Unedited: From Idea to Manuscript and Shelf to Screen

Today on Unedited, three authors of historical fiction join us to parse the state of modern entertainment and ponder whether we’re really living in a uniquely stupid era. We as creatures have been weaving epic fictions since at least the Iron Age—and authors have been called out for their overuse of sex and violence since at least Herodotus. But with millions of books being published (or self-publ...

If you, like Theseus, got trapped in a maze with a Minotaur, how would you escape? Except in this case, the maze is made of video games, nonstop TV, and the 3.5 million books published on Amazon KDP in 2025. And you don’t have a ball of string to retrace your steps. Last week on Unedited , we began a discussion of stupid. Where have all the smart books gone, and, maybe more importantly, where has...

After a kickoff discussion of sequels last month, we’re pivoting in the next few Unedited episodes to a debate around what happened to good fiction and why so many of the novels we read these days feel, well, stupid.  Is it nostalgia talking to say that the novels of fifty or one hundred years ago felt smarter than the stuff getting praised in the (increasingly decimated) newspaper reviews of toda...

Last week, we jumped into sequels—what are they, and why are they everywhere? This week, Noah gives us a different spin on the subject by asking, where did sequels come from? How did they develop? Which books and movies turned sequels into the ubiquitous format we’re surrounded by today? From caveman campfires to the books we curled up with as kids, stories with a “part two” are so common we almos...

This month, Unedited: From Idea to Manuscript and Shelf to Screen returns. Adam — accompanied by a surprise guest, his youngest daughter — kicks us off with an introduction to the topic of the next several episodes: sequels. Here at Inkshares, we’ve been thinking a lot about sequels as we work on follow-ups from authors like Scott Thomas, JF Dubeau, and Christopher Huang. Pretty much all of our fa...

In episode 26 of Unedited , we continue with Part 2 of our Jurassic discussion, this time joined by writer, podcaster and returning guest Will Gish. Together, Gish and Gomolin take a magnifying glass to the techniques Crichton uses to rope readers into his story, from the authoritative and academic introduction, to the pulse-pounding prologue, to the deceptive lull of the first chapter and the gra...

Episode 25 of Unedited is a special one. In Part 1 of 2, Adam sits down with current Inkshares editor Noah Broyles and former Inkshares editor (and accomplished novelist) Matt Harry to discuss one of the most successful book-to-film adaptations of all time, Jurassic Park . Noah brings first impressions of the film, while Matt shares a lifelong appreciation of each version of the story. Throughout...

Unedited is back, and so is BookCon. In episode 24, Adam, Sarah, and Noah survey the return of NYC’s biggest book event, which has awoken from a five-year covid coma. This time around, the Javit’s Center will host a convention with special focus on those readers romantasy-inclined: signings, meetups, workshops, and a “fantasy ball” are on offer. Less love is being lost across the pond, however, wh...

In Episode 23 of Unedited , Adam, Sarah, and Noah, alongside a special returning guest, take a bite at the apple and discuss whether Original Sin by Tapper and Thompson is actually that original—and whether the real sin isn’t the timing of this safely after-the-fact account? Whatever the answer, it is a truth universally acknowledged that an audiobook company in possession of large fortune must be...

In Episode 22 of Unedited , Adam, Sarah, and Noah—like Odysseus, Aeneas, and Dante before them—plunge into the netherworld. Instead of Virgil, though, we follow the spectre of AI ghostwriters and “reverse harems” through a discussion about the state of self-publishing in the age of LLMs and what this means for the very act of storytelling and editorial collaboration. At the bottom of hell, we enco...

In Episode 21 of Unedited , Adam is joined once again by Sarah Elizabeth Hill of Bobi Media and Inkshares editor Noah Broyles to unpack the news that is shaping the global story economy. Audible’s feet-first leap into the AI space leads our discussion, causing the group to ponder what it will mean for aspiring narrators, translators, and listeners around the world to have LLMs telling stories. Spe...

The News of the Global Story Economy In Episode 20 of Unedited , we shake up the format to bring you three bellwether news pieces from the global story economy. Adam, Sarah Elizabeth Hill of Bobi Media, and Inkshares’ own Noah Broyles sit down and unpack the rising phenomenon of publishers acquiring authors who are BookTok stars and what this means for non-viral writers hoping to break into a spic...

Sarah Elizabeth Hill joins us for Episode 19 of Unedited. Sarah is the founder of Bobi Media, a digital marketing and brand management company based in NYC. We chart Sarah’s path from six-year-old poet to anonymous college romance columnist to the world of media and publishing, starting with her time at Bookstr, which she grew to a community of more than three million. We discuss entrepreneurship...

Grant Bayliss joins us for Episode 18 of Unedited. Grant was an elite military operator in the global war on terror, with fourteen years across four tours in Iraq and Afghanistan and subsequent private protection for British diplomatic personnel. He is also the author of the forthcoming story and screenplay The Old Believer , which follows a group of disavowed British special forces operatives on...

Marcus Gipps joins us for Episode 17 of Unedited. We trace his career in books, beginning as a sales manager at the flagship Blackwell’s store on Charing Cross Road, followed by his journey up the publishing ladder at one of the UK's oldest and most venerable sci-fi/fantasy houses, Gollancz, which is approaching its centenary. We also recount some of the authors he has worked with, including Andrz...

Nigel Newton, founder and CEO of Bloomsbury Publishing, joins us from the floor of the London Book Fair on Episode 16 of Unedited . We discuss his journey to the top of the book world, from his days at Cambridge, to his time as a graduate trainee at Macmillan, to landing a job as a sales manager at Sidgwick & Jackson. We dive into the birth of Bloomsbury, the business plan for which Nigel wrot...

Rick Nicita and Bob Bookman join us for Episode 15 of Unedited. For nearly three decades, Rick and Bob were at the top of CAA's world of talent and book to film. They represented actors including Tom Cruise, Al Pacino, Nicole Kidman, and Sir Anthony Hopkins, and namebrand authors like Michael Crichton, Anne Rice, and Thomas Harris, to name only a few. We discuss how books matriculated through one...

Film executive and content innovator Liesl Copland joins us for episode fourteen of Unedited: From Idea to Manuscript and Shelf to Screen. Over a glass of grenache, we discuss her winding road from Mickey Drexler’s GAP, to a brief stint as a cruise director, to the heyday of magazines, and her rise through independent film. As Netflix’s first chief of original content, a fifteen-year veteran of th...

Lawyer by training and a writer by compulsion Michael Bennett joins us for episode thirteen of Unedited: From Idea to Manuscript and Shelf to Screen. We discuss where funny comes from, what it means to be funny to different people, the evolution of satire from Don Quixote to the present, and whether, in a realm of seven-second Instagram reels, political satire still has a meaningful place in longf...

Manager and producer Brooklyn Weaver of Energy Entertainment  joins us for episode twelve of Unedited: From Idea to Manuscript and Shelf to Screen. We discuss why books remain the bedrock of Hollywood but how other forms of literary material from comic books to short stories are taking increasing market-share in underlying IP. Having managed and worked with top talent from Rob Liefeld to Christian...

Screenwriter and aspiring novelist Will Gish joins us for episode eleven of Unedited: From Idea to Manuscript and Shelf to Screen. Over a glass of Grenache, we discuss the road from Philadelphia to New Jersey to Vermont and eventually, via Mexico City and Tokyo, to LA. We break down the ebbs and flows of humor in publishing, television, and cinema, and ponder whether, in an increasingly dark world...

Mike Holz joins us on the tenth episode of Unedited: From Idea to Manuscript and Shelf to Screen. We discuss the shift from a producer-led Hollywood to a streamer-led Hollywood, the breakdown of the global-licensing framework in television, and how the “gourmet cheeseburger” is becoming a dangerously popular order on our television menu. Having spent the last decade working in international televi...

Noah Broyles joins us for the ninth episode of Unedited: From Idea to Manuscript and Shelf to Screen. Having sat down at fourteen to write his first novel, Noah dipped into several genres and took inspiration from some unique places before his debut novel, The House of Dust , landed on our desk at Inkshares. We discuss his journey into reading, his journey into writing, his experience being publis...

Fires began burning in the Palisades on the morning of the 7th of January, ten days ago. They spread. Last Wednesday night, when the Hills lit on fire, it looked like Hollywood was literally going to burn to the ground. We are joined by our Episode 2 and 7 guests, Bob Bookman and Chase Pletts, to find out what the last ten days have been like for them and how they think this is going to affect a H...

Chase Pletts joins us for the seventh episode of Unedited: From Idea to Manuscript and Shelf to Screen. We discuss his journey from Brooklyn to Los Angeles and from a young reader of Jack London to a winner of not one but two SPUR awards from the Western Writers of America. Chase also discusses the path from screenwriter to novelist (and then back to screenwriter) and the imperative of mining the...