Manuscript Monday joins the Friday Pitch

typewriter keys

Worth checking out if you’ve got a manuscript in your pocket: Pan Macmillan has opened its doors to submissions with Manuscript Monday, an initiative very similar to Allen and Unwin’s long-running Friday Pitch.

Both invite writers across a variety of genres within fiction and non-fiction to submit a synopsis and first chapter, and both promise quick replies, so if you haven’t heard within a month (Pan Mac) or a fortnight (A&U), you know you can hunt elsewhere.

Madigan Mine: launched!

kirstyn mcdermott at the launch of her novel madigan mine

Madigan Mine has been officially launched! A most excellent crowd attended at Melbourne’s Carlton Library (three cheers for the brilliant staff) to see a metaphoric bottle of bubbles broken over the bow of Kirstyn McDermott’s debut novel. Lucy Sussex (who has her own launch coming up) did the honours, fitting the Melbourne-set thriller into the wider context of Australian Gothic and saying some very nice things about Kirstyn’s prose.

It was grand to see such support for a local writer, with publisher Pan Macmillan sending representatives, including the artist who designed the superb cover.

Kirstyn provides the author’s perspective of the event, and there are more pictures here.

Lucy Sussex launches Madigan Mine