Publishing is evolving. When Hookline
began, we were on the front line of changes. Lately we have felt as though we are standing still. We love the Hookline process of letting readers
find manuscripts worthy of publication. However, it is time to speed up
the process – over the years, we have lost out as good writers were snapped up
by other publishing houses during our lengthy ten-month, two-stage selection
process.
The first thing is to assure you all
that book groups will remain an integral part of the selection process. The
second thing is that submissions will remain open only to students and
graduates of MA writing courses. This keeps the Hookline link between new
writers and serious readers.
But we do need to be more nimble and
put out promising titles in a faster manner.
Writers, let’s first detail how the
changes will affect you.
Writers there will be no submission deadline, and we still ask you to initially submit only the first three
chapters – if we think the work reads well, we will ask for the complete
manuscript and pass it on to book groups who favour that particular genre. The book group will report back to us, and
feedback will go to the writer. A thumbs up from the groups will result in
e-reader publication. A resounding thumbs up, will result in paperback and
e-reader publication. Any ebook with sales exceeding 10,000 will be published
in paperback format.
Writers, there will be no submission
fee. However, we ask for no multiple submissions and to ensure
you only submit your best work, we will only take one submission from each
writer in any given year.