Orca Book Publishers

I believe they have a thread in the Bewares and Background Checks.

ETA: Here it is. It was in Children's forum. Cassidy just had a book published with them. You might PM her for her experiences.

Orca has a VERY good reputation as a relatively small publisher of kids books. They have a big market with their series for reluctant readers and they're trying to expand their teen lines a lot. They are also trying to expand into the states, with new offices in Washington. There are a few Orca authors here, but I'm not one of them

Chicken Warrior said:

They are also trying to expand into the states, with new offices in Washington. There are a few Orca authors here, but I'm not one of them

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Does this mean they may be changing their policy in the future and accepting submissions from US authors?

I work at a university library in BC. Our children's section has many Orca titles, and I often see them in bookstores.
-Barbara

Hi,
I publish with Orca and think they're terrific. They have a good website (orcabook.com) with lots of information about the company, their submission guidelines and their books.

They promote their books well, including in the school system (advertising, catalogues, teacher's guides etc) and have sales reps in both Canada and the US. They have a US office and warehouse in Washington and distribute their books on both sides of the border.

Orca puts out about 60 titles a year I think, from picture books to YA, which actually makes them one of Canada's largest publishers of kids' book. I'm pretty new to all this but I have heard only good things about them from other authors too.

Hope that helps!

dobiwon said:

Does this mean they may be changing their policy in the future and accepting submissions from US authors?

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Possibly. At this time, I believe they still get grant money from the Canadian government. Canadian grants are very strict about Canadian publishers publishing Canadians, so their Washington office is just for distribution so far. I'm only guessing here, but I bet they won't give up their council grants anytime soon. The mostly likely situation for accepting American authors is that they open essentially a whole new house in the states that is legally its own entity, but shares distribution, etc. Having said that, they're already a very tough market and they probably don't have a lot of incentive to open themselves up to a huge influx in submissions.

They did a very nice book launch for Cassidy's book - it was packed!
-Barbara

I've put together a submission package for my YA novel. I'll send it off tomorrow and see how it goes.

Chumplet, can you keep us posted. I've been thinking of submitting to them myself.

I will!

I prepared a submission package for them this morning. Fingers crossed for both of us.

Sorry... forgot to report a form rejection March 19.

Chumplet said:

Sorry... forgot to report a form rejection March 19.

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Me too. Around the same date, I think.