright whose owners cannot be identified or located by third parties seeking permission to use the works.

"AAP and its members fully understand the 'orphan works' problem and embrace the need for a carefully crafted solution, '' said AAP v-p for Legal and Government Affairs Allan Adler. "Enactment of the 'Shawn Bentley Orphan Works Act' before the close of this Congress would be an extremely important accomplishment. But even if the House does not act,'' Adler said, Senate "passage is a significant step, establishing a benchmark for continuing efforts to enact meaningful 'orphan works' legislation early in the new Congress.'' [PW]

Editorial Skills for Digital Days

Pan Macmillan's Nicholas Blake posts a presentation made at the Society of Young Publishers this week on the company's Digitalist blog, in which he looked at the role of the editor in a world adapting to digital processes and markets. "I argued that although editors in our part of the archipelago needed new knowledge and understanding, as they always have, they didn't need new skills, and I outlined ten key islands of knowledge, five collaborative and five individual." Those islands:

1. Get the rights. Penguin got 700 titles up for the Waterstone's launch - then had to take 120 down as they discovered rights hadn't been agreed.
2. Understand moral rights. The new formats mean titles that had no moral rights will re-acquire them once republished. When commissioning indexes, state that the index will be used in all editions.
3. Assign ISBNs correctly. Each format of a title needs a unique ISBN.
4. Understand localization. Harper didn't get any UK titles up for the Waterstone's launch - all theirs are US titles.
5. Understand version control and decide on a strategy - there are no impression numbers in eBooks.
6. Get to know your output formats.
7. Get to know your conversion or output process. ADE officially imports from XML, Mobipocket from HTML, Word, PDF or text, MS Reader from Word.
8. Understand metadata and decide on its importance for your books (bookmarks in Perdido Street Station; bookmarks in a Tor book).
9. Build in metadata-friendly elements to your books at the earliest stages.
unnamed sections in Electricity ('or was it goodbye').
10. Understand a digital workflow. [Digitalist]

Maybe "We Can't Review You&#xu201D; Is the Wrong Answer [Ya think?]

Following the Washington Post's blog post about a few "worthy" books they didn't have space to review, the St. Louis Post Dispatch has a much longer explanation of why the paper will never do what readers ask for. [Hmm, mayhap because they ain't that smart?] "We don't review every local author's book. We can't - we don't have the space, time or freelance budget. Plus, there are more books published now than ever before.... But we no longer have an Everyday section, where we also used to run feature stories about local and national authors and even book reviews. This is disappointing to everyone." [Especially the local authors who have few outlets for their work.]

They have policies, after all, and sometimes they follow them: "The policy has long been that we don't review self-published or paperback books (although we have 'violated' that policy several times in the last 10 years)." [Ya mean you only review self-published and paperback books when ya wanna be rebellious, or when there's something in it for you?]

Why don't they review your book in particular? "Some reasons we (and most book editors) choose not to review a book: poor quality, poor writing, little new material, obscure or boring subject matter." [According to whom? Hey, everyone who's ever written a self-pubbed or paperback book, don't forget to renew your subscription...] [Post Dispatch]

By Lynn Andriani -- Publishers Weekly

Simon & Schuster has announced its latest digital initiative: an in-house digital production studio that will serve as the company's primary source for original multimedia content about its authors and their books. The studio will produce high-definition video interviews and features, as well as audio and photos, for use on S&S's Web site, for viral marketing purposes through blogs and social networks, and for the company's retail and external marketing partners.

The first video produced in-house features Stephen King discussing his episodic graphic digital video series "N.'' The interview, which was featured exclusively on My Space from September 10 to September 12, now lives at www.NisHere.com, a site developed by Simon & Schuster Digital specifically for the video. S&S has more than 25 interviews currently in pre- or post-production, including Arianna Huffington, Blair Underwood and Philippa Gregory. The house expects to produce and post more than 600 pieces of multimedia content annually.

The studio will be managed by Charlie Corts, who previously held positions in digital production at Yahoo! and CBS Interactive.

The National Book Foundation will honor five young writers under 35 [I thought they were talkin' the 15-20 yr old range. No matter, since I'm in the home stretch to a fabulous 48, the Foundation members would haveta be over 100 to consider me  young. Ah, but they don't know me....] November 17 as part of the kick-off to National Book Week that culminates with the National Book Awards on November 19. The five writers have each been selected by a previous NBA finalist or winner as someone whose work is particularly promising and exciting and is among the best of a new generation of writers. 

The 2008 "5 Under 35'' are:

Matthew Eck, The Farther Shore (Milkweed Editions, 2007) selected by Joshua Ferris, 2007 Fiction Finalist for Then We Came to the End; Keith Gessen, All the Sad Young Literary Men (Viking Press, 2008) selected by Jonathan Franzen, 2001 Fiction Winner for The Corrections; Sana Krasikov, One More Year: Stories (Spiegel & Grau, 2008) selected by Francine Prose, 2000 Fiction Finalist for Blue Angel; Nam Le, The Boat (Knopf, 2008) selected by Mary Gaitskill, 2005 Fiction Finalist for Veronica; and Fiona Maazel, Last Last Chance (FSG, 2008) selected by Jim Shepard, 2007 Finalist for Like You'd Understand, Anyway. [PW]

National Book Festival

A wet weekend did not deter attendance at Washington, DC's National Book Festival on Saturday. The AP says the event has grown from about 30,000 people in 2001 to approximately 120,000 attendees this year. Created by First Lady Laura Bush, the Librarian of Congress's James Billington is "hopeful it will continue under a new administration.'' The library, Billington said last week, ''will be looking to all possible ways' to perpetuate this 'unique and popular' event."

This Washington Post piece focuses on presentations from authors, including Neil Gaiman, Geraldine Brooks, Dionne Warwick, James McBride, and others. [PW]

Director's "Jesus Book'' a Dutch Bestseller [Oh, joy.]

Dutch director Paul Verhoeven co-wrote JESUS OF NAZARETH with his own biographer Rob van Scheers and publisher Meulenhoff is on their fourth printing within weeks of release after a big promotional campaign in Holland. In the book, "Verhoeven suggests that Jesus was the son of Mary and a Roman soldier who raped her," the Hollywood Reporter says. [grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!]

Pendo has bought German rights; a US deal is reportedly in negotiations. [Another surprise. Of course Hollywood's gonna jump all over this one. I wonder if they'll produce the sequel I'm gonna write about the Roman soldier's time in Hell....]

Everyone Loves the Underdog (We're countin' on it...)

If ya haven't heard, Underdog Press released Robin Miller w/a Robin Caroll from her obligation to publish Torrents of Destruction with us so she could accept a three-book, single title deal from B&H. I sent refunds out to those who pre-ordered Torrents. If I missed ya, please let me know.

We still have spectacular author Sheryl Brennan's book, Celtic Sacrifice to offer. Senior Editor Sherri Andervich worked closely with Sheryl to make this work sublime, and let the author's unbelievable voice shine through. We're 25 books shy of our pre-sale goal of 125, which we need to print the book. If you haven't seen the video trailer yet, please hop on over to www.underdogpress.com .

We'll release book two, Celtic Hope, mid-2009, if all goes well with book one. C'mon, support an author who sold her book to Tiger Publications, but didn't receive her advance before they filed bankruptcy. Let's not orphan this single mother of three a second time. Ante up! UNDERDOG PRESS needs your support to publish great work that needs a home. Please visit us at www.underdogpress.com and pre-order Celtic Sacrifice in Trade Paperback today.