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YouWriteOn Book of the Year Awards - Fiction winner The Legacy Secures 2 Book Orion Deal, publisher of bestselling authors such as Ian Rankin

The Legacy Joins Previous YouWriteOn Award Winners, pictured above, who have developed their writing on YouWriteOn & achieved mainstream publishing successes including a six figure book deal with Random House, & book deals with Penguin & Harper Collins in 2007 and 2008.

Publish With YouWriteOn YouWriteOn published previous Winner Bufflehead Sisters, sales achieved a 2 book deal with Penguin More

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Senior Orion Editor Sara O'Keefe, who commissioned the Legacy, commented the following on The Legacy, and how it came to her attention through YouWriteOn and its members:

"Every editor dreams of unexpectedly stumbling across a great talent – that thrilling moment when one knows, without question, that one has unearthed a tremendous new voice. Realistically, though, unsolicited manuscripts rarely see the light of day, let alone receive backing from a major publishing house. Literary agents are said to be the gatekeepers of the industry, and on the whole, they do an excellent job of filtering material – but what does an author do if they can’t secure an agent? If, amongst the vast sea of manuscripts that wash across every agent’s desk, their talent somehow gets missed? I know from speaking with authors recently at the Stratford Upon Avon literary festival that the path to publication can be disheartening, frustrating and all too often disappointing.

Perhaps that’s why Katherine Webb’s story is so heartening. After years of toil, writing novel after novel, submitting endlessly to agents in hope of progressing her cause, Katherine ultimately found her way to the peer review website YouWriteOn.com, where she uploaded a couple of sample chapters of her work-in-progress THE LEGACY to the site. As a Senior Commissioning Editor at Orion I have had a long-standing relationship with YouWriteOn.com. I like to keep an eye on the site, regarding it as a useful creative laboratory for new writers .. My assistant, Natalie Braine, simply raved about Katherine Webb’s sample chapters on the website, so I decided to investigate further, contacting Katherine directly and calling in the full novel. Even in its raw, unedited and unpolished state, the script simply knocked my socks off.

THE LEGACY is a sweeping, multi-generational drama that moves from turn of the century Oklahoma to present day Wiltshire, exploring the lives of two very different women from one extraordinary family. It immediately reminded me of one of my favourite novels, The Shell Seekers by Rosamunde Pilcher. Katherine’s novel is a hauntingly beautiful, deeply satisfying read, exploring themes of individual and collective identity, of loss and of atonement. Most of all, it’s a novel about how two characters from two different generations in one family come to terms with a terrible act of betrayal – and the secret, heart-breaking legacy left behind. I simply cannot wait to publish this novel and feel very grateful to YouWriteOn for helping Katherine Webb’s talent to shine. Orion plans to publish THE LEGACY next summer.

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