Delivering to the EU under the GPSR – and the Christmas Rush

Delivering to the EU under the GPSR

I have just now, one day before the new GPSR regulation enters into force, been informed that my distributor will be able to continue deliveries to the EU after tomorrow. And that nothing will really change, for Eibonvale Press at least. Given the confusion and chaos surrounding this topic, I hope that is true!

I only found out about the EU’s latest sledgehammer regulation a few days ago and, like many, got into a panic thinking that the EU ‘market’ was finally closing off – that the bureaucracy would finally make selling anything to EU countries beyond possible. I had only a few days to try and find out information and the overall impression was that nobody at all really understood what was going to happen – including, one suspects, the people who created the damn thing in the first place!

It’s hard to say for sure but the feeling is that the regulations themselves are not so ill-intentioned – the problem is that EU regulators treat everyone, including small presses and struggling artists, as though they are international pharmaceutical companies or some such. This is not the first time they have done this. They show a deep obliviousness or carelessness about small-scale enterprise, creativity, doing things on a personal level, or just being interested in stuff. Do they assume that someone like me, who runs a tiny indie press that has never really made much profit in 20 years, can just find hundreds or thousands of extra £, or open offices in other countries, or has multiple departments and teams who can somehow get to grips with the confusion and complexity? I don’t know – it’s hard to avoid descending into rant territory after this exact same problem with bad regulations has arisen multiple times, and each time you end up thinking to yourself “Is this finally the one that ends it?”

As may have been the case with previous events, I hope the chaos will fade a little, things will settle down, they’ll revise the law as needed and clarify the stuff that urgently needs clarifying. I feel Eibonvale got lucky here, and I’m not sure how other presses will handle it in a worst case scenario. But for now, I will continue sending deliveries to the EU countries as usual.

The Christmas Rush

I also just wanted to let people know that we are deep in the pre-Christmas rush at the moment, which means orders are taking considerably longer than usual for the distributor to process. So if you have not received an order yet, I want to reassure you that they are going through the system. All outstanding orders have been sent through to them, as of now. But as always, if you want to check anything up, feel free to drop me an email and I’ll look into it.

Thanks everyone!

A Website Revamp and Some New Imprints

There are various items of Eibonvale news that I need to share, all at once. If you’ve been to the website ( http://www.eibonvalepress.co.uk/ ) in the last few days, you will have noticed that I have given the ageing and somewhat murky design a refresh. The new layout should be much clearer and easier to read. The new version comes with a lot of tweaks and changes, better info and a more streamlined layout, so if you find anything not working, do let me know!

More importantly, you may have noticed some entirely new pages on there. I have started a new branch of the press for photobooks, since I made up my mind to release Kessingland Autumn. There is nothing there yet, as I have yet to even start designing that one – but watch this space. Maybe one day I can even start opening up to other people’s ideas as well.

There is also an entirely new book imprint that has been brought into the fold – Somniatis Press. A Latin term that roughly translates as “You Dream”. This is a weird one, and basically, if Eibonvale is a bit of a fringe press – or fringe of the fringe – then Somniatis is the fringe of the fringe of the fringe! It’s a place for books that are even weirder, wilder, more experimental and maybe more dangerous than Eibonvale itself. It will be an occasional press, unlikely to release that many titles – but every so often, something will come along that will fit there.

The titles will also be limited editions, unlike Eibonvale. Not signed and numbered limited editions, but still a set number of copies that will eventually go out of print. I would very much like to do signed and numbered, but that would mean distributing them myself and the basic fact is that international postage costs have become so apocalyptic that I would rather keep the books as accessible as possible and use the existing international systems.

Somniatis press is very much in its infancy and for now, there is just one book currently available – from Eibonvale regular Alexander Zelenyj. His Hammer-Fights is a tiny yet brutal work. An illustrated mini-book of hammer-blows revealing the darkness that lies beneath the facades of our lives. This is a dark and experimental illustrated collection of micro-fictions and vignettes where Bizarro meets horror meets… something unexpected. See here for more: http://www.eibonvalepress.co.uk/somniatis/Hammerfights.htm

Meanwhile, the next titles to be released from Eibonvale itself will be D F Lewis’s novel Nemonymous Night and the revised and much-expanded edition of my own (David Rix’s) What the Giants were Saying. Thank you for your patience as we (Alice and myself) pick away at the many many different tasks that all this entails!