Who We Are!

[Andrew Hook]

Hi all

Thanks to Brian for kindly providing us with this discussion board.

As some of you may know, I have been running Elastic Press since November 2002. Our focus is specifically single-author short story collections which we publish on 1st February, 1st May, 1st August, and 1st November each year; together with the occasional anthology. In 2005 we won two British Fantasy Society awards, one for best anthology ("The Alsiso Project"), and the second as Best Small Press. In 2006, we won another award for best anthology for our collection of number-themed stories, "The Elastic Book of Numbers".

Our books can be obtained through any good bookstore, and we are distributed by Central Books in the UK. We always prefer orders directly via our website of course, but ultimately we want our books to be read!

Elastic Press is me (editor, proof-reader, typesetter), Marie O'Regan (webmistress), and Dean Harkness (cover and layout designer).

Please feel free to ask any questions about us in this thread.

[Ian Whates]

Hi Andrew,

Nice to see you with your own little corner of Chronicles!

[Andrew Hook]

Cheers Ian...send everyone else over will you

[Brown Rat]

Howdy, and welcome.

[I, Brian]

Hi Andrew, and welcome to chronicles.

[dwndrgn]

Welcome Andrew!

I've a couple of questions.

First, can you tell us of some of the authors who's stories you publish?
Second, are they previously written stories or written specifically for these books?
And third, related to #2, are any of the stories previously published?

Thanks!

[Andrew Hook]

Thanks for the welcomes!

Onto the questions:

1. we publish a wide range of authors. Some of whom, taking Mat Coward for example, have had work published over a number of years: stories in Interzone, The Third Alternative, various anthologies, as well as the popular writer's guide "Success and How To Avoid It" which was published by TTA Press, in addition to a number of crime books Mat has had published in the States. But as well as those old hands as it were, we've also published newcomer Maurice Suckling, whose "Photocopies of Heaven" represents his first published work and contains totally original and all previously unpublished stories. Incidentally, more information on the authors can be found on the website (Elastic Press - Publishing at the edges of reality and fantasy) where each author we've published has a small page detailing themselves and their work;

2. Most of the collections collate previously published material simply because the writers we work with tend to have had several successes along the way before they approach us; however wherever possible we do try to add new stories into each collection. However, as with Maurice Suckling mentioned above, and also David Swann and Kay Green, the majority of stories in their collections hadn't been published before. So there are no hard and fast rules. If I like the stories, then they go into the book. It's as simple as that!

3. Took the questions out of order as it seemed more logical to respond that way. Most authors approach me with a specific collection already written, but sometimes - particularly if it's a shorter book and we have time to add more material - I am agreeable to them adding more stories as they write them up to six months before publication date (or in the case of one author, up to one day before it went to the printers, but I wouldn't want to repeat that experience!). So we're very flexible.

The bottom line really with these answers is that if we like your material enough to want to publish it, then it doesn't matter if you're a "name" or a "newcomer", if the stories have appeared before or if they haven't. We're always prepared to take the risk!