The Muse & The Marketplace 2020

Big publishing houses want big stories – stories that reaffirm what people already believe, stories that they “know” will sell well. Small presses, on the other hand, can-- and want to-- take bigger risks, challenging readers with unexpected stories. They often value quality and originality over marketability and "platform,” and give authors more personalized attention than a large press. This session features authors who had original, unexpected stories to tell, and who each eventually decided that a small press would give them greater freedom to tell these stories truthfully. Is your story "difficult?" Does it challenge dominant beliefs? Is your form creative or nontraditional? Then maybe a small press is right for you, too. This session will discuss how these authors made their choices, and suggest how you might make your own.