Anna Baddeley 

Getting your book Pigeonholed could be a good thing

A new provider has entered the serial fiction market – and it may just have the format for success, writes Anna Baddeley
  
  

pigeonhole yseult ogilvie
Yseult Ogilvie, whose serial Redpoint is the first to be published by The Pigeonhole. Photograph: PR

When I heard another startup was having a stab at digital serials, I sighed. The rebirth of the 19th-century format has been heralded several times over the past few years, but so far it has failed to catch on. Kindle Serials has only published a few titles, Plympton was abandoned, and while there's some great writing in serial form (see my review of Nunslinger) I'm not sure people are talking about the latest instalments down the pub.

After roadtesting the Pigeonhole, however, I hope that might be about to change. Just launched in beta, it publishes fiction and non-fiction in weekly "staves" that download to an iOS device or Kindle (Android version coming soon). Each stave has bonus content – an audio reading, an essay by the author. It's free to subscribe: readers pay for the story after they've read it. Once a book gets 5,000 subscribers, a print edition will be published.

The Pigeonhole's debut serial, Redpoint by Yseult Ogilvie, is about the relationship between a man and his teenage nephew, who comes to live with him in Cornwall after a family tragedy. It starts awkwardly, with too many adjectives ("heavy thud", "luminous glow"), but once we get out of London the writing becomes less forced and the pace picks up.

Ogilvie is adept at building atmosphere and suspense – I can see why early readers were reminded of Daphne du Maurier.

The app's minimalist design is superb – I haven't enjoyed reading on my phone until now – and the commenting tool is useful, if underdeveloped. The full launch will be this autumn, with serials to include crime fiction and essays by hipster thinkers the Wisdom Hackers. In the meantime, they're keen for your input. The Pigeonhole's Erica Jarnes tells me: "We want readers to be part of our success." Now's the time to download your first stave.

 

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