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This Week in Books

Book banning runs rampant (This week in books)

May 20, 2022 by Nathan Bransford 1 Comment

This week! Books! I saved up quite a few links while I was away on vacation, so let’s get to them! Book banning is spreading like wildfire as groups take advantage of new digital tools and strategies to try to enact a wave of challenges and lawsuits. Elizabeth A. Harris and Alexandra Alter surveyed the […]

Filed Under: This Week in Books Tagged With: #OwnVoices, AALA, Alexandra Alter, Barnes & Noble, Becca Puglisi, Brooke Warner, Censorship, Elizabeth A. Harris, Frederick Kaufman, Grace Lapointe, Jessica Contrera, JoAnn Yao, John Maher, Maia Kobabe, Sarah J. Maas, Victoria Strauss, We Need Diverse Books

The novel that predicted Putin’s war (This week in books)

April 8, 2022 by Nathan Bransford 2 Comments

This week! Books! People have been searching for answers for Putin’s senseless war in Ukraine, and at least one intriguing piece of the puzzle comes from Mikhail Yuriev’s 2006 utopian novel The Third Empire: Russia as It Ought to Be, which starts with an unannounced war in eastern Ukraine, and culminates in the entire world […]

Filed Under: This Week in Books Tagged With: Christian Smalls, Dan Blank, Derrick Palmer, Emily St. John Mandel, Erica Ackerberg, Fifty Shades of Grey, Katy Waldman, Libraries, Lincoln Michel, Lydia Kiesling, Ocean Vuong, Russia, Sands Hall, Tina Jordan, Unions, Wallace Stegner

Be wary of unsolicited literary agents in your inbox (This week in books)

April 1, 2022 by Nathan Bransford 1 Comment

This week! Books! Publishing scam watchdog Writer Beware has relaunched at writerbeware.blog. As it moves away from its accrispin.blogspot domain, it’s a time to honor the legacy of Writer Beware’s late co-founder Ann Crispin, a really lovely person who dedicated so much energy to helping authors. She was one of my early blog inspirations, and […]

Filed Under: This Week in Books Tagged With: Ann Crispin, Donald Trump, Janet Reid, Leslie Budewitz, Writer Beware

Censorship (the real kind) sweeps the country (This week in books)

March 25, 2022 by Nathan Bransford 24 Comments

This week! Books! While newspaper editorials continue to clutch their pearls about “cancel culture” (say it with me: SHAMING IS NOT CENSORSHIP), there is real honest-to-god censorship sweeping the country, particularly targeting antiracist and LBGTQ books, with plenty of others caught in the crossfire. Two articles this week profile people fighting back: Odette Yousef at […]

Filed Under: This Week in Books Tagged With: Censorship, David R. Godine, Japan, JoAnn Yao, Kristin Nelson, Lauren Hough, Melissa Febos, Tiffany Yates Martin, We Need Diverse Books

The Great Resignation hits publishing (This week in books)

March 18, 2022 by Nathan Bransford 5 Comments

This week! Books! The Great Resignation. Publishing style. Editors are creaking under chronically low pay, ever-expanding publisher expectations, publisher under-investment in support infrastructure like contracts departments… and oh yes, all of this is happening amid bonanza years for publishers’ bottom lines. This makes it accordingly more difficult for young agents to get their books read […]

Filed Under: This Week in Books Tagged With: Alexandra Horowitz, Censorship, coronavirus, Elisabeth Egan, Erin Somers, Kate McKean, Meredith Maran, Octopus, Olivia Fisher, Picture Books, publishing industry, Quarto, Rider Strong

Cormac McCarthy has two new novels (This week in books)

March 11, 2022 by Nathan Bransford 7 Comments

This week! Books! Cormac McCarthy has been quiet since The Road was published in 2006 (and no, he’s not on Twitter), but at 88 he has two new novels on the way this fall. Retention of employees from diverse backgrounds has long been a problem in the publishing industry, and We Need Diverse Books is […]

Filed Under: This Week in Books Tagged With: Adam Tooze, Anne R. Allen, Brenda Drake, Cormac McCarthy, David Corbett, Pitch Wars, We Need Diverse Books

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About Nathan

Hi, I’m Nathan. I’m the author of How to Write a Novel and the Jacob Wonderbar series, which was published by Penguin. I used to be a literary agent at Curtis Brown Ltd. and I’m dedicated to helping authors achieve their dreams. Let me help you with your book!

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How to Write A Novel
Cover of How to Publish a Book by Nathan Bransford
Jacob Wonderbar and the Cosmic Space Kapo
Jacob Wonderbar for President of the Universe
Jacob Wonderbar and the Interstellar Time Warp

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