100 sites for fiction writers: #34 - Preditors & Editors

This is an ongoing series looking at websites that can be of help to fiction writers with their craft and career.

Preditors & Editors

The website Preditors & Editors states its purpose "is to provide writers with information and contacts for the purpose of seeking publication of their work."

But the site is so much more than that.

First, for beginning writers, the Preditors & Editors site is a must. If you want to know how a Literary Agent works, then go to Preditors & Editors. If you are trying to find out about writing and publishing Awards, this site is for you. Looking for Chat Sites to contact other writers? Preditors & Editors is for you. Truly, there is so much information available at this website that you'll just have to spend some hours and days looking it over.

Also, if you are job hunting and prefer something in the writing field, don't forget to check out the Jobs page.

In a way, because of its Magazine listings and Book Publisher listings and plenty of other listings, this site is somewhat akin to other writers' market sites like Duotrope's Digest and Ralan.com. But in my opinion the Preditors & Editors site is more complex and offers much more information.

Sure, there are lists of markets to be found on this site, but Preditors & Editors goes one major step further than most other sites.

It makes recommendations. And it offers warnings.

If an agent or publisher or any other individual or company has a history of potentially questionable actions in dealings with writers, you can bet to find something about this at Preditors & Editors.

On the other hand, Preditors & Editors does not hesitate to point out companies and people who have shown themselves in good standing with writers.

Still, all of this does sometimes bring up some drama and potentially even legal concerns with the Preditors & Editors site. The website has been run by Dave Kuzminski since 1997 and he and the site have faced more than their fair share of controversies. But that's to be expected from a site that has become known somewhat as a whistle-blower within the publishing industry. If you'd like to know more about this, check out the Warnings page.

Before closing, I'd like to bring up another point. Though the focus of this series is upon fiction writers, and though the Preditors & Editors site tends to be lumped in as a writers' site, Preditors & Editors also offers Music listings, Journalism listings, information about Game Publishers, Convention and Festival listings, and so much more that I would have to write a book to mention it all.

All I'm saying is ... if you're a writer, this site is definitely worth your while. There is so much knowledge here, it could take years to study it all.