What bloggers writing about the publishing world or writing careers could we submit this site to for links?

Question

Since we are currently working on coming up with ways to promote the site, let's start a list of bloggers whom we might be interested in asking to reference the site or come try it out. I'd think the following would be interesting:

• literature professors who blog teaching and writing (they know what makes good writing)
• agents who blog about how to impress them or how to be an agent
• editors who blog about how to get your work published or how to be an editor
• published writers who keep blogs in many areas (technical, fiction, poetry, scientific, memoirs, essays)

Others could be on-topic too, you can add to the list.

When answering this question, please justify your suggestion with a short blurb about the blog or person. Things to include would be the person's employment, publication history, the blog's affiliation or readership, etc.

Answer 1

This might be a bit of an odd one, but how about something with Writing Excuses? It's probably the most popular writing podcast out there, so if we can get a plug on it we'll get a lot of coverage. Even better would be if we could get the hosts to contribute to the site.

Answer 2

The following is a Community Wiki answer for the purposes of drafting a common e-mail or letter that we can use when contacting others. It is there to be edited as well as used, so please go ahead and modify it. When you are contacting people, if you already have a relationship with someone you may want to eschew the form letter. This can be a place to start talking about ourselves to others, though.

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Dear /Name/,

I have been a fan of your {blog|podcast|zine} for some time now. As a {writer|editor|agent|employee at /organization/} I am constantly seeking information about the writing world. I've recently discovered a new site for questions and answers about writing and writing careers. This site seeks to be a place for experts to ask and answer questions about all genres of writing and many aspects of the writing discipline. Some of the questions since the site's inception that show its potential include:

• Help me find the unnecessary words
• What are some ways to get to know your characters?
• Should DOIs ever be preferred to ISBNs?

We are looking for more experts to participate in this site, and I thought of you. Would you be willing to visit http://writers.stackexchange.com and check it out? If you like it, we'd also love if you encourage others you know in the business and art of writing to take a look.

Sincerely,

/Your Name/

Answer 3

Nathan Bransford is an author and former agent whose blog has a pretty large following of tech-savvy writers, which I would say is our key demographic. He does a series of "This week in books/publishing" blog posts that we could probably get a link in.

Answer 4

The Rejectionist is an editorial assistant who has a large following among aspiring authors. She does quite a bit on the dos and don'ts of query letters and manuscripts.

Answer 5

Neil Gaiman is a multi-award winning author with a popular blog. He frequently links useful resources and fun things in his posts. From his Q&A sections, it seems like he has a large audience among aspiring authors. He also seems to get quite far behind on his email, so it might be a month or five between sending him something and actually getting linked in the blog (assuming he chose to do so).

Answer 6

Rachelle Gardner is a literary agent whose blog is largely devoted to helping aspiring authors.

Answer 7

Andrew Burt is a blogger and the administrator of the Critters online writing workshop. He's a published author, and the workshop has a huge audience of amateur and professional writers.

As justkt mentioned in comments, Critters also has a free ad program for members' personal projects that we might be able to use. We'll have to check with Burt, however, to see if Writers.SE qualifies.