This month’s Writers in the Hall event was ‘How to Get Published’. Author Nina de La Mer hosted the evening, discussing top tips with Eleanor Crawforth, editor at Brighton based publishers Myriad Editions, and writers Al Brookes, Erinna Mettler and Gill Hasson. Erinna, Al and Nina are all fiction writers. Gill is a non fiction author – she writes self help and personal development books
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Erinna and Gill explained how they had found a publisher to publish their books, and Al talked about her experience of self publishing. (Al’s novel ‘The Gift of Looking Closely’ was The Guardian’s Self Published Book of the month in August last year)
There was much debate about the merits of having an agent (don’t bother) and lots of encouragement from Erinna, Nina and Eleanor on entering story and writing competitions as a way of getting your work noticed and read.
Top tips for aspiring writers and authors? Stay focused, have sticking power and write for the love of it!
Gill Hasson