Upstart Indie
Press Gaining Recognition As A Breakout Publisher With Award-Winning Books
Running Wild Press, a small indie publisher with nearly two
dozen titles in its four year publishing history, has produced two books
selected by Kirkus Reviews as Indie
Books of the Year for 2019.
“We publish stories that cross genres with great stories and
writing that don’t fit neatly in a box,” says Founder and Executive Editor Lisa
Diane Kastner, who is also an author.
One of the two book-of-the-year selections is Frontal
Matter: Glue Gone Wild by Suzanne Samples, a moving memoir about the
author’s struggle to live with terminal brain cancer at age 36. The other is Dark
Corners by Reuben “Tihi” Hayslett, a series of explosive essays and
narratives written with unsettling illumination that touch upon racism, LGBTQ,
and the human condition in a Trumpian world.
“The book marketplace is growing and expanding, because
publishers like Running Wild Press are wisely filling a void. We target stories
that the public craves by lesser pursued authors. Those stories that aren’t
perceived to be safe to publish,” says Kastner. Her press is promoted to the
media by the PR firm that I work for, and in getting to know them, I can say they
publish some terrific books that would otherwise go unpublished.
The book industry publishes over 4,000 titles every single
day yet some stories don’t see the light of day and that’s Running Wild Press’s
focus.
Some recent local
and national accomplishments of Running Wild Press include these:
●
Short stories have been nominated for the Horror Writers
Association Brahm Stoker Award.
●
They have had several stories nominated for Pushcart Prizes, PEN
Awards, and the National Book Award.
●
Their books have been included in gift bags for presenters and
nominees for the SAG Awards and the Grammy Awards and were included in gift
bags for VIPS who attended the George Lopez Celebrity Golf Tournament.
●
They sponsored a mini-literature festival at Gatsby Books in Long
Beach in partnership with the Long Beach Literary Arts Center.
“We started the press because we read too many great stories
that never found a readership,” adds Kastner. “We wanted to create a
platform. We look for unusual tales that
mainstream publishing won’t pick up because the story is not neatly defined.”
For more information about Running
wild Press, please see: www.runningwildpress.com.
Below is an interview with
Running wild Press Founder Lisa Kastner.
- Lisa,
what inspired you to launch an indie book publishing company, Running Wild
Press?
When I ran a writers
community and a non-profit writers organization, I encountered tons of
brilliant writers who weren’t published. I’d ask why and many times the answer
was that they received beautiful rejections that simply said that the story
didn’t quite fit the publication. Or
they tried to get agents and the agent politely said that she didn’t think the
piece fit with her list and wished the author well. These were truly great
stories which couldn’t make it to readers. So I decided to create a publishing
house that focused on great stories with great writing that didn’t fit neatly
in a box. That became Running Wild Press.
- What challenges have
you been confronting? Honestly,
our biggest challenge has been getting the attention of most mainstream
publishing, reviewers, and marketing circles. We’ve been blessed to
receive amazing reviews from Kirkus but we’ve submitted our books for
review to other mainstream reviewers to no avail. This is a shame because I’m positive
that if they’d simply read the stories, they’d love them.
- Does the book
publishing universe have room, in the marketplace for yet another
publisher, given some 4,000 titles are cranked out every day in America? Absolutely. There’s room for everyone. We should
all be working together to help each other so that we can get our stories
to readers. No one reads only a
single story. Readers are readers and many read across genres and forms,
so let’s give them lots of options.
- You are a writer and
editor as well. How does it feel to put on the publisher thinking cap to
determine which books should be published? At first it felt like I didn’t have the right to
do that: a kind of Imposter Syndrome. Then one day I was looking at a
lovely memory book I was given when I graduated from Fairfield University
with an MFA and most of the comments were about what an amazing editor I
was and how I had an eye for talent. Seeing those comments from professors
and fellow students gave me the courage to get over my Imposter Syndrome
and give it a shot. Of course, with every title we put into publication, I
get that feeling again, but when we get amazing feedback from reviewers
and readers then I know we made the right choice.
5. Are you shocked at having two books selected by Kirkus Reviews for Indie Book of the
Year in 2019? Absolutely!
I was shocked when half of the titles we submitted for reviews received starred
reviews. Imagine my thrill when we also had two books named to the best of
2019. I was completely overjoyed. The authors, Suzanne Samples and Reuben
“Tihi” Hayslett, as well as their editors more than deserved the destinctions.
The works speak for themselves.
6. What trends are you seeing in book publishing today? There’s a greater emphasis on
independent publishing. More authors are taking the plunge to either start
presses and publish others or to focus on their own work and self publishing.
There’s also more hybrid authors - authors
who both self publish and publish with bigger houses. Once upon a time, that
was considered a no-no. Now it’s pretty common. Also, once upon a time, if
someone published in one genre then they were stuck in that genre. For example,
if you were published in horror then publishing houses and publications only
reached out to you for horror stories. Now, authors are published across genres
quite frequently.
- Define what you like to
green-light for Running Wild Press. I’m the first to review all submissions. Nothing goes forward
without my approval. When I’m looking at submissions I’m looking for a
strong story set up in the initial five pages, I’m looking for a strong
voice. I want to see something in the narrative or way that the story’s
being told that’s a bit unusual or unique. And I’m looking for a
perspective that we haven’t necessarily seen before. I’m also looking for
cross genre - so stories that don’t fit neatly in a box. For example, Suzanne Samples FRONTAL
MATTER: GLUE GONE WILD is a memoir about her experience with fighting
brain cancer but it’s told in a flash fiction style of writing that’s more
stream of conciousness. It has a very funny and positive outlook, which
was refreshing. For DARK CORNERS by Reuben “Tihi” Hayslett, Tihi’s
collection shares stories with unique points of view and in-your-face
narratives.
- Why do you believe most
publishers ignore publishing the type of books – narrative poems, short
stories, novellas, niche non-fiction – that you run towards with open
arms? I honestly think that
mainstream publishers shy away from those forms because they don’t think
that they can make money off of them. The reality is that a narrative poem
is simply a great story told in a poetry format. Short stories and
novellas are the easiset forms of writing to be translated to film or television
because of the story arcs, structures, and narrative threads. Those are
missed opportunities.
- You say too many books
come from whites and males. Why do you think the books published don’t
reflect the diversity of Americans? Before we started the publishing house, I would have said that
it’s purely an unconscious bias. I do believe that there is an unconcious
bias but it’s not the only reason. I think part of it is that sometimes
writers simply don’t know where to send their works so they’re sending
them to the wrong publications or publications that are already gluttoned
with submissions and tend to stick with authors they’ve already published.
I also think that, for
whatever reason, white males are more persistent. For example, we recently had
a call for novellas and at one point only a third of the submissions were
authored by females. So, I posted on social media and asked for more females to
submit their novellas. Guess what happened? I received a slew of new submissions
- from males who wrote from a female protagonist’s perspective. Seriously?
Somehow the men perceived that as a call for them to send their best female
imitation? Women especially need to get
better at simply going for it, otherwise we’ll never get to equilibrium.
10. You say you are a small press that brings great stories from new
voices out into the world. How do these specialty stories push boundaries of
genre and perspective? One
comment I received about FRONTAL MATTER: GLUE GONE WILD by Suzanne Samples from
a reviewer was that they’d never seen a memoir about cancer that was so funny
and optimistic. Each book that we publish gives the reader something new,
something unique to experience. This
year we’re publishing TURING’S GRAVEYARD: STORIES by Terence Hawkins. It’s
already gotten a starred review and it comes out in May. Terry brings these
funny, snarky, dark and complex characters and stories to life. He takes genres
and puts them in a blender then pours them out to see what happens. It’s a
blast. Another example of someone willing to let the stories run wild (See what
I did there).
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Brian Feinblum’s
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at brianfeinblum@gmail.com. He feels much more important when discussed in
the third-person. This is copyrighted by BookMarketingBuzzBlog ©2020. Born and
raised in Brooklyn, he now resides in Westchester. His writings are often
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This was named one of the best book marketing blogs by Book Baby http://blog.bookbaby.com/2013/09/the-best-book-marketing-blogs and recognized by Feedspot in 2018 as one of the
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resource.” He recently hosted a panel on book publicity for Book Expo America.
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