The publishing industry is competitive, but the writing community doesn’t have to be.
Writer, YouTuber, developmental book editor, and former literary agent Meg LaTorre launched iWriterly as a go-to resource for writers, publishing a variety of content to assist both veteran and aspiring authors in their writerly journeys.
On the iWriterly website, writers can find the latest iWriterly videos, Query Hack critiques, guest blogs, writing tools and resources, author interviews, a pitch contest calendar, Meg’s book reviews, as well as the iWriterly editorial services.
Latest videos, articles, blogs, & more:
Announcement
iWriterly Co-Launches New Monthly YouTube Show
Ever wondered which publishing path is best for you—self, traditional, or hybrid publishing? Have you always wanted to better understand the nuances of each in order to determine the best home for your book?
Join Courtney Young, Kaitlyn Johnson, and Meg LaTorre in this NEW monthly YouTube live show all about publishing.
The first episode will be on Wednesday, February 20th, at 7:30 pm EST on iWriterly’s YouTube channel.
ABOUT PUBLISHABLE
Publishable is a monthly YouTube live show, where experts from across the publishing spectrums join forces. Learn which path might be best for your book—self, traditional, or hybrid publishing—and the ins and outs of the modern-day publishing industry. Join our three co-hosts, Meg LaTorre of iWriterly (a SFF writer, developmental editor, and former literary agent), Courtney Young (a self-published author who writes under the pen names Lyra Parish and is one-half of the USA TODAY Bestselling duo Kennedy Fox), and Kaitlyn Johnson (a literary agent and developmental editor), in these monthly one-hour episodes as they dive into the intricacies of publishing.
Learn More
This WEek’s iWriterly Video
Valentine’s Day 2019 Q&A
The iWriterly team answers YOUR questions in this special Valentine’s Day Q&A—from each other’s weirdest quirks to how many characters can Kevin name from Meg’s manuscripts.
Watch the Video
Writers Helping Writers Blog
Why Querying Writers Shouldn’t Write Sequels
Querying writers have quite a few hurdles to jump through to secure literary representation. For those of you who don’t know what a query is or what I mean by literary representation, let’s go over a few of the basics to start.
There are a few ways to publish a book, one of those being traditional publishing. As of early 2019, the big five publishers—whose names you have likely heard of many times before—are Hachette Book Group, HarperCollins, Macmillan Publishers, Penguin Random House, and Simon and Schuster. If you want to be published through the big five or through another traditional publisher, you need to have a literary agent.
Many people call literary agents the “gatekeepers” to the traditional publishing industry. Whether or not that’s true, writers have to pitch their unpublished manuscripts to agents via a query letter, which is essentially a professional cover letter all about your book.
Now, imagine you spend years writing and editing a book that an agent (and publisher) doesn’t want.
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Savvy Authors Blog
What is Character Agency?
As time goes on and the genre of novels matures and evolves, so too does reader expectation. For example, if you look at J. R. R. Tolkien’s LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy, you will probably note that the action sequences and battles scenes are often paragraphs or pages long. In books such as SIX OF CROWS, we get pages and pages of epic confrontations between characters. Why? That’s what the modern-day reader enjoys: living the details of action scenes.
But that isn’t the only thing modern-day readers want. They also want to see characters with agency.
For years, I heard the phrase “character agency” spoken by industry professionals on Twitter, and it took me a while to get it.
In short, character agency is when a character (usually a protagonist) is more proactive than reactive to situations in a story.
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iWriterly Video
What is Your Greatest Struggle as a Writer? | Writing Community Answers
The iWriterly team asks a group of writers the following question: What is your greatest struggle in your journey as a writer? Thirteen writers (traditionally-published, indie-published, and yet-to-be-published) share what they do to overcome hurdles in their writing careers. The writing community unites in this thirteen-person collab.
Special thank you to all of the writers who shared their experiences in this video.
Watch the Video
