I am a founder member of The Beach Hut Writing Academy and, as regular readers may remember, we are holding our first conference on Saturday March 12. Write by the Beach is designed to help you get the inspiration and insider knowledge to achieve your writing ambitions and the full programme has just been unveiled.
I’m running a session on the short story and as an organiser I will be there all day – it would be great to meet up. There’s going to be a lot of networking opportunities and I would be happy to help you make the most of them.

We think it’s the best value conference around – read on to see if you agree. And don’t forget the early bird offer, saving you 20%, ends next Sunday on January 24.

• Full day conference, from 9.30-6pm

• 15+ high-profile authors, scriptwriters, editors and agents share their expertise 

• One-to-ones with story mentors – and win the chance to pitch to an agent at the conference (places limited)

• Refreshments and networking buffet lunch

We will be in Angel House, a beautiful, inspiring setting right by the Brighton/Hove seafront, less than 1 hour from London

Early bird rate ends on January 24th. Click HERE to book
Scroll down to find out what’s on offer – the full programme details are on our website  HERE

MORNING – Inspiration

Why is a question mark shaped like a hook?

Learn how to write a page turner with Simon Toyne, the international bestselling author of the Sanctus trilogy and the Solomon Creed series.

Choice of Two Sessions:Character or Short Story

Option A: How to create unforgettable characters for page and screen
With novelists Lizzie Enfield & Araminta Hall, and TV & Radio writer Sue Teddern

Option B: Award-winning short stories: the art and craft of making your stories stand out
With writers Bridget Whelan and Erinna Mettler

 Making a living from your writing 
With bestselling authors Jo and Emlyn Rees. Jo writes glamorous novels featuring heroines living dramatic lives.  Emlyn Rees is a fiction and non-fiction author, editor, and director of the Dark and Stormy Crime Festival. They both co-write fiction and non-fiction together including the parody, The Very Hungover Caterpillar

AFTERNOON  – Publication

Working with an agent, from first idea to big book deal
With London literary agent Simon Trewin, partner and Head of the London Literary Department at WME UK and his client Brighton’s queen of domestic noir Julia Crouch. They discuss how they work together as partners in crime…

Perfect Pitch: how to make your pitch irresistible to agents, publishers and readers

With three leading literary agents from London and New York: David Headley, on The Bookseller magazine’s Top 100 list, he is a literary agent and owner of Goldsboro Books; Simon Trewin (see previous session), Sharon Bowers, New York  literary agent with a particular interest in lifestyle and food books

Host is Kate Harrison, author of 16 fiction and non-fiction books

Choose a Session: Literary Consultants or Crime Writing
Option A: Crafting your book with help from the experts: what literary consultants want authors to know

With Dionne McCulloch and Alex Hammond of Cornerstones literary agency and Brighton author/editor Laura Wilkinson

Option B: Finding Your Crime Voice: how to nurture your style to stand out in one of fiction’s hottest genres
With bestselling author William Shaw, author of the critically acclaimed Breen and Tozer trilogy of detective novels, set in 1968-9. His third Breen and Tozer novel, A Book of Scars, was picked as one of the top crime books of 2015 by the Sunday Times; the New York Times praised it as “an elegy for an entire neglected generation.”

Getting into print: the best ways to become a bestseller in 2016
With self-published and ‘hybrid’ author, Catherine Quinn, a historical novelist, published in over 15 countries, an editor from leading Brighton independent publisher Myriad Editions and a representative of WGGB, the writers’ union

 Host is Sarah Rayner, international bestselling author of five novels and four self-published non fiction books