Could a Small Independent Publisher Be Right For You?

Introducing Author Susan May

photo by Stephanie Kay

Getting the attention of a publisher can be very frustrating for a writer. But thankfully not all publishers are created equal. There are only five or six major publishing houses and with these it is often difficult for an author to get in the door. Editors at these houses tell of enormous slush piles and many times require that an author have an agent to represent the work. A small independent publisher is another avenue that an author can purse to have their work published. There are numerous small presses, each offering their own special brand of publishing. Many manuscripts have found a home in one of them.

Nick’s New Heart, my nonfiction book about my son’s heart transplant experience was picked up by a small press. It’s not only a book about my son but also about my family. I did shop it to the big guys and numerous others also. I’d received a large number of rejections but also enough encouraging ones to keep me submitting. I send it to a small independent publisher who saw its value and contracted me. It was the best publishing decision I could have made for Nick’s New Heart. 

The personal aspect of working with a small press is what most appealed. I not only wanted, but needed personal attention. Being asked what I thought should be done with Nick’s New Heart was important because this book wasn’t only about my baby (my manuscript), but the book was about my real baby and family. I needed to have some control over how it was presented, the title and the direction.

This was my first book and I wanted to understand step by step what was happening. By having a small press, I had someone who listened and answered my questions. I didn’t just hand my manuscript over to a group of committees to make all the decisions.  I was asked about what I wanted to see on the cover and had a chance to okay it. I got to discuss length, font, paper quality and whether or not it should be hard back or soft cover. Most of these items were decided for me but I did get to feel like I had some input. 



A small press can offer the uneducated writer publishing knowledge that a large house doesn’t have time to give. The editing process and setting of pages are things easier shared when working with a small publisher.  Staying in contact can sometimes be easier because the number of authors isn’t so great. My email and phone calls were always answered in a timely manner. If a writer feels the need to be involved in their book all the way through the publishing press, I would recommend a small press.

Often independent presses are more open to story ideas and submissions that large press who will pass on them for any number of reasons. The large publishers may think the book idea is good, but that it doesn’t make good business sense.  Small press can have less of a slush pile to wade through, meaning a response time is shorter. The author isn’t waiting around for months to hear whether or not the press is interested in their work. Waiting six months to a year to hear back from a large publisher isn’t unusual. In my experience, six weeks to a month is a long time for a small press to hold on to a manuscript.

 There are many reputable independent presses that use the same business model as larger publishers but do it on a smaller scale.  They offer editors, some give the author a minimum advance, while others don’t but pay higher royalties. Many small presses don’t offer high amounts of promotional money but then at a large publishing house a new author might not get a lot of attention in that area if they aren’t already well known.  

Small independent publishers can be found at http://www.writersmarket.com/ and http://www.newpages.com/book-publishers Also Google-Small Independent Publishers for even more outlets.

One word of caution, small presses, like large ones need to be researched and their guidelines for submission follow. Just because a press is small doesn’t mean that they publish every genre or type of book. Treat submitting to a small press with the same professionalism as a larger one would be given.        

 If it is important to you that your opinion at least be considered, valued and your voice heard think about submitting to a small publisher. The best thing I ever did for Nick’s New Heart and for me as an author of the book was to sign with a small press. My baby was treated well and so was I.    http://www.susancmay.com/index.php

Susan May’s love affair with books began when she was in the sixth grade and made a bad grade on her report card in math. (She still doesn’t like math.) Not allowed to watch TV for  six weeks she filled her extra time with reading.   

            Her first book, Nick’s New Heart about her son’s heart transplant experience is available now. She is currently working on a her fifth romance novel about a strong, rich man and the woman that loves him, a nonfiction about a WWII flight surgeon and another about her summer trip to Europe with her four teenage children.

She often speaks to nursing groups, civic groups, and high school health classes about the importance of organ donation. She leads workshops on promotion, rejection, time management, finding the right writer’s conference, collaging and memoir writing.  

            When her head isn’t in a book, hers or someone else’s, Susan is either traveling, cross-stitching or reading. Visit her at www.susancmay.com.    

It’s The Bees’ Knees!

Meet Guest Blogger Nicelle Davis

What is your vision for Bees' Knees?

My vision for The Bees’ Knees Blog is to create an interactive space where poets can explore language. The blog is divided into three components: Writing, Reading, and the Biz of Poetry.

The Writing:

I post a monthly workshop, poetry prompt, and contest. Poets are encouraged to post their work and give feedback in the comment sections of these monthly posts. The poems submitted at The Bees’ Knees should be in a state of making—in other words, not polished ready for publication poems, but works still in the process of becoming. This is ultimately a place for poetic exploration.

The Reading:

Reading is a large component of The Bees’ Knees Blog. There is a book club that looks at three books over the course of three months: a book on craft, a book by an established author, and a chapbook by an up-and-coming author. There is also a salon where poets can post their favorite poems for an open discussion on why the writing is so good—why it works—how words remake us as we read them.




I also feel very compelled to help promote work that I find fabulous. Poetry is something I want to share. If I read a good book I want to scream from the tops of buildings, this is a very good book and you all should read it. In some aspects the Bees’ Knees is that very tall building, so when I find something good I start yelling about it like a cheerleader drunk on a six-pack of soda-pop.

*RUDE NARRATIVE INTRUSION BY THE AUTHOR OF MORTAL CORKSCREW*

*Speaking of really good poetry: Check this out!*

Nicelle’s poetry at:

 

*click to enlarge*

AND NOW BACK TO OUR REGULARLY SCHEDULED PROGRAM




The Biz:

In addition to writing and reading I want to provide information about the business of poetry. The word business tastes bad when placed so close to the word poetry—like peanut-butter and pickles—but I haven’t a better word to describe the emotional rollercoaster that is the act of submitting poems.


So here is what I know about peanut-butter and pickles:




Editors are not monsters, they will not kick you, or call you names. They are word lovers to the fullest extent of the word love. An editor is someone who has decided to dedicate their time, money, and heart to provide a place for someone else’s words. I think this information is very important for the poet who is just beginning to submit work to journals. I run a monthly spotlight on editors / journals in order to demystify the process of submitting work. Ultimately, I believe that poetry, like song, is a social animal. It wants friends, cohorts, family, and the company of other poems. The Bees’ Knees wants to be that coffee shop / bar / office / classroom where poets can meet and bond over a cup of great words. A place for community is my hope for the blog. I hope on it and hope on it as though it were my wishing star.

--Nicelle Davis

Quote of the Day: 

...The poem demands the demise of the poet who writes it and the birth of the poet who reads it.

-Octavio Paz: Alternating Current

For Those Who Carry On

Memorial Day

Remembrance. Today was set aside to think of the fallen. To pay respect to those who have carried guns in defense of ideals, in defense of other people, in defense of their comrades or their own lives. There are many stories being told about courage today. The courage it takes to leave home, to travel across the world into a foreign country and face hatred, to deal with a battle with no clear way out, without knowing when it will end or how long you will be called on, or even if you will be the one who is sent home in a pine box. To choose to live the life of an American soldier shows a strength of character which should be recognized with respect and gratitude. Military service, at the most basic level, is a self-less act. The willingness to sacrifice one's life for others, regardless of the politics or the ideals surrounding the military, is a noble desire.

The military is why we have the security we do. (It’s not the lawyers or politicians, that is for sure.) Men and women have sacrificed their lives for an ideal; the ideal of human equality and the right to exist with dignity and to respect each other without resorting to violence, even when we don’t agree. It is a wonderful thing that we can say whatever we want to say in America and not get punished for disagreeing with those in power. We are a blessed country and a lucky people to live in a place which allows us to express discontent or disagreement without our own military being used against us. Certainly, it goes without saying that it is not a perfect institution and mistakes have been made by individuals in the past and mistakes will be made in the future, no man and no man made institution is perfect. But at the heart of the majority of individuals serving in the armed forces is a person who believes in service, a person who believes one individual can make a difference, a person willing to die for others.

But there are some heroes who do not carry a gun, they simply carry on. There is of a different kind of war going on today and it is a war within the households across the world. Today, while I honor the fallen I would also like to honor the living. Please note, the images following will be disturbing to some.

WORLD IN A SNAP | Interesting images from around the world

Terrorism that's personal (12 images)

EDITOR'S NOTE: GRAPHIC CONTENT

Text by Jim Verhulst, Times' Perspective editor | Photos by Emilio Morenatti, Associated Press

We typically think of terrorism as a political act.

But sometimes it’s very personal. It wasn’t a government or a guerrilla insurgency that threw acid on this woman’s face in Pakistan. It was a young man whom she had rejected for marriage. As the United States ponders what to do in Afghanistan — and for that matter, in Pakistan — it is wise to understand both the political and the personal, that the very ignorance and illiteracy and misogyny that create the climate for these acid attacks can and does bleed over into the political realm. Nicholas Kristof, the New York Times op-ed columnist who traveled to Pakistan last year to write about acid attacks, put it this way in an essay at the time: “I’ve been investigating such acid attacks, which are commonly used to terrorize and subjugate women and girls in a swath of Asia from Afghanistan through Cambodia (men are almost never attacked with acid). Because women usually don’t matter in this part of the world, their attackers are rarely prosecuted and acid sales are usually not controlled. It’s a kind of terrorism that becomes accepted as part of the background noise in the region. ...

“Bangladesh has imposed controls on acid sales to curb such attacks, but otherwise it is fairly easy in Asia to walk into a shop and buy sulfuric or hydrochloric acid suitable for destroying a human face. Acid attacks and wife burnings are common in parts of Asia because the victims are the most voiceless in these societies: They are poor and female. The first step is simply for the world to take note, to give voice to these women.” Since 1994, a Pakistani activist who founded the Progressive Women’s Association to help such women “has documented 7,800 cases of women who were deliberately burned, scalded or subjected to acid attacks, just in the Islamabad area. In only 2 percent of those cases was anyone convicted.”

The geopolitical question is already hard enough: Should the United States commit more troops to Afghanistan and for what specific purpose? As American policymakers mull the options, here is a frame of reference that puts the tough choices in even starker relief: Are acid attacks a sign of just how little the United States can do to solve intractable problems there — therefore, we should pull out? Or having declared war on terrorism, must the United States stay out of moral duty, to try to protect women such as these — and the schoolgirls whom the Taliban in Afghanistan sprayed with acid simply for going to class — who have suffered a very personal terrorist attack? We offer links to smart essays that come to differing conclusions.

• In August, Perspective published a New York Times Magazine piece that followed up the story of Afghan sisters Shamsia and Atifa Husseini, who were attacked with acid simply for attending school. If you wish to refresh your memory, you may read the original article.

• Two very smart, informed observers come to opposite conclusions on the proper U.S. course of action in Afghanistan:

1. In his “Think Tank” blog at NewYorker.com, Steve Coll argues why we can’t leave — “What If We Fail In Afghanistan?” Read the essay in full.

2. In an essay entitled “The War We Can’t Win” in Commonweal (also reprinted in the November issue of Harper’s), Andrew J. Bacevich makes the case that we are overstating the importance of Afghanistan to U.S. interests. Bacevich is a professor of International Relations at Boston University and the author, most recently, of The Limits of Power. A retired Army lieutenant colonel, he served from 1969 to 1992, in Vietnam and the first Persian Gulf War. He was a conservative critic of the Iraq war. Several of his essays have run before in Perspective. Read his essay in full.

• Read the original story about acid attacks by Nicholas Kristof.

Irum Saeed, 30, poses for a photograph at her office at the Urdu University of Islamabad, Pakistan, Thursday, July 24, 2008. Irum was burned on her face, back and shoulders twelve years ago when a boy whom she rejected for marriage threw acid on her in the middle of the street. She has undergone plastic surgery 25 times to try to recover from her scars.

Shameem Akhter, 18, poses for a photograph at her home in Jhang, Pakistan, Wednesday, July 10, 2008. Shameem was raped by three boys who then threw acid on her three years ago. Shameem has undergone plastic surgery 10 times to try to recover from her scars.

Najaf Sultana, 16, poses for a photograph at her home in Lahore, Pakistan on Wednesday, July 9, 2008. At the age of five Najaf was burned by her father while she was sleeping, apparently because he didn't want to have another girl in the family. As a result of the burning Najaf became blind and after being abandoned by both her parents she now lives with relatives. She has undergone plastic surgery around 15 times to try to recover from her scars.

Shehnaz Usman, 36, poses for a photograph in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, Oct. 26, 2008. Shehnaz was burned with acid by a relative due to a familial dispute five years ago. Shehnaz has undergone plastic surgery 10 times to try to recover from her scars.

Shahnaz Bibi, 35, poses for a photograph in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, Oct. 26, 2008. Ten years ago Shahnaz was burned with acid by a relative due to a familial dispute. She has never undergone plastic surgery.

Kanwal Kayum, 26, adjusts her veil as she poses for a photograph in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, Oct. 26, 2008. Kanwal was burned with acid one year ago by a boy whom she rejected for marriage. She has never undergone plastic surgery.

Munira Asef, 23, poses for a photograph in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, Oct. 26, 2008. Munira was burned with acid five years ago by a boy whom she rejected for marriage. She has undergone plastic surgery 7 times to try to recover from her scars.

Bushra Shari, 39, adjusts her veil as she poses for a photograph in Lahore, Pakistan, Friday, July. 11, 2008. Bushra was burned with acid thrown by her husband five years ago because she was trying to divorce him. She has undergone plastic surgery 25 times to try to recover from her scars.

Memuna Khan, 21, poses for a photograph in Karachi, Pakistan, Friday, Dec. 19, 2008. Menuna was burned by a group of boys who threw acid on her to settle a dispute between their family and Menuna's. She has undergone plastic surgery 21 times to try to recover from her scars.

Zainab Bibi, 17, adjusts her veil as she poses for a photograph in Islamabad, Pakistan, Wednesday, Dec. 24, 2008. Zainab was burned on her face with acid thrown by a boy whom she rejected for marriage five years ago. She has undergone plastic surgery several times to try to recover from her scars.

Naila Farhat, 19, poses for a photograph in Islamabad, Pakistan, Wednesday, Dec. 24, 2008. Naila was burned on her face with acid thrown by a boy whom she rejected for marriage five years ago. She has undergone plastic surgery several times to try to recover from her scars.

Saira Liaqat, 26, poses for the camera as she holds a portrait of herself before being burned, at her home in Lahore, Pakistan, Wednesday, July 9, 2008. When she was fifteen, Saira was married to a relative who would later attack her with acid after insistently demanding her to live with him, although the families had agreed she wouldn't join him until she finished school. Saira has undergone plastic surgery 9 times to try to recover from her scars.

 

 

 

 

Segue into Video: Melissa Broder ***(I just wanted an excuse to use the word "segue" because it is a really cool word,)*** Also, Poetry and Sock Puppets are AWESOME!

Dear Aging Anarchist / Melissa Broder from Leigh Stein on Vimeo.

Say Hello to Poet Melissa Broder a.k.a The Gefilte Fisherwoman

 

Author of WHEN YOU SAY ONE THING AND MEAN YOUR MOTHER

:

Well that’s not really her but that is her book and this poem is really by her:

Summer Soldiers

by Melissa Broder

This was the game: we would gaze down the barrel
of our lipsticks, waiting for you to finish
band practice. Stalk you in the 7-11 lot.
Where the boys were. Boys. Sparrow spirits on skateboards,
bottles of Tahitian Treat, Rose's Cola,
and blue raspberry Slurpees laced with liquor.
I had the blues 'cause I wanted to be you:
all shit-beers and stars, pentagrams instead of Temple.
Old-school kick flips—no purses—under the low-hung moon,
and you could skin your knees and you could give me
carpet burn all evening in somebody's basement,
trying to lick my nothing-tit, a baby lion
cleaning a china plate. Calluses and nipples,
bass guitars. Cinnamon gum will turn him on,
said the wise women of Seventeen magazine.
What kind of kisser are you? Timid? Sexy? Strong?
Once I opened my eyes and he only had one eye.
He kept his mouth sealed shut. Is there something wrong?
Then you'd heel-flip your Simples, ollie higher
over gutters, down suburb sidewalks, to your mothers
and we'd go tongue the mirror in your honor,
apply silver eyeliner, make scars out of pimples.

http://delsolreview.webdelsol.com/dsr15/poems-melissa.htm

I may just have to dance on potato chips

 

I'm s'mad I can't sleep. At present I'm sitting here in my living room looking over the wreckage. Today my husband took the kids to play laser tag and to hit some baseballs, and to just goof off in general supposedly to give mom some "time alone." Translation…"Mom plans on cleaning house today we better get the heck out of dodge."

 

Okay, fine. Often it is easier for me to just roll up my sleeves and get things done than to direct the traffic of who should do what, where and why.

"BUT Mom, I cleaned the bathroom LAST time."

Yeah, last MONTH. If you call running a rag over the sink "cleaning the bathroom."

BUT MOM, why should I pick up the living room, I didn't make the mess in here. That's not fair."

I never thought I'd be the kind of mom that would ever say: "Because I said so."

But now I say it. BECAUSE. I. SAID. SO.

My favorite excuse from my nine year old son.

"I can't. I think my legs are broken."

So, my family comes home from their day of lollygagging and within ten minutes…probably not even that…what I'd worked ALL day to clean was destroyed.

They decided to watch movies. Good end to a nice day.

Well bully for y'all. I thought to myself and I decided to just sit back and wait and see if anyone would bother to pick up a thing, one thing, before they went to bed.

The mess statistic as of 1:00 a.m. Sunday night:

8 pairs of shoes in my living room. That is sixteen individual shoes. Not even piled in front of the door, no, like easter eggs they're scattered all willy nilly about the place.

2 cups under the couch, 1 cup beside the couch.

1 granola bar wrapper shoved under the couch and some other stuff, but I'm not going to see what it is.

1 batting glove.

Some sort of tool which says Dewalt on it.

Two bowls and one spoon.

A box of art supplies.

Socks. (single of course, not matching.)

X-box games (two) gaming control (one)

A blanket (looks like someone spilled something and used the blanket to cover it up.)

And that's just the living room.

In the kitchen---Oh god. I don't even want to talk about the Kitchen!!

Half eaten bags of chips left open. Left OPEN. Are they trying to drive me mad? I think they are.

I am having this really strong desire to dump ALL the chips on the floor in the kitchen and just dance on them. Two step, boot scootin boogie, stomp…whatever. Dance, dance, dance on potato chips and just leave them there and when the kids wake up in the morning and ask what happened I'll pull out some of their own lines on them:

"What? What mess? Where? I don't see anything. Oh…that….I didn't do that. Don't worry about it, it's not a big deal, why don't you just CHILAX sheesh, you'd think you'd never seen potato chips on the floor before."

 

:: maggie taylor ::

"Messenger"

Great artist, fascinating work, Southern Gothic, click to visit her website.

:: maggie taylor :::

Born on a blue day

To adopt to chaos the mind might recite π for hours

two is yellow, six a void, five a clap of thunder

the rosetta stone

profound talent/profound disability
are divided by a thin line

Not even an eyelash.

Each hair on the human head has a number
the sparrow falls without counting.
Intelligence is not a gift it is

a cracker-jack prize, a wash off tattoo
a plastic compass
the candy coating on the pop-corn

or likely just the nuts that settle
to the bottom during shipping  

1. What is a baby goldfish called?
   
2. Where do iatrophobes fear to go?
   
3. When is a nightshade a vegetable?
   
4. 'Hands' are a part of what religion?
   
5. What is the collective noun for collective nouns?
   

   
    

Wisdom, on the other hand, is a wonderful peculiar

 

pebble

 

 

*Italics are author/autistic/savant Dannel Tammet's words, used with permission. Photo by John Sweet, also used with permission. After the fact of the post, but still, it counts.

Bad Luck, Good Luck: “I Shouldn’t Have Been a Pirate Whore.”

 

You ever wake up with an epiphany? Words flowing from you like St. Elmo’s fire, ( y’know not the creepy red puppet, but the legend) and you pick up whatever writing utensil is at hand and whatever scrap of paper, box of tissue, back of a receipt you can find and write it down as fast as you can, and then set it aside, pleased that you have captured brilliance, that exact moment of divine reckoning where Truth (capital T) has been revealed to you. So you fall blissfully back to the cushions, sigh a contented sigh and embrace sleep only to wake abruptly and realize that on that massive pile of paper and books surrounding your bed…

 

you’ve lost your treasure.  That precious, nay, sacred gem is buried somewhere deep within the  folds of chaos, and like blinking right before the picture... you know you've been caught with your eyes closed, and you'll never figure out where you put that damn scrap of paper, and you don’t even know what that paper looked like, or what color of pen, pencil, crayon you used for the text because you didn’t even bother to turn on the light before you began penning your serendipitous verse down?

No?

Maybe it’s just me.

Anyway, this post is about luck. Why some people seem to have good luck, and some people seem to have bad luck. My oldest daughter seems to have the worse luck of anyone in the family. She’s been to the emergency room more than all my children combined. She trips, a lot. She hits her head on things, a lot. She’s dealt with the suicide of two close friends. On reflection, she’s come to a point where she’s developed a healthy does of sick humor to cope. .

Now when something bad happens, like she hits her head or stubs her toe or cuts her finger somehow on a box of cereal (really, how does one CUT their finger on a cereal box?) she says: “Dang it! I shouldn’t have been a Murdering Pirate Whore!”

and we laugh.

Now there’s Ben. He has found so many four leaf clovers in his life we stopped counting after a hundred. One time the child found twelve of them, all at once, during soccer practice. (What he was doing looking for clover rather than practicing, I can’t tell you.) I find them too, every once in a while, only one or maybe two at time. But almost every time that child goes outside, viola’ there’s a clover. My other children have invested time in attempting this feat. The youngest two will try on and off to find them. They’ll spend twenty or thirty minutes looking before they give up and Ben will come up, bend right over in front of them and pluck it out of the bunch.

I asked him how he did that.

“I don’t know, I just sorta feel like there’s one there. When I feel like there’s a clover there, I just go over and get it.”

Now, I wonder can our expectations MAKE bad things happen and good things happen when we want? Does Ben believing he has the power to find four leaf clovers, give him that power. Does Halee believing (somewhat) she must have done something bad to have bad things happen in turn make bad things happen?

I don’t claim I know. All I know is that, for my own part, my luck would have it that the epiphany I was going to share in this post is likely lost forever.

Dang it. I shouldn’t have been a pirate whore.

From Schole’: “Pied Beauty”

Glory be to God for dappled things –

For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;

For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;

Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;

Landscape plotted and pieced – fold, fallow, and plough;

And all trades, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare and strange;

What is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)

With swift, slow; sweet, sour; dazzle, dim;

He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:

Praise him.

 

by Gerard Manley Hopkins, Poet-Priest, 1844-1889