Identifying legitimate small presses

Small press

Distribution. Small press or not, the books they publish should show up in better bookstores everywhere.

The small press is always on the verge of bankruptcy; those who own small presses tend to be skeletal thin and emaciated. The scammer is always smearing dollar bills all over his naked body, which usually has its own gravity well and zip code.

I hope this helps!

I think this is a very good question, and one that I'm still trying to answer for myself - have a partial on consideration right now with a small press. The reason I picked this particular one was it being listed at Agent Query.com as legitimate, having a glowing recommendation from P&E, and also based on answers to my questions to a few members here that I'd recalled either did business with this publisher, or had some prior knowledge of them.

My first thought was "make sure they're for real". My second thought was "make sure they're not fly-by-night." My third thought a bit muddled and included "what's for dinner tonight" and "they'll just reject me, too."

Now, while I'm waiting to hear back, I'm trying hard not to have any more thoughts.

As JAR noted, the most important factor is bookstore presence. If they get their product on (national) store shelves then your baby will be side-by-side with the Big Boys. Can't complain about that.

Newbies need to be aware of weasel wording like "your book will be available in...." All that means is it can be special ordered, not that it will be stocked. We want 'em stocked!

Yup. What they said: distribution.

Here's a good list of independent and smaller presses, including university presses (with links) from newpages.com, a respected site that also lists independent book stores, literary magazines, etc.

http://www.newpages.com/npguides/bookpubs.htm

Another suggestion: ask your local bookseller for ideas! I got a couple of good suggestions from the manager of one of our well known local independent book stores. His criteria were succinct: a smaller publisher needs to be professional--and have good distribution.

Susan