Every Story Matters: Stony Brook’s MFA in Creative Writing Program
news.stonybrook.edu – Tuesday October 28, 2025
In a recent interview on WLIW-FM’s Heart of the East End with host Gianna Volpe, Robert Reeves, associate professor of creative writing and founder of Stony Brook University’s Lichtenstein Center, and Christian McLean, lecturer and MFA associate director of creative writing, sat down to discuss the unique strengths of the MFA Program in Creative Writing and Literature.
At the heart of their conversation was a simple but powerful idea: everyone has a story to tell.
Reeves and McLean emphasized that the program is designed to attract adults from a wide range of professional backgrounds who are ready to transform lived experience into art. “One [of our students] is a doctor who’s mid-career… and she has so many stories she wants to tell. We have someone who’s a senior real estate agent… [who] wants to write other things, personal essays, fiction, creative nonfiction,” Reeves said. “They want to come to a community that will give them the best opportunity to accomplish what they want to.”
Affordability and flexibility are the key to that mission. As a state university, Stony Brook offers competitive tuition rates and the option for part-time or non-matriculated study, making the MFA accessible to working professionals and life-long learners alike. “We are many, many, many thousand [dollars] less than equivalent MFA programs of the same quality,” Reeves noted. “They can take one class and see if it makes sense for them and go from there,” McLean added.
Record number of applications for 2025 round of Screen Ireland’s new writing scheme, Spotlight
screenireland.ie – Tuesday October 28, 2025
Screen Ireland is pleased to announce that its flagship new writing development scheme Spotlight, has received a record-breaking number of applications. This year’s initiative is themed around Irish Myths & Legends, and the 2025 round invited screenwriters to submit TV series concepts inspired by Ireland’s rich mythology and cultural heritage. With over 350 submissions, this marks the highest number of applications ever received for a single round of Spotlight.
Up to ten projects will be selected for the scheme – with writers receiving further development for their project and skills development support in the form of workshops, masterclasses, and industry networking opportunities. As a result, the scheme continues to be highly competitive, and Screen Ireland would like to confirm that the assessment process is currently underway. Results will be announced within the next 12 weeks.
Any further updates on Spotlight will be published on the Screen Ireland website.
DKW rebrands as Bryony Woods Literary Agency
thebookseller.com – Friday October 24, 2025
Diamond Kahn & Woods has rebranded to Bryony Woods Literary Agency (BWLA) following Bryony Woods taking over as sole owner and director of the company.
The agency will continue to work from its central London office at Salisbury House in Moorgate.
Bryony Woods represents authors including Catriona Silvey, Sarah Maria Griffin, Sylvia Bishop, Daisy May Johnson, Katharine Orton, Ellen Osborne, Rosie Fletcher, Jen Cownie and Caroline O’Donoghue.
After starting her career in libraries and bookshops, Woods began her career as an agent at the Caroline Sheldon Literary Agency in 2010, before co-founding DKW in 2012. She was named a Bookseller Rising Star, together with Ella Kahn, in 2013, and in 2016 was a winner of the London Book Fair Trailblazer Awards and the Young Stationers Prize.
Camille Burns launches Solas Literary Agency
thebookseller.com – Friday October 24, 2025
Camille Burns, most recently an agent at Diamond Kahn & Woods Literary Agency – which recently rebranded as the Bryony Woods Literary Agency – has launched Solas Literary Agency, a new independent agency representing fiction and non-fiction for adults, young adults and children.
Solas will focus on a selective list of authors across genres, with an emphasis on "strong storytelling, distinctive voice and long-term career development".
The name Solas, meaning “light” or “comfort” in Gaelic, aims to reflect the agency’s ethos of clarity, care and creative partnership.
Solas will operate in association with Apple Tree Literary, which will provide back-office and administrative support. Foreign rights for adult titles will be handled by Emily Randle at Randle Editorial & Literary Consultancy. The agency will also run a monthly editorial consultation programme designed to offer transparent, accessible feedback to emerging writers. Burns’ clients include Rebecca Orwin, Sarah Beth Durst and CBBC presenter Joe Tasker.
Hitchin teacher launches publishing company for children's fiction: Toller Press Ltd
hitchin.nub.news – Monday October 20, 2025
Alissa McDonald, who grew up in Hitchin, and moved back here with her family 12 years ago, has launched an independent publishing company of children's fiction: Toller Press Ltd.
Alissa's 20-year career as a literacy specialist – as a teacher, researcher and consultant – means she knows books and a good story when she finds one! Passionate about sparking a love of reading in all children, Toller Press was founded. (Follow Toller Press on Facebook and Instagram @tollerpress.)
What's special about Toller Press?
There are many incredible stories for children that have been published: Vashti Hardy, Piers Torday, and Darren Simpson to name but a few of the amazing authors writing today. But there are also many incredible stories waiting to be published and ignite that desire to read. We all love different books of course and that's part of the magic – finding the book that's right for you.
I want to create a platform for those undiscovered stories and authors who will get children excited about reading. Books which have stories at their heart, books which have diverse characters, and books which are reviewed by children.
Underlings: The Spark Engine by Murray Fisher is the first book to be published by Toller Press.
Certified organic and AI-free: New stamp for human-written books launches
theguardian.com – Thursday October 16, 2025
As machine-made books flood online marketplaces, a new UK initiative is introducing an Organic Literature stamp to help readers identify books created by real authors
A new UK start-up is taking aim at the growing wave of AI-generated books, launching an initiative to verify and label human-written works.
Books By People has launched an “Organic Literature” certification, partnering with an initial group of independent publishing houses.
The scheme will involve Organic Literature stamps being placed on books written by humans, with only limited AI use permitted for tasks such as formatting or idea generation.
The start-up, founded by rare books specialist Esme Dennys along with Conrad Young and Gavin Johnston, said it plans to expand globally in 2026.
The first certified title will be Telenovela by Gonzalo C Garcia, publishing this November by Galley Beggar Press, one of the founding publishing partners. Other partners include Bluemoose Books, Snowbooks, Scorpius Books and Bedford Square Publishers.
The World’s Largest Publishers, 2025
publishersweekly.com – Thursday October 16, 2025
After a seven-year run, the RELX Group has given up its title as the world’s largest book publisher, displaced by Thomson Reuters. The Canadian-based legal and professional publisher had a solid 2024, with revenue rising 6%, to $6.43 billion. After a flat 2023, sales at RELX slipped slightly in 2024, falling about 1%, to $6.2 billion for the STM and legal publisher.
This year’s top 10 publisher list also includes a new addition, as McGraw Hill returns. The educational and professional publisher had been excluded for a number of years when its private equity owners refused to provide any financial data. But in July, MH returned to the public markets and according to its prospectus, the company had total sales in the fiscal year ended March 31, 2025 of $2.10 billion, up 7% from fiscal 2024. The performance was good enough to put the publisher in seventh place on the ranking.
The inaugural Romance Writing Festival in Bournemouth
greatbritishlife.co.uk – Wednesday October 15, 2025
Dominic Wong, director of the Bournemouth Writing Festival, reveals the authors launching their books at the inaugural Romance Writing Festival in Bournemouth this month
Romance Writing Festival
Sunday Times bestselling authors Milly Johnson and Paige Toon will headline the inaugural Romance Writing Festival, taking place in Bournemouth on October 18. They join fellow Sunday Times bestseller Katie Fforde on an impressive programme featuring award-winning authors, editors, literary agents, and publishers.
This one-day event is dedicated to romance writing, offering a mix of panel discussions, workshops, and networking opportunities. Attendees can also book one-to-one sessions with agents and editors or take part in free activities designed to inspire writers at all stages of their journey.
New Romance Novels Are Transforming the Publishing Industry
goethe.de – Wednesday October 8, 2025
The New Adult genre is not only filling bookstores and topping bestseller lists – it’s transforming the publishing industry. Long dismissed as “light reading”, these novels are shaking up publishers and book fairs – and forcing literary critics to reevaluate popular fiction.
The shifting dynamics of Germany’s publishing industry are on full display at Frankfurter Buchmesse. As soon as the doors of the world’s largest book fair open, crowds flock to Lyx’s glittering, pastel-hued booth. The New Adult imprint of publishing house Bastei Lübbe has become home to the country’s most successful authors in this flourishing genre, including Mona Kasten, Laura Kneidl and Anabelle Stehl.
Enemies to Lovers
Last year, the “safe space for everyone who loves reading” even set an international record when the TV adaptation of Mona Kasten’s Maxton Hall became the most-streamed non-American series Amazon has ever produced. Set not in Germany but at an elite British boarding school, this coming-of-age story embodies the “dark academia” aesthetic popularised on social media. Here, ambitious, kind-hearted Ruby Bell, who comes from a humble background, meets privileged heir James Beaufort. Their initial rivalry soon blossoms into a passionate romance. It’s a familiar storytelling pattern – or trope: enemies to lovers, foes who gradually fall for each other.
Baker & Taylor Prepares Plan to Shut Down
publishersweekly.com – Wednesday October 8, 2025
At a town hall meeting yesterday, Baker & Taylor owner and CEO Aman Kochar said that while he had hoped to find another way forward for the company after its acquisition deal with ReaderLink was called off, he now does not see a sustainable path to keep the library wholesaler in business.
As a result, B&T let go about 520 employees yesterday and plans to wind down the business by January. Employees who were laid off had their severance plans canceled as well. B&T had undergone some layoffs earlier this year, but recently had as many as 1,500 full-time and part-time employees.
A story in the Shaw Local, a business journal for Northern Illinois, said that of the 318 employees in the B&T distribution center in Momence, IL., 253 were let go on October 6. Sixty-two employees will remain until December 22 and a “post–wind down” group of three employees will be let go on Jan. 3.
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