Okay, I would appreciate the truth here because it could ultimately save me a lot of pain and heartache.
I read in a magazine the other day that publishers are only interested in new writers that are "marketable" i.e. young, nubile, attractive, thin etc etc. If that is the case, then I may as well give up now or at least wait until I've dropped a few (lots) pounds and have a bit of work done.
4 comments:
I've wondered about that too, to the point where I've considered lying about my age - especially as the market my writing would appeal to is probably younger. Awful isn't it, and I hope it's not actually true that that's what publishers are looking for :oO
Oh I hope its not true because I enjoy food hate excercise and couldn't go under the scalpel for anything that wasn't life threatening.
I hate this sort of stuff, Colette - and I've seen it from both sides. First, to reassure you - I had 5 books published as 'myself' - in my fifties and definitely not nubile! Then my publisher had the idea of reinventing me as Olivia - younger name, younger image, to supposedly appeal to a younger readership as well as marketing the new series of books afresh. So I do think there is an element of this ageism thing in publishing. But on the other hand I don't believe it's true that editors will only commission books by the young and nubile! I might be naive here but I'd like to think they still accept a book because it's what they want: but the 'young and nubile' are then easier to market. That's just a sad fact of life - that's what I hate!
Sad but true. I guess it's the same in all walks of life. I guess if the book is good enough they will get around my drawbacks. Its amazing what you can do with an airbrush.
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