I am a British ex-pat living in France. I write in English with the view of (hopefully) being published in the UK. Often I find that publishers and competitions calling for fiction subs stipulate they want UK residents only. Why is this? Is my living abroad going to be a constant block to my possible publishing success? Do publishers and/or agents accept authors from abroad?
Thanks.
Hi CA.
I agree with all the above, and would believe it - I'm a UK ex-pat living in Spain.
Yes about the Bridport prize. Check it out online. But I do believe many publishers/agents/et-cetera, believe people abroad don't make themselves available as readily for promotional events; especially at short notice. For my part, if a publisher wanted me to attend events every night and day to publish my book, I would sleep under Westminster Bridge if necessary.
Also a big yes to the Writers' magazine and other similar publications. They can be surprisingly helpful.
Good luck and keep on doing.
PabloJ.
Hi Charlie
For competitions, rules are different every time, and sometimes they want the winner to be a resident for publicity opportunities, tax reasons, or a million other things. BUT, for agents and publishers, it doesn't matter. I promise you that! I'm British, used to live in Japan (Hi Khai - hope you're loving it as much as I did!) and now live in the US. My agent is British, but that didn't stop anything. E-mail / the Internet makes most agents and publishers open to submissions from anyone. Good luck!
Hi Charlie, I too am English living in France, and you do have to read the terms and conditions . There are many comps you can enter: Bridport, for example, is international. If you can get hold of a copy of this month's Writing Magazine, it has a comprehensive listing of writing comps with websites that you can check, and you will find several there open to us expats. Online entry makes it far easier, and electronic payments make the prizes accessible to all. Geographical limitations may be used to restrict the numbers of entries.
Publishers and agents vary; I have a friend in Tenerife who was turned down by an agent specifically because she lives too far away, even though they liked her mss. France is only a ferry/tunnel away, so may not be seen in quite such a distant light.