Life's little mysteries and five UK literary agents open for submissions

Plus Hachette Pride Grow Your Story competition, CWA Dagger shortlist, Women's Prize winner, Telling Tales event

My dear wordsmiths,

There are some mysteries in life that cannot be solved. Why socks are solo travellers, why things that taste good are usually bad for you and why does the Kelly Osbourne follow me on X? And, of course, why getting a literary agent is rarer than rocking horse poo - unless of course you are a celebrity with five zillion follows on Tik Tok, stunning good looks and the Christmas stocking market of never-to-be-read books in your sights.

I do not have the answer to any of these but I hope to help on the latter - whether it be through the opportunity section at the bottom of this newsletter ior through sharing insights from working and published authors and journalists. At the very least I hope to brighten up your inbox with latest sightings here in the countryside and tales from the day job in journalism - and night job in radio.

If you like all this - please share and encourage sign ups. And if YOU are a writer of the best-selling, never-selling or aspiring variety - or a massive reader - get in touch and I will share your story. Just ..

This week I’m sharing five literary agents from the UK who are open to submissions. They are:

Louise Buckley, Sheppard Agency: Louise is specially keen to see submissions in Literary fiction, Book-club fiction by Irish writers, Cosy crime, Cosy fantasy, Gothic novels, Dark academia.

Michelle Kass, Michelle Kass Associates: Michelle is looking or Fiction, Mystery, Young Adult, Children's Book, Middle Grade. She is interested in debut authors.

David Headley, DHH Literary: One of the OG’s and prob gets more queries than I get mass mailed-out press releases in the day job. His genres are Fiction, Crime Fiction, Romance, Thriller, Cookbook, Memoir.

Molly Ker Hawn, The Bent Agency: Molly is looking for Fiction, Graphic Novel, Young Adult, Nonfiction, Children's Book and Middle Grade.

Kari Stuart, Curtis Brown: Kari is looking for Fiction, Mystery, Thriller, Nonfiction, Business Book, Cookbook, Memoir, Self-Help, Spirituality & Sports

News, events and opportunities:

Hachette Pride - Grow your story: Hachette UK’s Pride Network has launched the Grow Your Story initiative. Submissions are now open to the third cohort of aspiring authors for the free creative writing development scheme. Grow Your Story provides ten unagented fiction writers, who identify as LGBTQ+ and have not been traditionally published, with the opportunity to develop their novels, demystify the publishing process and provide them with the practical skills essential for all published authors. Applicants are requested to send a 3,000 word sample of their work. Submissions will close on Sunday 14 July.

Chorley Theatre, Lancashire - Telling Tales: A new live literary event will see Author Joanne Sefton chat to fellow novelist Carys Bray as well as introduce work from fellow local writers. who will each read an extract from their own work, and have the chance to join in a panel discussion, speaking with Carys and Joanne about their work and creative practice.

Women’s Prize Winner:

'“This beautifully written story follows Sashi, a sixteen-year-old aspiring doctor, growing up in Jaffna in the 1980s. Her close family is torn apart by the onset of civil war. Brotherless Night vividly and compassionately centres itself around erased and marginalised stories – Tamil women, students, teachers, ordinary civilians – exploring the moral nuances of violence and terrorism against a backdrop of oppression and exile

The winner of the 29th Women’s Prize for Fiction is Brotherless Night by V. V. Ganeshananthan. The judging panel for the 2024 Prize was chaired by author Monica Ali. She was joined by author Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀; author and illustrator Laura Dockrill; actor Indira Varma; and presenter and author Anna Whitehouse.

The CWA Dagger award shortlist: The 2024 shortlists for the Crime Writers’ Association (CWA) Dagger awards have been announced.Created in 1955, the world-famous CWA Daggers are the oldest awards in the genre. The shortlist for the Gold Dagger, which is awarded for the best crime novel of the year, includes the debut novel Black River from Nilanjana Roy, Mick Herron for The Secret Hours, and Dennis Lehane, with Small Mercies. Maz Evans also makes the list with her debut adult novel, Over My Dead Body, Una Mannion with Tell Me What I Am and Jesse Sutanto, with Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers. The rest of the shortlists are linked above.

Sorry if this is a little brief this week - as I type it’s three minutes before the 6pm deadline. Ok, it’s two mins now. Now I’m late.. Thanks for reading and happy writing! N