Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2007 16:41:27 -0400
From: "Michael Walsh" <MJW at press.jhu.edu>
To: <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: But Tell Us What  You Know...
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at KeithLynch.net>

> swstiles at comcast.net 04/26/07 10:20 PM >>>

>I haven't been paying attention to the book publishing scene
>in the past many years, but while I was at RavenCon last
>weekend I noticed there were nothing *but* small press books
>on display in the dealers' room. Just *who* are the major
>small press (if that isn't an oxymoron) publishers these
>days?

Here are a few:

Golden Gryphon
http://www.goldengryphon.com

NESFA Press
www.nesfa.org

Night Shade Books
http://www.nightshadebooks.com

Subterranean Press
http://www.subterraneanpress.com

Small Beer Press
http://www.lcrw.net

Tachyon
http://www.tachyonpublications.com

Wildside
http://www.wildsidepress.com

>And is this a viable alternative for writers, if not
>as profitable as the major players, or just a step above the
>vanity press?

Depends.

Very broadly speaking, what most of the small press I listed above have
done is publish authors that the trade houses feel they can not make
enough money from.

Nightshade last year contracted for Walter Jon Williams next novel, for
the ""the largest advance ever offered by Night Shade Books."
<http://walterjonwilliams.blogspot.com/2006/07/implied-spaces.html>

>There seems to have been an explosion in this area, but I
>haven't been paying attention (I get the feeling that the
>small press *comics* are a debt creating, semi-prozine
>proposition).

Changes in the book biz.  The rise of Amazon has made it possible for a
small press title to have equal footing with anything from Random House
or Simon & Schuster.

Another change is in priniting technology.  In particular:
Print-On-Demand. This enabled a lot of people to publish their own
books.  Are they any good?  Well, I suspect YMMV.  And don't forget to
invoke Sturgeon's Law.  Maybe twice.

mjw