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Search press releases
May 13th, 2008
Book Cover of the Week Raises Some Eyebrows
A poetry book from mid-sized publisher Crystal Dreams Publishing wins the Book Cover of the Week award, surprising some industry experts.
While no one has criticized the merits of the design of the book cover, normally
books receive awards and other accolades in their first year of life. “Stirring the Sky,” however, has led a
tortuous existence, with a limited initial print run, ownership of the
publishing company changing hands three times, and an extended stint of being
out of print. Any one of these issues would
be more than enough to send a normal book to the grave. “Stirring the Sky” has survived all of this
and has emerged with a renewed vigor. "I was completely surprised," says Fred Friedman, a New York book publicist, "most publishers would not waste their time submitting older books to contests, even if they were eligible. [The publisher] is really going beyond what we normally expect when they continue to support low-selling books that are four years old." Wisconsin-based Crystal Dreams Publishing, the company that initially
published “Stirring the Sky” back in March 2004, was facing bankruptcy when it
was rescued by 20-year publishing vetran Multi-Media Publications Inc. (MMP),
an independent Canadian publisher based in MMP president Alba Aguanno explained her rationale: “Many of the acquired books had no hopes of achieving profitability, or were just too poorly executed, so we kept them out of print. Others were put back in print because we saw a strong market for them, or we believed that with some fixing (such as new covers) they could contribute to our backlist sales. This book and a couple of others were anomalies for us – we were doubtful that they would break even, but the content and the artwork were so well done, that we thought we would take a big risk and put them back into production.” With the winning of the Book Cover of the Week Award, it appears that Aguanno’s gamble may pay off. “We hope that this award will spark an increase in sales for this title,” she says. “Perhaps the renewed interest in this book will create some drag-along sales for the other poetry titles in the lineup.” Those are big wishes for a genre that is known for very poor sales and short book lifespans. Yet, Aguanno’s optimism is encouraging. The poetry genre has seen critical interest but little commercial interest for far too long. Many poets are desperately looking for a publisher that will still take a risk on poetry. Despite this award, Crystal Dreams is not one to take any more risks with the genre: “I feel bad for new poets,” Aguanno notes, “as they have fewer and fewer outlets to share their art. Yes, there is the Internet, but there are now very, very few publishers who will put out a book of poetry. We hope that sales pick up for us in this genre, but we aren’t naïve enough to believe that this award will turn the genre around for us. For Crystal Dreams Publishing, we will see if we can sell out our poetry titles, but we don’t plan on taking on any new ones.” ----- ABOUT THE BOOK ABOUT THE PUBLISHER ABOUT THE AWARD # # #
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