| | | | First up, "What is the LitDen Anthology?" Well, one of our prominent members, RocketRabbit was struck by a rather fabulous Idea: What if we gathered togeather about 20 of our best writers, got them all to write short stories of 2000-5000 words in length, spent a good deal of time editing and fine tuning (with particular help from our members who are experienced in these areas, and other who are published themselves) and then publish it privately with a fairly small company called "Lulu". They can be found at www.lulu.com. The plan is, once finished, all members would do their best to promote the book and we'd try and sell as many copies as possible. Then, to top it off, the plan is to give the proceeds to charity. Like the sound of it? Get onto the forum and check out the board titled "LiteraryDen Anthology". Please note that just because you offer to help, or even submit work, doesn't guarantee your work will end up in the finished book. The hope is, that if successful this could become a yearly occurance! Lastly, thanks again to RocketRabbit for coming up with such a great idea!
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| | | | Here's a little more News on the Literary Den Anthology! On Deadlines:
The deadline for entrants was the 1st November. This has been provisionally extended to the 30th to cater for people who have only just been made aware of the anthology (we do have the average of one new member every few days) added to the fact we still only 10 people confirmed interest. Entrants will be decided by who has sent a first draft to Paul by the 30th November. From that point on, editors will work with authors to finalise all submissions. Although this process has already begun, we have not reached the deadline for entrants yet, so there is still plenty of time.
Covers/PR Posters
Covers will be designed by members of the group (as yet to be nominated I think but don't quote me) to reflect the overall feel and theme of the anthology. This can only be decided upon when a) all submissions are in, and b) the editors have conferenced to discuss the common themes they find. Posters will follow accordingly.
PR
Paul Carroll has been nominated for coordinating the Press Releases in two stages, a) when we launch the book (to gain awareness and interest and hopefully sales) and b) when we make our first donation to the LCT (after 6months or £800, whichever is the sooner). Posters can be distributed at these times in one mass media hit, again this can coordinated by Paul and whoever wishes to offer assistance. (Chris C-M you may want to have a hand in this, as we will be advertising under the LitDen name).
Final Editing/Proof Reading
The team of first editors stands at: myself, Sam Priestley, Chris Stewart and Claire Hack, who will all conference as and when necessary. The concept idea of the anthology was by Claire, and I've accepted the role as final editor before publication, so we shall do the final edit and decide the running order and contents layout between us (I imagine this to be done in a face-to-face meeting sometime mid January 2008 ish, Claire and I aren't far from each other, this should be easy to arrange). Chris C-M, as head of the LitDen, you can of course have a proof read before publication. This, however, will be for one main purpose: for you to decided whether this anthology will be endorsed by the LitDen, and therefor use LitDen's name and logo; or not, in which case the anthology will still go ahead, but without reference to the LitDen. I point out that not every writer potentially involved is a member of the forum, but most have come together by using bebo.com. On this point, I would advise that everyone involved does have a bebo.com account and page, so that when we press release to bebo we will be (sort of) telling the truth that the anthology involves writers who 'met by using bebo.com'... this gets us more (high level) publicity from bebo if they are interested. Chris, again, if there are minor alterations needed for you to endorse this, I'm sure Claire and I will be able to accommodate you, I hope there won't be much you won't approve of.
Copyright
Copyright remains with each individual author, and notes to this effect will be throughout the anthology. If we use the 'Publish by lulu.com' method, lulu retain first publishing rights. 'Published by You', means we retain first publishing rights each individually, same as copyright. For the purposes of marketing and selling the anthology, I would suggest that authors do not upload their contributions to bebo, as this pretty much defeats the object of the anthology, at least for a year from publication date. After that time, do what you like with your story!
And Finally
All matters are in hand. Chris S has outlined the rough plan for us, we shall stick to it as much as we can though it is only a guide. As final editor, I accept responsibility for keeping us on track... which is why I keep saying "One step at a time!" on various threads. Every part of the process will be considered at the appropriate time, and all members viewing the forum will be able to see this process and add comments and suggestions as we go along. The use of the forum will guide the process, this is OUR anthology afterall. I am only acting as a helmsman. You lot are the rest of the crew, and this is your ship. Sail it well, and we all come home feeling proud of ourselves as published authors.
The full plan can be found here.
Anthology Plan 
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