Publishing and packaging
EnvelopeBooks is a cool, old-fashioned generalist publisher, and we’re constantly on the lookout for new manuscripts—but they have to be good. Unlike many small independents, we’re very selective. We only take writing that’s ambitious and that impresses us. Inevitably, most of what is offered to us (and we get a lot) doesn’t make the cut. That’s the downside.
The upside is that we welcome submissions, whether fiction or non-fiction, from all over the world, and we process submissions very quickly. Also, we don’t ask you to send us rafts of supporting paperwork. We don’t need biographies or explanations about why you wanted to become a writer or whether you edited your high-school magazine. Just send us the goddam manuscript—because that’s all that counts.
Don’t put anything in the post. Just email us: we always respond quickly. And after reviewing your submission, we’ll let you know whether we like what we see or recommend your taking it elsewhere.
If we like your book we’ll then assess whether it has commercial potential. Not all books do. We may conclude that your offering would look good as an EnvelopeBooks publication, but may not sell readily in what is a very competitive market. In that case we’ll suggest alternative ways of packaging it for publication.
There’s no shame in this: just because a book is unlikely to sell to the mass public doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be treated with respect. That’s true of authors too: you put in a lot of hard work getting your draft finished; you don’t then deserve to be humiliated, by having to write lengthy and intrusive submission documents or by being kept waiting for months (or simply ignored). Big publishers and agents think such behaviour is normal; we think it’s an abuse.
To send us something, email: editor@envelopebooks.co.uk
Some books are written for personal reasons. That should not disqualify them from being produced to the same professional standards as any commercial publication. If what you want is to share thoughts and memories and family histories with relatives and friends, we have an imprint called PostcardBooks, and we can provide you with all the support necessary to bring out the best book possible.
For more information, click our Publish a Memoir link, below
