Last year was our second annual Pitch to Publication session and it was a huge success.

The Pitching Session 

Like many publishers who accept unsolicited manuscripts, we receive a large number of submissions every week. This means hours spent wading through many emails as we try to give every author feedback on their work. Writers often try to arrange meetings with publishers, convinced that meeting the publisher in person will persuade them to publish the book, but with only so many hours in a day this isn’t always feasible.

We are offering you the chance to participate in a 15–20-minute session where you’ll be able to pitch your book to a panel comprising of three publishers and a high-powered bookseller. External panelists so far include Sharon Naidoo from Exclusive Books. This is your chance to impress and persuade us in person to consider your work for publication.

We realise this isn’t an approach that will work for all authors, but if you would like to be one of the 20 candidates who will present at the live pitching session on 28 August 2019, we encourage you to submit an entry on our website.

You will need to tell us why we would be interested in hearing your pitch. Take a look at the following websites for some ideas:

• The Art of Pitching
• What is a Pitch Session?

Accompanying your manuscript should be one page outlining:

• How you are going to help us sell your book,
• What target market you can reach with your book,
• How your book fits into the Jacana brand.

We will consider pitches in the following genres:

• Lifestyle
• Children’s
• Fiction
• Politics/Current Affairs/History
• Memoir/Biography/Autobiography
• Natural History/Travel
• Cookery/Baking
• Business
• Self-help

• Click here to submit your entry.

Submissions are open from 1–26 July 2019.
Queries can be emailed to: submissions@jacana.co.za.

Please note that we will only be giving feedback on submissions that interest us. If you have not heard from us by 5 August 2019, please consider your submission unsuccessful.