Four literary agents at Kimberley Cameron & Associates are looking for you and your manuscript

Kimberley Cameron & Associates

1550 Tiburon Blvd.

#704

Tiburon, CA 94920

http://www.kimberleycameron.com/

Update August 4, 2013:

Dear Brian,

Wanted to send a quick note to let you know that our submission email has changed. We are no longer using info@kimberleycameron.com and plan to retire it soon. Instead we request that authors email each agent at their personal KC&A email. Can you update your blog post?
Thank you so much!
Cordially,
Kimberley Cameron
President,
Kimberley Cameron & Associates

Kimberley Cameron is the agency’s president. She is looking for outstanding writing in any field, particularly writing that touches the heart and makes us feel something. She’s been successful with many different genres and loves the thrill of securing a publishing contract for debut authors. She represents botch fiction and nonfiction, but no romance, children’s books or screenplays.

Query Kimberley at kimberley@kimberleycameron.com 

Include a one-page synopsis and the first 50 pages in word attachments. For nonfiction, please submit a well-crafted proposal and the first three chapters of your work.

Elizabeth Kracht joined the agency in the fall of 2010. In fiction, she represents literary, commercial, women’s thrillers, mysteries and YA with crossover appeal. She is intrigued by untrustworthy narrators, tragic tales of class and circumstances, and identifies with flawed and query yet sterling characters.

In nonfiction, she particularly loves voice-driven or adventure-driven memoir, and other nonfiction projects that contribute to the well-being of the self or other {whatever that means}, in addition to niche projects that fill holes in the market, offer a fresh approach or make her laugh. She also has a soft spot for heroic nonfiction pet stories.

Query Elizabeth at liz@kimberleycameron.com 

Include a one-page synopsis and the first 50 pages in word attachments. For nonfiction, please submit a well-crafted proposal and the first three chapters of your work.

Pooja Menon joined the agency in the fall of 2011 as in intern. She blogs at http://eatlovewritelive.wordpress.com/

Pooja is actively seeking to build her client list. She’s looking for compelling writing with an easy flow, a timely pacing, a unique perspective, and strong voices. She enjoys literary, commercial, historical, and upmarket women’s fiction; but is particularly drawn to stories with an international flavor, vibrant characters, multicultural themes, and lush settings. 

She has a soft spot for fantasy novels that are original and layered, with worlds as real and alive as the ones created by Philip Pullman and J.K. Rowling. In YA, she’s eagerly looking for submissions across all genres (contemporary, adventure, realist, paranormal romance, gothic, horror, historical, steampunk, dystopian, magical realism, urban fantasy, and new age).

Pooja is also acquiring nonfiction adventure and travel memoirs, journalism and human interest stories, and self-help books addressing relationships and the human psychology from a fresh perspective. It is imperative for nonfiction writers to have a strong platform. If you do not have one, please build on that before sending your query letter.

Query Pooja at pooja@kimberleycameron.com

Include a one-page synopsis and the first 50 pages in word attachments. For nonfiction, please submit a well-crafted proposal and the first three chapters of your work.

Ethan Vaughan joined Kimberley Cameron & Associates as an intern in the fall or 2011 after completing a summer internship with Folio Literary Management. Ethan is looking for fantasy and science fiction manuscripts with believable characters and unique premises.

Ethan is also looking for literary fiction, horror, historical fiction, accessible historical nonfiction (Cleopatra: A Life, for example), well done political literature and women’s fiction.

Query Ethan at Ethan@kimberleycameron.com

Include a one-page synopsis and the first 50 pages in word attachments. For nonfiction, please submit a well-crafted proposal and the first three chapters of your work.

Brian Henry will be leading a "Writing for Children and for Young Adults" workshop in Hamilton on February 9 (details here). Also, he'll be leading "How to Get Published" workshops on March 16 in Kingston (details here) and on March 17 in Peterborough (details here). To register, email: brianhenry@sympatico.ca  

But probably the best single step you can take toward getting manuscript ready for publication is to join one of the “Next Step” or “Intensive” creative writing courses. Starting in January, Brian will be leading “Next Step” courses in Mississauga (details here) and in Georgetown (details here). He’ll be leading   “Intensive” courses in Burlington (details here) and in Mississauga (details here).

See Brian's full schedule here, including writing workshops and creative writing courses in Kingston, Peterborough, Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton, Georgetown, Milton, Oakville, Burlington, St. Catharines, Hamilton, Dundas, Kitchener, Guelph, London, Woodstock, Orangeville, Newmarket, Barrie, Gravenhurst, Sudbury, Muskoka, Peel, Halton, the GTA, Ontario and beyond.

Writing Your Life & Other True Stories workshop, Saturday, January 26, Toronto

The East End Writers’ Group, presents…

Writing your life & other true stories
Saturday, January 26, 2013
10:00 a.m. – 3:30 p.m.
World’s Biggest Bookstore, 20 Edward St, Toronto (A block north of Dundas, just west off Yonge St. Map here.)

Have you ever considered writing your memoirs or family history? This workshop will introduce you to the tricks and conventions of telling true stories and will show you how to use the techniques of the novel to recount actual events. Whether you want to write for your family or for a wider public, don't miss this workshop.

Workshop leader Brian Henry has been a book editor and creative writing instructor for more than 25 years. He teaches at Ryerson University and has led workshops everywhere from Boston to Buffalo and from Sarnia to Moncton. But his proudest boast is that he has helped many of his students get published.

Fee: $49.72 + 13% hst = $44 paid in advance by mail or Interac
or $4248 + 13% hst = $48 if you wait to pay at the door.

To reserve your spot, email brianhenry@sympatico.ca

See Brian's full schedule here, including writing workshops and creative writing courses in Kingston, Peterborough, Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton, Georgetown, Milton, Oakville, Burlington, St. Catharines, Hamilton, Dundas, Kitchener, Guelph, London, Woodstock, Orangeville, Newmarket, Barrie, Gravenhurst, Sudbury, Muskoka, Peel, Halton, the GTA, Ontario and beyond.

The Governor General’s Awards, The Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize, The Hilary Weston nonfiction prize, and the Samuel Johnson nonfiction prize – Who won what

A number of prominent awards, were handed out recently, including the Governor General Literary Awards:

Linda Spalding took the Governor General's fiction award for The Purchase (McClelland & Stewart)

Ross King won the nonfiction award for Leonardo and the Last Supper (Bond Street Books)

And Susin Nielsen won the children's text award for The Reluctant Journal of Henry K. Larson (Tundra Books)

(See all the GG winners and finalists here.)

Tamas Dobozy, one of the GG Award nominees, won the Writers' Trust Fiction Prize for his novel Siege 13 (Thomas Allen Publishers). Read more here.

Candace Savage won the Hilary Weston Prize for Nonfiction for A Geography in Blood: Unearthing Memory from a Prairie Landscape (Greystone Books) Read more here.

Note: See submission guidelines for Greystone Books here, and for Tundra Books here.

And Canadian author Wade Davis won Britain’s Samuel Johnson Prize in Nonfiction for Into the Silence:  The Great War, Mallory, and the Conquest of Everest (Alfred A. Knopf). Read more here.

I’d be happy to post a review of any of these – or of any good book you’ve read recently. Send your review to: brianhenry@sympatico.ca 

See Brian Henry's schedule here, including writing workshops and creative writing courses in Kingston, Peterborough, Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton, Georgetown, Milton, Oakville, Burlington, St. Catharines, Hamilton, Dundas, Kitchener, Guelph, London, Woodstock, Orangeville, Newmarket, Barrie, Gravenhurst, Sudbury, Muskoka, Peel, Halton, the GTA, Ontario and beyond.

A Private Man by Chris Laing, reviewed by Liz Mackay Wickham

Published by Seraphim Editions. Available for $14.40 from Amazon here.

Everybody loves a scrappy hero, and heroes don’t come much scrappier than Max Dexter, Canadian Army veteran with a blown-out knee and a “don’t mess with me” attitude. A Private Man opens in 1947. Max is back in Hamilton, Ontario, determined to make a go of his newly acquired one-man detective agency. 

Job #1, however, is to hire an assistant, which begins with a couple of false starts: Miss Higgins, with her grey hair “so closely cropped it conformed to her head like a pewter helmet,” and sweet-16 Linda Jaworski who pronounces high school an “utter waste of time”. Then Max gets luck when red-haired, green-eyed Isabel O’Brien strides into his life. Her class, sophistication, and accountant’s organized mind perfectly balance his street smarts and rough edges. He hires her on the spot, and the fun begins.

It’s a match made in heaven – or Hamilton. Max and Isabel (aka “Iz”) are an impressive team, she with her disarming good looks, charm, and determination to learn the business, he with his get-down-to-brass-tacks manner. Together they suss out the motives of a mysterious client, the truth behind accusations of embezzlement, a motive for a murder or two, and even a scheme for capitalizing on works of art looted by Nazis. It may seem like a lot to pack into a 290-page book, but it’s post-WWII Southern Ontario, after all, and the story clicks along smoothly and convincingly.

A big part of the reason for the book’s authentic feel is that its author, Chris Laing, is a native of Hamilton and grew up more or less in the era about which he writes. The locale rings true, as do its subplots. For example, there really was a femme fatale named Evelyn Dick who was tried for murdering her husband and about whom Hamiltonians famously joked, “How could you, Missus Dick?”  Laing weaves her real story into his fictional one almost seamlessly.

I say “almost seamlessly” because his first full-length novel is not without flaws. Laing readily admits that the most challenging part of a story, especially a detective story, is the ending. A Private Man rushes headlong to a close with a whirlwind of activity that includes an explosion, a trip to Niagara Falls, capture, an amazing rescue and escape, a car chase, and (spoiler alert!) a happy ending. And there are a few minor flaws overlooked by an otherwise conscientious editor – for example, a legless veteran named Bob whose sister Aggie is referred to at one point as his wife.

But this is small stuff in a book filled with such three-dimensional people that to read them is to feel like you know them. Laing’s character development is rich and vivid, and his dialogue rings true. It’s easy to imagine Max, his knee wrecked by shrapnel, limping determinedly to his next meeting; equally easy to gauge by Isabel’s words her integrity and single-mindedness. Ultimately, Laing has created characters with whom a reader connects. I found myself wanting to know more about legless Bob, Max’s irascible journalist uncle Scotty, his police friend Frank, and of course the main characters themselves.

A Private Man is a complete and self-contained book with a satisfying ending. But it will be a rare reader who closes the book at the end and doesn’t wonder what will happen next in the lives of Max Dexter and Isabel O’Brien.

Liz Mackay Wickham writes humorous essays, restaurant reviews and a home repair column in the San Francisco Bay Area where she lives with her husband, three dogs, and assorted tools and kitchen utensils.

Quick Brown Fox welcomes book reviews and other book related pieces. I also welcome reviews of plays, movies, restaurants and anything else that catches your fancy. Reviews may be straight up or tongue in cheek. You might review restaurants you can’t afford, basing your review on what you can see peering through the window. Or you might review the patrons of some event, rather than the event itself. Please keep reviews short and as free of clumsy prose and grammatical mistakes as possible. Email them to me at: brianhenry@sympatico.ca

See my schedule here, including writing workshops and creative writing courses in Kingston, Peterborough, Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton, Georgetown, Milton, Oakville, Burlington, St. Catharines, Hamilton, Dundas, Kitchener, Guelph, London, Woodstock, Orangeville, Newmarket, Barrie, Gravenhurst, Sudbury, Muskoka, Peel, Halton, the GTA, Ontario and beyond.

Douglas & McIntyre files for bankruptcy

A Geography of Blood by Candace Savage,

published by D&M's Greystone Books, 

recently won the Hilary Weston Prize for Nonfiction

One of Canada’s largest remaining independent publishers has filed for bankruptcy protection.

Vancouver’s D&M Publishers, which includes Douglas & McIntyre and Greystone Books, has filed a “Notice of Intention to make a proposal under the provisions of the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act” ... more

See Brian Henry's schedule here, including writing workshops and creative writing courses in Kingston, Peterborough, Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton, Georgetown, Milton, Oakville, Burlington, St. Catharines, Hamilton, Dundas, Kitchener, Guelph, London, Woodstock, Orangeville, Newmarket, Barrie, Gravenhurst, Sudbury, Muskoka, Peel, Halton, the GTA, Ontario and beyond.

Contests: House of Gryhm seeks short horror; Mona Schreiber Prize for humour accepting entries

The House Of Gryhm, a new imprint of Grey Border Books of Niagara Falls, Canada, is accepting entries for their horror chapbook contest. Prize: $50 and 25 copies. Length: 2000 words max. Entry fee: $5. No deadline provided.

Visit The House of Gryhm here.

Visit Grey Border Books here.

Entries are invited for the Mona Schreiber Prize for Humorous Fiction and Nonfiction (US). First prize: $500 US. Length: 750 words. Submit humour writing in any form: essays, articles, short stories, poetry, shopping lists, etc. Fee: $5 US per entry. Deadline: December 1, 2012.

Full contest rules and examples of previous winners here.

See Brian Henry's schedule here, including writing workshops and creative writing courses in Kingston, Peterborough, Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton, Georgetown, Milton, Oakville, Burlington, St. Catharines, Hamilton, Dundas, Kitchener, Guelph, London, Woodstock, Orangeville, Newmarket, Barrie, Gravenhurst, Sudbury, Muskoka, Peel, Halton, the GTA, Ontario and beyond.

H.E. Francis Short Story Competition

Sponsored by: The Ruth Hindman Foundation and the University of Alabama in Huntsville English Department

Judged by: A panel of nationally recognized, award-winning authors, directors of creative writing programs, and editors of literary journals.

Award: $1,000 / $2,000 prize (the university site says $1,000; the H.E. Francis site, $2,000)

Limitations: Manuscripts must be unpublished and may not exceed 5,000 words in length. Multiple submissions are acceptable so long as we are notified immediately in the event that a manuscript is selected by another competition or publication.

Deadline: December 31, 2012 (postmark)

Entry Fee: Check or money order for $15 for each submission, made out to the Ruth Hindman Foundation.

Format: All manuscripts must be free of any means of author identification. A cover sheet must accompany each submission. This cover sheet must indicate the title of the story, the author's name and address, and the approximate word count.

Submission of entries: Mail submissions to Department of English, Morton Hall 222, H.E. Francis Contest, University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, AL 35899.

A submission is complete when it includes all of the following:

Entry fee

Cover sheet

Three copies of the manuscript

If desired, SASE for announcement of winner

Announcement of Winner: March 2013

Read more about the competition, including the complete rules and a portal for electronic entries and payment here.

See Brian Henry's schedule here, including writing workshops and creative writing courses in Kingston, Peterborough, Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton, Georgetown, Milton, Oakville, Burlington, St. Catharines, Hamilton, Dundas, Kitchener, Guelph, London, Woodstock, Orangeville, Newmarket, Barrie, Gravenhurst, Sudbury, Muskoka, Peel, Halton, the GTA, Ontario and beyond.

Lest we forget...

Flanders fields

In Flanders Fields

by Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place: and in the sky
The larks still bravely singing fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the dead: Short days ago,
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved: and now we lie
In Flanders fields!

Take up our quarrel with the foe
To you, from failing hands, we throw
The torch: be yours to hold it high
If ye break faith with us who die,
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields

Remembrance Day Assembly by Mary Steer

So today, Yasmin's school had their Remembrance Day assembly, and families were invited to attend if they wanted to. I just got back from it and wanted to share with you a little about it, because many things struck me as extraordinary about it.

The children were so quiet and well-behaved all the way through. We had heard the children, even the toddlers, at Yasmin's old school, were also very quiet and respectful for the minute of silence last year. I think somehow children just "get it".

When it came time to sing "O Canada", it was very moving: all the children in the English stream sang in English, all the children in the French Immersion programme sang in French, and the two languages melded so beautifully. And in the last couple of rows at the back, near where we parents were sitting, the older children were also signing the words.

I wish I could remember the name and rank of the army gentleman who attended. He stood at the front as representatives came up to him, class by class, to present him with the hand-made wreathes of poppies, and as each child or pair of children approached, he saluted them, then took the wreath. Some wreathes were clearly made of children's hand prints cut out of red construction paper; one wreath was white; another was pink; most were circles but two or three were squares. All were beautiful.

One class stood and read "In Flanders Fields" (although I did notice one little boy had clearly memorized it - also very touching). Another class stood and read a poem called "A Little Poppy".

I believe it was the music teacher who played for us a song by James Kelly, called "A Pittance of Time". He explained that Terry Kelly was in a Shoppers Drug Mart at 11 am on November 11th, and the store made an announcement over the PA system that there would be two minutes of silence for Remembrance Day. One man refused to respect this and tried to get the cashier to ring him through anyway. Snaps to James Kelly for writing a song about it, and such a moving song too: 

The principal made an address and then asked us all to stand for two minutes of silence. There was a recording of the Last Post, and then silence. Everybody, even the nearby toddler who had come with her mother, was silent. Then Reveille and the end.

The song by James Kelly reminded me of the time I was working in the box office at the Grand Theatre in Kingston on Remembrance Day. I noticed it was 11 am, and I said to the next person at my window, "It's eleven o'clock, I'm just going to stop for two minutes for Remembrance Day."

"Oh, okay," she said. And she picked up a brochure from the rack outside the window and began flipping through it.

When the two minutes was up, I completed her order and off she went - and the next person in line stepped up and said, "I'm so glad you did that. I hadn't noticed the time. Thank you."

May we all notice the time, at 11 am on Sunday, and pay our respect and show our gratitude with two minutes of silence.

Mary Steer lives and writes in the GTA. Born and raised in Kingston, she had her first piece published in The Whig-Standard when she was 19. She has been addicted to writing ever since, and is currently working on a memoir of time spent in her other favourite occupation, working as an artists' model.

See Brian Henry's schedule here, including writing workshops and creative writing courses in Kingston, Peterborough, Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton, Georgetown, Milton, Oakville, Burlington, St. Catharines, Hamilton, Dundas, Kitchener, Guelph, London, Woodstock, Orangeville, Newmarket, Barrie, Gravenhurst, Sudbury, Muskoka, Peel, Halton, the GTA, Ontario and beyond.

Intensive Creative Writing course, Wednesday afternoons in Burlington – Winter session starts Jan 23; spring March 27

“Intensive Creative Writing”

~ An adventure in creative growth ~

Wednesday afternoons, 12:30 to 2:45
at Appleby United Church, 4407 Spruce Ave, Burlington, Ontario

Winter session:
8 weeks, Jan 23 to March 13, 2013
First set of readings emailed Jan 16

Fee: $132.74 plus 13% hst = $150 Payment in advance by mail or Interac.

Spring session:

12 weeks, March 27 to June 12, 2013
First set of readings emailed March 20
Fee: $181.42 plus 13% hst = $205 Payment in advance by mail or Interac.

This course is for people who are working on their own writing. Over the eight classes, you’ll be asked to bring in four pieces of your writing for detailed feedback. All your pieces may be from the same work, such as a novel in progress, or they may be stand alone pieces. You bring whatever you want to work on.

Besides critiquing pieces, the instructor will give short lectures at the start of each class, addressing the needs of the group.

In addition to learning how to critique your own work and receiving constructive suggestions about your writing, you’ll discover that the greatest benefits come from seeing how your classmates approach and critique a piece of writing and how they write and re-write. This is a challenging course, but extremely rewarding.

Instructor Brian Henry has been a book editor and creative writing teacher for more than 25 years. He teaches at Ryerson University and has led writing workshops everywhere from Boston to Buffalo and from Sarnia to Charlottetown. But his proudest boast is that he's helped many of his students get published.

Advance registration only. These courses usually fill up, so enroll early to avoid disappointment.

To reserve a spot now, email: brianhenry@sympatico.ca

Note: A similar course, The Next Step in Creative Writing, is offered on Thursdays, Jan 24 to March 14, during the afternoon in Mississauga (see here) and and in evenings in Georgetown (see here).

See Brian Henry's full schedule here, including writing workshops and creative writing courses in Kingston, Peterborough, Toronto, Mississauga, Brampton, Georgetown, Milton, Oakville, Burlington, St. Catharines, Hamilton, Dundas, Kitchener, Guelph, London, Woodstock, Orangeville, Newmarket, Barrie, Gravenhurst, Sudbury, Muskoka, Peel, Halton, the GTA, Ontario and beyond.