Big thanks to Adam Groves of The Bedlam Files for his recent review of The Neo-Decadent Cookbook, edited by Brendan Connell and Justin Isis! And while you’re there, check out the VAST archive of book and film reviews – a fantastic reference!
You can find out more and order the book here: http://www.eibonvalepress.co.uk/books/books_neo-decadent.htm
Eibonvale Press will be open for submissions for a new anthology edited by Allen Ashley and Sarah Doyle. “Humanagerie” will showcase both poetry and short fiction on the theme of animals. The book will not be about animals as such, but will instead be inspired by the characteristics that animals possess, and the points at which these intersect with – and manifest in – humanity. It will also be based on the strange and beautiful adjectives used to describe such traits, such as:
and many many more. You will find a much larger list in the guidelines.
We are interested in shifting states, in scenarios that explore duality, hybridity, and liminality. We are asking writers to consider how animalistic attributes might manifest in the human psyche – or vice versa. We want hints of scales, tails, fur and fins… gills, claws, paws and spines… glimpses of horns, tusks, teeth and tongues… stalking, slinking, slithering and stomping… roars, whimpers, howls and song. We want breath, heat, musk. We want landscapes ranging from urban wastelands to frozen tundra, from bedsits to coastlines, from suburbia to savannah – and the imagined worlds between. We want water and we want fish out of water. We want the visceral and the vulnerable, the slippery and the synaesthetic, emergence and extinction.
The submissions window will run from March 1st until May 31st 2018. The word limits are up to 60 lines for poetry and 4,000 words for fiction.
The new Eibonvale Press Chapbook Line is now a reality, with no less than three small books available to order – in both hardcover and paperback. You don’t see that many hardcover chapbooks around unfortunately but I am really pleased with the results. The first set of books includes titles by Kristine Ong Muslim, D. F. Lewis and Tom Johnstone. They can be purchased either individually or as a set on the Eibonvale website: http://www.eibonvalepress.co.uk/chapbooks.html
And a reminder – I am still open for submissions for more chapbooks. Indeed, I hope to keep this permanent. I am especially keen to hear from the under-represented and those not published by Eibonvale before. You can find full details here: http://www.eibonvalepress.co.uk/infoforwriters.htm
It has been a while, unfortunately, since Eibonvale Press was open to public submissions. This is not a condition that I particularly like, since I always valued being open to new authors. However, sheer busyness means that I have to keep careful control of the press to avoid getting swamped – and in the end exhaustion from trying to do too much led to me taking a break entirely. Now however, I am releasing a call for works specifically for a new line of chapbooks that I am starting. I am looking for individual works or micro-collections of up to 10,000 words or so. You can see the full details and download the guidelines here:
http://www.eibonvalepress.co.uk/infoforwriters.htm
I am specifically keen to find some new faces here, especially the under-represented, which the press rather needs! Indeed, I am hoping that about two thirds of these will be people who have not been published by Eibonvale before.
I am seeing this line of chapbooks as visually rather different to the existing Eibonvale books, with covers based more on simple line-art rather than complex collages. The recent special offer chapbook by Brendan Connell is a simple example of what I have in mind, as is the kind of art that I have used before in the interior of certain books. For example, here and here.
I hope to do these chapbooks in both hardcover and paperback, both of which will be quite economically priced volumes. Tiny hardcovers are very much a possibility with my printers and they are not something I have experimented with until now. Hardcovers are still my favourite binding, and they do sell – sometimes even outselling the paperback edition – so there is really no reason why I should not make them here. Hopefully the hardcovers would be a nice collectable matching set!
I am really quite excited about this. Hopefully these chapbooks will be a lively thread running through Eibonvale Press for a while yet.
Eibonvale Press has been quiet lately while I treated myself to some much needed R&R – but now it is starting to wake up from it’s slumbers and there is new news in the air!
Pleasant Tales by Brendan Connell
I am happy to present a new collection by a familiar face here at Eibonvale press – Brendan Connell. Pleasant Tales – a follow-up to his earlier Unpleasant Tales (one of Eibonvale’s most successful titles) – is now available to preorder, complete with one of our special offers to get things going. The author has provided an exclusive chapbook entitled Curious Births to Light the Universe, limited to just 50 copies. Buy a hardcover of Pleasant Tales and you will get the chapbook for free while it lasts; we have also prepared a bundle deal with the paperback. You can find full information on the Eibonvale website (link below). I expect this to be a fairly brisk seller (some have already gone before I could even announce it!), so I would suggest that you head on over and grab a copy!
Human Maps by Andrew Hook
Just a reminder that our latest release, Andrew Hook’s collection Human Maps is also available to order here: http://www.eibonvalepress.co.uk/books/books_humanmaps.htm
Forthcoming Titles
And lastly a quick announcement of some future projects. I am in the process of updating the website (oh boy did it need it!) – including the ‘forthcoming’ section. So it is now a matter of public knowledge that more books are on the way. No going to sleep again now!
We have a new collection by Rosanne Rabinowitz, which will be released near the end of this year. And that will be followed by another familiar face – Douglas Thompson and his remarkable novel Barking Circus. Watch this space for info on these!
In addition, news that might be of interest to writers will be following shortly!
Two new Eibonvale titles are now available for order – and two very exciting ones. The first is a substantial new novel by Hal Duncan (author of Vellum and Ink) – Testament.
In the 21st century, a scalpel slices bible pages, passages spliced to restore lost truth. In the days of King Herod, the messias rises, calling to black sheep: walk with me. Now, here, between two aeons and across Æternity, a beloved student rebuilds his Gospel for the era of Anonymous: anarchist, socialist, atheist, revolutionary. Forget the tale you were spun and open your ears to the teacher who said, I will have mercy and not sacrifice. From the Hebridean fishing village of Capernaum, to a Jerusalem under Il Duce Pontius Pilate…
The Empire ends today.
The second new title is Scar City, a new collection by Joel Lane. This book was submitted to Eibonvale shortly before the author’s death and I am very excited indeed to release it now. It contains 22 stories and an essay by Nina Allan on the author’s Blue trilogy of novels.
Both of these are available to order now in hardcover, with paperbacks to follow. If anyone is interested in review copies, don’t hesitate to get in touch with details.
Not final!
Just time for some Eibonvale Press updates here. I am currently working on a re-release of Experiments at 3 Billion A.M. by Alexander Zelenyj – one of the earliest Eibonvale Books. I guess I have learned a lot since those days so here is a chance to put together a volume that is worthy to sit alongside Songs for the Lost, easily one of the best projects I have been involved in with the press and, if I may voice a personal opinion, one of the two most beautiful Eibonvale books! The book will have a newly designed cover and a more streamlined design has reduced the pagecount considerably, leading to a comfortable price reduction. In addition, the author has revisited the entire text, editing and changing it. However, the one thing that will remain the same is the 40 artworks included in there … yes, even THAT weird artwork of Grandmother Mars!
In addition, look out soon for the new edition of Allen Ashley’s first novel The Planet Suite, complete with lots of extras and new materials. That will be the second project to arrive.
In a previous post, I outlined the massive and crippling problems caused by the new EU VAT rules – so badly thought out that they threaten a vast amount of small enterprise, including this press. Now, in January, the changes have rolled out for digital products, with all products following some time down the line if we don’t find a way to stop it.
Just over one week into the digital side of the VAT apocalypse, we are starting to get a picture of the damage it is doing and the results are pretty much exactly as predicted – the exact same miserable litany that the activists have been trying to get into the heads of the officials ever since this came to light: business closures, the EU excluded from sales all over the world, even quite major 3rd party platforms unable to comply, even some accountants washing their hands of small businesses because they simply can’t cope with the problems. A new article on the EUVATACTION website details some of what is happening – it’s gloomy reading but kind of vital. However, please remember that this is just the small percentage of companies who have actually talked to EUVATAction, and that this still excludes vast numbers around the world who don’t even know about it. I have personally been in touch with several relevant providers of digital materials abroad (mostly ebooks) and not one had even heard of this yet.
How we got into this disastrous situation is still beyond me, but i will not start ranting about that again – you can read my frothings on my previous post if it gives you pleasure. But it is absolutely vital to get the message out that wherever you are in the world, and whatever you are doing, this affects you – not just sellers and publishers. As buyers in the EU, you are now cut off from material. As writers anywhere in the world, your markets have been messed around and limited. And of course the same thing applies to every other subject aside from the literary as well. Unless you are really happy to do all your research and shopping on Amazon, this affects you or will do if they roll it out for all products as they plan.
The mobilization of activism and pressure against this centred round EUVATACTION and certain facebook groups has been one of the biggest and best organised i have ever seen – that is the one comfort in this bizarre business.
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