#338 Between the Stacks with The London Library

This week, we're running a takeover in collaboration with our friends over at The London Library, a leading literary institution in the UK and the world's largest independent lending library! We'll let them take it from here…

Hello, writers!

I’m Claire, Head of Programmes at The London Library, where I oversee our ever-thriving Emerging Writers Programme: a unique opportunity for unpublished/unproduced writers (of every discipline and from any background!) to develop work at the Library. As we open applications for the Programme’s eighth year, we are delighted to be hosting this week’s Reedsy Prompts contest, taking inspiration from the Library’s atmospheric labyrinth of book stacks, reading rooms, and around a million books.

Some of the most famous books ever written were inspired by The London Library's collection. Bram Stoker used our topography section to conjure Transylvania and our folklore section to summon the eponymous Dracula; Kazuo Ishiguro’s chance find in our Science & Miscellaneous section led to The Remains of the Day; and A.S. Byatt’s literary detective classic, Possession, begins with a revelation hidden inside a book found on the Library’s shelves.

Libraries and the books they hold are worlds of discovery, endless sources of inspiration, and magical, secretive spaces full of voices, ideas, and encounters that can set the imagination alight. This week’s prompts are an invitation into those spaces, to explore the stories that might unfurl from between the stacks.

Special Update: The Results 🏆

The top pick for this takeover was "The Super Pals" by Michael Gattis. Here's what Claire from The London Library had to say about it:

I can't resist a great sense of humour, and this story had plenty — line by line and within the story itself, which perfectly sends up the trope of the superhero and the concept of secret societies, highlighting the absurdity at the heart of each. It was deftly written, the storytelling was excellent, and it was lots of fun to read. Libraries are full of secrets, stories, and no small measure of absurdity, so we're delighted that this was inspired by our prompts.

Congratulations to contest winner Michael Gattis and the runners-up, Jonathan Page and Maria Poppy!