The Black List is turning its attention to fiction.
The influential screenwriting platform will now let authors of novels create profiles and post their fiction on its website, it announced in a news release.
The Black List was founded by film executive Franklin Leonard in 2004 as an annual survey of buzzy screenplays. Scripts featured on the platform that have become films include Argo, Spotlight, and Juno.
“The Black List's core mission has always been discovering, supporting, and amplifying exceptional writing—providing it with the platform and visibility that it deserves based on its merit," Leonard said. "Expanding into fiction is a natural progression. Right now, there are brilliant writers around the world who don't have access to high-quality, accountable feedback, and whose work goes unseen for reasons entirely unrelated to how good it is. That’s a massive market failure, and it changes today.”
The platform announced it will be establishing the Unpublished Novel Award, which will “celebrate excellent manuscripts in seven genres: Children's & Young Adult, Crime & Mystery, Horror, Literary Fiction, Romance, Science Fiction & Fantasy, and Thriller & Suspense.” Winners of the prizes will receive cash awards of $10,000 each.
Judges for the prizes will include LeVar Burton, Roxane Gay, Dhonielle Clayton, Marie-Helene Bertino, and Tananarive Due.
In a statement, novelist Tomi Adeyemi said, “For decades, The Black List has been THE place for the most exciting scripts in Hollywood to be discovered, and Franklin Leonard has single-handedly nurtured and mentored an entire generation of screenwriters. The fact that he and The Black List will now be doing the same with novelists is gigantic for the literary world and Hollywood's future book adaptations."
Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.
