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Click on the links below to view more details about YouWriteOn in the press. To join for free, click here.The BBC News Site"Each month, the people behind the highest-ranked stories at the site, YouWriteOn.com, will receive free critiques from established writers and agents. The Arts Council is behind the site, which aims to give budding authors the chance to see their own work in print."From The Times Newspaper: "The Arts Council-sponsored website youwriteon.com allows writers to evaluate the opening chapters of each other’s unpublished novels, with interjections from industry professionals."The Scotsman"Each month, the top-rated chapters receive a free detailed assessment from five professional writers - the kind of service for which you'd normally expect to pay about £150. Leading literary agencies Curtis Brown and Christopher Little also promise to take a look at the site's best work"YouWriteOn Member Feedback: ‘The feedback is helping me enormously. When more than one reader hits on the same weakness, bingo - do something. Reviewing the work of others is a lesson in itself. Somebody writes an atmospheric description and you wonder why you can't do as well yourself. Somebody else misses a plot opportunity and you realise you have done that too.’ Membership is free, sponsored by the Arts Council. To view more details about YouWriteOn and our literary professionals, click here. Our Literary ProfessionalsSARA O'KEEFFE Sara O’ Keeffe is a Senior Editor working for leading publisher Orion. Orion publish some of the world's best selling authors, including Ian Rankin, Michael Palin, and Elmore Leonard. Sara works with many best selling authors and specialises in editing crime fiction, women’s fiction, action-adventure and historical fiction. Sara previously worked for a large bookseller as a crime fiction buyer. She has sat as a judge on the CWA (Crime Writers Association) debut dagger panel and has been an active member of the RNA (Romantic Novelist’s Association) for years. GILLIAN STERN Gillian Stern works as a Literary Editor, following many years as a Commissioning Editor. She works as an Editor at leading publisher Bloomsbury, working with Alexandra Pringle, Editor-in-Chief at Bloomsbury. She also works with all the Literary Agents at leading literary agency Curtis Brown, whose bestselling authors include Margaret Atwood, Ed McBain, David Lodge and Sue Townsend. Gillian reads novels across the genres. She reads novels that the agents have signed or are thinking of signing (Curtis Brown director Jonny Geller, for example, is well known for work with new authors) and provides constructive edits, and her opinion on how a novel works/does not work and how it could move forward. She works on novels that are definitely going to be published, and which may also be the author's second or third novel. Gillian provides detailed opinions, and is well known for her constructive approach, and ability to help authors move forward with their work. She also works with Luigi Bonomi and Associates; A M Heath and The Literary Consultancy, as well as directly with authors who know of her work and approach her directly for a constructive edit. She has worked on many well-known and very successful contemporary novels. MICHAEL LEGAT After a highly successful career in publishing, mostly as Editorial Director firstly of Corgi Books and later of Cassell, Michael Legat became a full-time writer and tutor of Creative Writing. He has published five novels and eighteen non-fiction books, the latter including the Best Sellers An Author's Guide to Publishing and Writing for Pleasure and Profit. Website: http://www.bookends.clara.net/
MELISSA WEATHERILL Melissa Weatherill worked for literary superagent Ed Victor before becoming an editor at Simon & Schuster where she worked for five years on women's fiction, literary fiction, crime and thriller. She commissioned, edited and published authors such as Jules Hardy, Annabel Dilke and Kate O'Riordan, and worked closely with many others including Adriana Trigiani, Will Rhode, Victoria Glendinning, Jennifer Weiner and Kathy Lette. She is now an independent editor and reviewer for books and film, freelance editing fiction and non-fiction and assessing books and screenplays for film companies such as BBC films. PHIL WHITAKERPhil Whitaker's Eclipse of the Sun won the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize and a Betty Trask Award, and was shortlisted for the Whitbread First Novel Award. Triangulation won the Encore Award for best second novel. His third novel, The Face, is currently being developed for film. Phil is an occasional tutor in novel writing for the Arvon Foundation; previous appointments include external assessor for the creative writing MA at UEA and judge for 2003 Betty Trask Awards. He is co-founder of the manuscript appraisal service Literary Intelligence. His fourth novel, Freak of Nature, is published on 8th February 2007. Click here to read opening chapters. View Phil's website - www.philwhitaker.co.uk MARTYN BEDFORDMartyn Bedford has published five novels: the critically acclaimed Acts of Revision, which won the Yorkshire Post Best First Work Award; Exit, Orange and Red; The Houdini Girl, which is currently being developed for film; and Black Cat. Martyn is a former lecturer in creative writing at Manchester University and an occasional tutor in novel writing for the Arvon Foundation. Martyn has been a judge for the Betty Trask Awards, and is co-founder of the manuscript appraisal service Literary Intelligence. His fifth novel, The Island of Lost Souls, will be published in paperback by Bloomsbury in July 2007. JOANNA DEVEREUX Joanna Devereux is an authors’ agent for a medium-sized, long established London based literary agency that handles all types of general trade adult and children’s fiction and non-fiction books. She previously worked as an editor and publisher for a number of large trade publishers, specializing in children’s books.
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