Fifteen Years as W&W Publisher
This summer I realized that it’s been fifteen years since I became the publisher at Wolsak and Wynn. It’s been an interesting journey, to say the least. When I pitched the idea of my purchasing the press to the founder, Marja Jacobs, I had no money and only a few years of experience in the industry. I also quickly discovered I was pregnant with my first child. But Marja felt I had the potential to be a good publisher and was willing to work out a creative payment option for me to purchase the company from her. I learned much from her about publishing (and about life) and will be forever grateful for the opportunity she gave me.
Publishing with two small children at home kept me busy and kept the press grounded. It’s not always been easy – we’ve had grants go up and down; we’ve had printers fail, taking with them thousands of our dollars. Over the years there’s been more than a few people who couldn’t believe I was the publisher of W&W. Either well-meaning types who suggested I consider working for other great presses that they knew of who would really support a sharp young woman like myself (I gently explained I owned the company) or less well-meaning types who were flummoxed that I could decide what happened with their manuscript.
Through it all the press has grown and changed. We’ve added imprints, we’ve won awards, we’ve published amazing books by deeply talented authors. The press has gathered together a brilliant group of editors, designers and publishing professionals who are able to fairly regularly work miracles. Now I feel – fifteen years in – that I mostly know how publishing works. It takes a long time to get your feet under you in this industry, which has a deep history and strange customs. Just ask any publisher about returns, and you’ll understand what I mean. I’m not done learning, of course; the best thing about publishing is the new ideas, new writers and new stories that are always coming to you. But it does mean that I feel like now that I understand how publishing traditionally works, and how to be an effective publisher, we can choose to do things a little differently.
Which is why our fall catalogue is so different from our previous, traditional ones. Which is why we’re more interested in sharing our team approach to publishing and in celebrating the community we’re bringing books out into. Independent bookstores are our best friends.
Traditional publishing wisdom is that no one remembers who the publisher is, just the author. There is a reason for this – authors are the heart of publishing. Without them, there would be no stories to share. But we should know who the publishers are. We should know who the team is that takes that fabulous manuscript and turns it into a gorgeous book and gets the word out to our readers. Even a one-person play has a group behind it that makes the play happen.
So now there are more names on our copyright pages, there are more faces in our catalogues and we’ll be doing things just a little bit slant of industry expectations. I think the result is going to be fabulous. I can’t wait for the next fifteen years.
