Interview with Modjaji Books’ Colleen Higgs on the Art of the Manuscript
Mousehand is delighted to be joining the BOOK SA community – and we kick things off with this interview with Colleen Higgs, publisher and worker of wonders at Modjaji Books, on the art of the manuscript. What makes a good fiction manuscript, from Higgs’ perspective? Find out in our Q&A here.
First, some prefatory notes on Colleen Higgs?
I am also a writer in addition to being a publisher, so I understand how it is for writers. I have also worked in a role where I gave advice to writers about getting published at the Centre for the Book. In fact I am still available to do consultations about publishing options and looking at manuscripts. I charge R400 an hour to do this, as it is not my core work anymore and I don’t have much time available to do this kind of work. I am not sentimental about writers and their needs though, which I think I was when I first got involved in this kind of work almost 20 years ago.
How do you find the manuscripts you publish? Are they mainly unsolicited?
Different ways, I know a lot of writers and so sometimes encourage people into sending me a manuscript if I hear about what they are working on. I get a number of manuscripts, too many, always feel slightly frantic about how to deal with them. I operate with limited resources and it is costly to have manuscripts assessed by readers. On the other hand I don’t have time to look at all the unsolicited ms that come to Modjaji Books, so I have to send them out to readers. Although I do usually do a very quick assessment to see if I will spend money on having it read. I only publish the work of southern African women writers, so if the writer doesn’t fit that bill, then they are immediately out of the picture.
Sometimes I have to wait until I have enough cash flow available to send an MS out for assessment.
When you receive a manuscript and start to read it, how do you go about reading it?
I skim for a feel and then start reading. If I am hooked I carry on, if not, I stop. If I have a sense that there is something more there, I send it off to a reader. Very occasionally I read the whole ms myself at first, I usually get a reader to help me short list.
When going through a manuscript, what key elements do you focus on assessing?
Has to be well written, no obvious mistakes or problems at first.
The MS has to capture my imagination, I do look at the synopsis too and if that doesn’t appeal to me or feel like it is a fit with Modjaji then I also drop the ms right then. I can’t even possibly begin to publish all the ms that come across my desk, even the good ones, so for a MS to be selected it has to have something special about it.
How many unsolicited manuscripts do you receive a day/week/month?
30 or more a month. I only publish 6 or so books a year, so as you can see there is a big sifting task.
Fiction comes in many styles, and covers many types of stories. Broadly speaking, what makes a good fiction manuscript?
A good story, that holds the reader, well written, clear voice, a sympathetic protagonist. I think that only very sophisticated writers can offer a reader an unsympathetic main character and get away with it. It has to answer questions like these: Why should I care? Do I care? So what?
What can writers do to enhance or improve their idea/writing/manuscript as far as possible before submitting it to a publisher?
Let a number of other objective readers read it and give feedback. Be sure you have drafted and redrafted a few times based on feedback. The story should open in such a way that the reader is hooked, wants to carry on reading. Make sure there are scenes, details that bring the story to life.
What traps should writers be wary of falling into?
Plodding “and then and then and then” type of stories, especially where the story is based on the writer’s life. The writer’s task is to present the story to the reader so that the reader is interested. Trust the reader’s intelligence – don’t spell everything out.
Also don’t copy another writer’s approach exactly, you can while building yourself up as a writer do exercises with yourself where you try to write like Hemingway or JM Coetzee, but don’t stop with the imitation. There are lots of courses and ways that writers can learn that are helpful – particularly in getting honest feedback.
What makes a book ‘un-put-downable’, for you?
Caring about the main character and wanting to find out what happens to her, how it all turns out, some sort of suspense or clear story arc. Whiplash by Tracey Farren is still my touchstone as far as what makes a brilliant South African novel. It is beautifully written, funny, gritty, and a strong narrative pull, and a character, Tess, who I came to care for deeply in quite a short space of time, in spite of her being a sex worker and an addict, neither of which are the sort of traits I would have imagined in a character that I would care about.
Is there any gap in locally written fiction, waiting to be filled by a creative writer? Or, in other words, what is the current trend in locally written fiction?
This is best left to each writer’s own imagination. There are an unlimited number of possibilities and many untold stories.
