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What’s On Your Summer Reading List?

Independent Fiction is Scarce on Mainstream Summer Reading Lists -- and They Don't Know What They're Missing...

by Jim Barnes

What’s on your list? If you made your Summer Reading choices based on the lists offered up by major U.S. media, it isn’t likely to include any independently published titles. This year’s “beach book” lists are particularly mainstream; both the NYTimes and Wall Street Journal lists were indie-free, as were those of most network TV news shows.

This is a sad state of affairs, and one that occurs every summer -– it seems critics are particularly subject to corporate publishing hype this time of year. While new and regional fiction from independent presses continues to get stronger, these great books still battle for respect and attention in both the media and the marketplace.

At this year’s BEA panel on the state of newspaper book review sections, L.A. Times book review editor Steve Wasserman admitted that he usually passes over indies because the output of mainstream presses is already much larger than he has the space to cover. During NPR’s Talk of the Nation annual Summer Reading on-air discussion, indies did fare a bit better: of the 21 adult books mentioned by the panel of critics, six were independently published, and of the ten books mentioned by callers, 4 were indies.

Well, my summer reading list includes several beach bags’ worth of independently published fiction. This year’s IPPY-award winning titles alone will keep me busy -- both of our General Fiction and Mystery/Thriller categories had so many award-worthy titles that each had to be expanded with an extra finalist. See the results of all nine adult fiction categories on our IPPY results page, and I’ll include my own “top ten” list here, comprised of the winners and finalists in our General Fiction, Short Story Fiction, and Multicultural Fiction categories:

General Fiction Winner: The God File, by Frank Turner Hollon (MacAdam/Cage)
Finalists: Avoidance, by Michael Lowenthal (Greywolf Press)
One Foot in Eden, by Ron Rash (Novello Festival Press)
Cloud Cuckoo Land, by Lisa Borders (River City Publishing)

Short Story Fiction Winner: Coal Miner’s Holiday, by Kiki DeLancey (Sarabande Books)
Finalists: Small Accidents, by Andrew Gray (Rain Coast Books)
McSweeny’s 7, various authors (McSweeny’s Books)

Multicultural Winner: Soy la Avon Lady and Other Stories, by Lorraine López (Curbstone Press)
Finalists: Not My Bowl of Rice, by E.R. Escober (1st Books Library)
Red Thunder, by David Matheson (Media Weavers LLC)

I spoke with some of the editors and publishers of these fine books during the BEA show, and asked them for their assessment of the attention they’re getting from reviewers, booksellers, and the media, and about some of the challenges they’re facing as publishers of independent fiction today.

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Alexander “Sandy” Taylor is co-director (along with Judith Ayer Doyle) of Curbstone Press, the non-profit, 28-year-old publisher of books that “promote human rights and inter-cultural understanding.” Sandy’s first comment was to defend and compliment Wasserman, saying that the L.A. Times “is one of the major papers that does pay more attention to independent presses than most others. It is also one of the few papers that run poems in their book review section.” Taylor also sings the praises of The Dallas Morning News and The Washington Post in this regard.

“That said, we must all recognize the terrible shrinkage in review space brought about by corporate conglomeration and the corporate demand that review sections show a profit, so that the percentage of space devoted to advertising increases while the review space grows smaller,” says Taylor.

“If you are a web surfer like me, you can get severely depressed by going from paper to paper, sometimes not even seeing ‘Books’ on the main menu and frequently seeing the same books reviewed by chain papers, many of them wonderful books, of course, but all too frequently very thin books puffed by large advertising budgets and hype. A case in point is Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez's The Dirty Girls Social Club, a very slight book blown into national attention by a gale of advertising dollars, trying to capitalize on the success of such brilliant writers as Sandra Cisneros by marketeers who have recently discovered that "Latina" literature can make money. Nor should we criticize them for it.”

“The engine that drives the commercial house is profit; the engine that drives the non-profit press is mission. You can't blame a butterfly for being a butterfly nor a scorpion for being a scorpion. What is amazing to me is that in this context, so many really fine books are being published by commercial houses, some of which still invest in their writers over the long haul -- consider the case of Harcourt and Saramago, or the amazing work done by Farrar, Straus & Giroux.”

I asked Sarah Gorham, editor-in-chief at Sarabande Books about the challenge of marketing fiction in the retail marketplace: “We've received solid support from independents, libraries, and the academic market. Our progress with the chains is slowing, and we've suffered from astronomical returns.”

Taylor agreed: “Independent and non-profit publishers like Curbstone find themselves in severe competition for promotional attention in bookstores.” He cited the example of how Borders offers an end-cap positioning "near the main traffic or power aisles of the store" for four weeks at $4,000. “This is hardly practical for a book of poetry or mid-list fiction, since it would be nearly impossible to recover even the advertising cost.”

“And the continuing conglomeration of publishing companies has created a number of large and effective marketing organizations that have the money to pay booksellers for prime placement and other promotional activity, often continuing through the course of the entire year. Consequently, prime space that might once have been dedicated to books that the bookseller felt deserved his consumers' attention is now sold, cutting the small independent presses out of the running. The net result is that important literary titles are often not featured but end up spine out on the shelves -- if they are even stocked at all.”

The growth of the book superstores has been a mixed blessing for small publishers, according to Taylor. “As this trend was evolving, superstores added many small press titles to their inventories. These books added diversity, breadth, and size to their stock mix. In addition, some of these retailers replenished stock on their titles through computerized inventory systems. At the same time, competition from these well financed new stores (which often opened very close to established independent bookstores) put serious pressure on the small and mid-level stores which had traditionally been the key supporters of small press publishing. The result has been that hundreds of these independents have closed since the 1990s. And gone with them are the long term relationships developed between these stores and many small presses.”

“Luckily, there are still many great independent bookstores left -- City Lights, Elliott Bay, Food for Thought, Modern Times, Politics and Prose, Powell's, and The UConn Co-op, to name just a few. These stores care about literature, hand-sell books, and help promote titles though their ‘staff picks.’ In addition, working with the American Booksellers Association BookSense program offers independent presses a great avenue for promotion that depends on quality, rather than promotional dollars.”

In spite of the challenges and pressures of the marketplace, both Taylor and Gorham feel that, from an editorial point of view, it is a great time to be publishing small press fiction.

”Sarabande considers itself a launching pad for new writers, but also as a superlative alternative for mid-career and mid-list fiction writers who are sometimes abandoned by mainstream publishers,” says Gorham. “We see our role both as rescuing talent and as offering a place to begin.”

“With the entertainment business taking over much of publishing, profit expectations have risen, forcing many mid-list writers out of the commercial market, so that the quality of submissions to independent presses is steadily increasing,” explains Taylor. “Many new and mid-list writers recognize independent publishing houses as suitable homes where they can get the attention they deserve and where their books will stay in print -- instead of being shredded if initial sales do not meet corporate expectations.”

“From a marketing point of view, publishing fiction, especially debut fiction, is a big challenge, particularly in the current recession. Literary fiction is difficult to get reviewed and difficult to sell. Even with good review coverage, initial sales tend to be modest. I think you have to consider it an investment in the writer's career and in your own backlist. Under the right circumstances, a good literary book will sell more over time than a beach-reading novel that goes up like a starshell and disappears in a year or so.”

Both publishers feel the pressure of finding good fiction, marketing it, and then going through the pain of losing writers who move on once they’ve made a name for themselves. “We want what is best for our writers, and applaud their success,” says Gorham. “But when they go on to mainstream houses before we earn back the investment made in their careers, we can't help but wish we could see some of the benefits financially.”

“One of the main goals of Curbstone is to help authors get into the mainstream and to expand the audience for their vision,” concurs Taylor. “I can't think of a better reputation for a non-profit press than to be the publisher that can help you go on to Norton, Harper/Collins or Simon and Schuster. On the other hand, for mid-list writers, the non-profit press may be a better home since the books are subsidized and have a much better chance of remaining in print.”

It may be this unselfish attitude that keeps authors coming to presses like Curbstone and Sarabande, and one can only hope that their dedication to literature and authors will pay off in the form of a breakaway bestseller. “The one concern many of us have is that a number of independents are ‘graying,’ says Taylor. “We’ll soon have to seriously face the problem of transition of leadership or disappear. On the other hand, it is encouraging to see so many vibrant new presses springing up.”

Amen to that. Most all of the presses listed above in the IPPY list are among the “new presses,” and their vibrancy is incredible. They may not be on the big Summer Reading lists, but they are producing an endless ocean of great indie titles, just waiting to be discovered, read, and shared.

Dive in!

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