Unnamed Press (formerly Ricochet Books)

[Savant99]

Attempted launch in 2013 by Chris Heiser and Olivia Smith as Ricochet Books, but ran into troubles with a poetry imprint with the same name. Relaunched in 2014 as Unnamed Press. They are based in Los Angeles, and tend to favor foreign writers and genre-defying manuscripts. The founders are both formerly from the Los Angeles Review of Books, where they met and decided to start an independent press.

They list just over 20 published titles at the time this post was written, and are distributed through Publishers Group West. They seem to be averaging about 10 titles a year at their current pace. They are making some deals with literary agents, since I did get some 'dealmaker' hits from Publishers Marketplace that show an agent making a deal with Unnamed Press. A sister imprint, Phoneme Media, is a nonprofit press that focuses on poetry. Another imprint, 'Unzipped' is in the process of being launched this year. That imprint will be digital only, and is geared towards romance titles.

I've done some digging, and they seem to have some good press coverage.

Unnamed Press Creating Home For Contemporary Authors (Publishers Weekly)

Unnamed Press is Making Waves by Defying Genres (Chicago Review of Books)

Talking with the publishers of new L.A.-based Unnamed Press (Los Angeles Times)

LA’s Unnamed Press: Relatable Foreign Fiction, Unlikely Protagonists (Publishing Perspectives)

Chris Heiser, editor and publisher of The Unnamed Press, on the imprint's mission and vision (YouTube)


Websites & social media:

Main website
Facebook
Twitter
Tumblr


So, that's what I have on this publisher. Given that they are relatively new, it's hard to find much about working with them. They don't list much of info about queries or submissions, other than, "Queries and submissions can be addressed to info @ unnamedpress DOT com." The press looks favorable, so they certainly have made a name for themselves. But has anyone else heard of them before? Does anyone know of any complaints or the like?

 

[C Alberts]

I don't know anything about them from an author's perspective, but I can say they seem to be doing things right in terms of efforts to get into bookstores. Solid distribution with PGW, as you said, and I've seen a couple of galleys for some of their books. They look pretty good, and they are getting them to store buyers. It also looks like they are getting reviews in Kirkus regularly and some in Library Journal as well. Whether or not this is translating into sales, I don't know. But I see no red flags from where I sit.

(I do wonder if the PGW distribution situation will change much now that Ingram bought it out, and how that will impact all these great little presses, but that's a bigger conversation and probably suited for a different part of the forum...)

 

[Feuilleton]

Has anyone submitted? Given the lack of guidelines, I don't really know what to send.

 

[Glidebfree22]

I am happy to say that their guidelines seem to be: Send us your book.
I sent an excerpt, they liked it, they followed up and asked for the complete manuscript and now...hoping for the best.
Really nice, thoughtful, open-minded people as far as I can tell.

 

[Feuilleton]

Thanks for the info & congratulations on the request! Hope it goes well

 

[pullman]

Attempted launch in 2013 by Chris Heiser and Olivia Smith as Ricochet Books, but ran into troubles with a poetry imprint with the same name. Relaunched in 2014 as Unnamed Press. They are based in Los Angeles, and tend to favor foreign writers and genre-defying manuscripts. The founders are both formerly from the Los Angeles Review of Books, where they met and decided to start an independent press.

They list just over 20 published titles at the time this post was written, and are distributed through Publishers Group West. They seem to be averaging about 10 titles a year at their current pace. They are making some deals with literary agents, since I did get some 'dealmaker' hits from Publishers Marketplace that show an agent making a deal with Unnamed Press. A sister imprint, Phoneme Media, is a nonprofit press that focuses on poetry. Another imprint, 'Unzipped' is in the process of being launched this year. That imprint will be digital only, and is geared towards romance titles.

I've done some digging, and they seem to have some good press coverage.

Unnamed Press Creating Home For Contemporary Authors (Publishers Weekly)

Unnamed Press is Making Waves by Defying Genres (Chicago Review of Books)

Talking with the publishers of new L.A.-based Unnamed Press (Los Angeles Times)

LA’s Unnamed Press: Relatable Foreign Fiction, Unlikely Protagonists (Publishing Perspectives)

Chris Heiser, editor and publisher of The Unnamed Press, on the imprint's mission and vision (YouTube)


Websites & social media:

Main website
Facebook
Twitter
Tumblr


So, that's what I have on this publisher. Given that they are relatively new, it's hard to find much about working with them. They don't list much of info about queries or submissions, other than, "Queries and submissions can be addressed to info @ unnamedpress DOT com." The press looks favorable, so they certainly have made a name for themselves. But has anyone else heard of them before? Does anyone know of any complaints or the like?

I just looked through their fiction books from 2015 to present and read their ratings and review stats and none of them are very high, like under 100 ratings (one book, the annie year had over 300 and one guy had over 200). Does this mean the authors have to do their own marketing?

 

[frimble3]

This is a minor quibble, but they couldn't have found a better name than 'Unnamed Press'?

That's not going to help authors publicize their books!
And along the spine, it makes the book look like a mock-up. The equivalent of 'Your name here'.

Still, as long as they do right by their authors, I wish them all the best!

 

[Feuilleton]

Has anyone submitted here lately and gotten a response? Duotrope has them taking 36 to 576 days to respond, which is a bit of a wide range!

 

[Maryn]

Wow, 576 days to respond? If that were my submission, I'd have chalked it off and moved on well before that.

 

[Feuilleton]

Maybe the 576 days was a CNR... their guidelines look like no reply means no:
Due to the extremely high volume of submissions we receive, we cannot confirm receipt of every query. If we are interested we will contact you directly.