Why HoAm Presst?

Hillhead of Ardmiddle is the home I always dreamed of, a place where I can be truly creative. It therefore seemed fitting to use the name for the imprint. Given that the style of publication is small, in keeping with my artistic and creative belief system, HOAM Presst gives the flavour of the homemade. Quality not quantity prevails. Buying a HoAm Presst publication means you are buying work which could sit on the shelves of any bookshop, but which is unique enough to grace your bookshelf as a work of art. A lot of hard work, thought and effort went into the writing and the finished product is not something to be pulped, remaindered or touted in the market place as a cultural fashion item.

 

 

Some musings about the publishing 'industry'

Against market driven publishing.

Politically I have been an anti-capitalist for more years than I care to remember. This has implications for one's whole life and it has always been of paramount importance to me that I live in accordance with my belief systems. This means that I cannot happily engage with a publication system which exists solely to make money for publishers and retailers. The society I live in is a market driven economy. I resist that. Therefore I cannot expect it to support me. My response is HoAm Presst Publishing. I need to own the means of my own production.

Problems and Resistance

Self-publishing is derided as a form of vanity publishing by the mainstream market (but then it would be, because it undermines the market driven system to some extent) Self-publishing is encouraged when it becomes small scale mainstream publishing - at that point the writer just becomes a smaller (and less successful) member of the market driven publishing system. I don't want to do that. I object to the whole system. So how to get your work out there? How to get people to read your work? The oldest way in the world is word of mouth. In a modern world this can be virtual word of mouth too. I retain a level of cynicism that 'word of mouth' has also become subject to market-driven forces as people have lost the ability to make their OWN free discerning choices. They don't like things unles they are TOLD to like them. I am a creative artist. I don't have time to change the system but nor do I want to live IN the system. So I RESIST the system and have developed the only alternative that makes sense to me. A work of literature is only realised when it is PRINTED. You might say it's only fully realised when people READ it. So I will provide the means for a limited number of people to read my work, to fully realise it, and where it goes from there is part of my other guiding belief WU WEI (which more or less means 'don't go against nature') It's not fate, it's not chance, it's just LIFE.

Compromises

If people who read the works want to publish or produce them because they see some merit in their world (or think they can make some money out of me) I'm happy to talk to them but it's not my main aim in life. Neither money nor the business of publishing are things I want to waste my time with. If people want to turn my art into product that's fine but it will be done in discussion with me not with me being held in thrall to the system.

You won't find barcodes on HoAm Presst books because they are not published with the aim of seeking a home in the market place. They seek a home on the bookshelves of individuals who don't buy things because they are told to or because they believe the hype of market driven reviews, but because they find that the books have something to say to them personally.