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2012 has been generous to three facets of my career: the publishing company, speakers' agency and my writing.
2012 kicked off with the launch of Susanne Gervay and Anna Pignataro's Ships in the Field. What a great success this book has been for Ford Street. Susanne of course is the consummate promoter. She has travelled around the world promoting this title, so much so we're getting requests from both the UK and the US for copies.
Other titles that have gone exceedingly well are Gary Crew and Den Scheer's In the Beech Forest. Gary, of course, is one of Australia's most awarded children's authors. I coupled him with first time illustrator, Den Sheer, whose art I first spotted at the Children's Charity Network award ceremonies. Trust Me Too edited by Paul Collins with a foreword by Judith Ridge has been similarly successful. Judith runs WestWords in Sydney, and also MCed our highly successful PD Reading Beyond 2012 seminar in Sydney. This anthology contains great original illustrations and stories from authors and illustrators such as Shaun Tan, Leigh Hobbs, Marc McBride and Oliver Phommavanh, Michael Gerard Bauer, Pat Flynn and James Roy. I asked Isobelle Carmody for a 1500 word story and she generously wrote a 9000 word novelette 'The Journey' is a prequel to Obernewtyn. What a collection!
Sequels that keep on selling have been the action-packed thrill rides Gamers' Challenge by the effervesent George Ivanoff and Dyson's Drop by Paul Collins.
For the first time ever one of our titles over-subscribed, which means booksellers ordered more copies than we printed. This was Michael Salmon's The Down-under 12 Days of Christmas. We also reprinted the delightful Isobelle Carmody's Greylands. Grant Gittus, designer extraordinaire and all-round nice guy came up with a stunning cover and Isobelle both revised the book and wrote a foreword on why she wrote the book. Ford Street also published first-timer Michelle Heeter's Riggs Crossing, a gritty book that is receiving its fair share of critical acclaim.
Both Ships in the Field and Trust Me Too sold into book clubs, which means thousands of copies sold before they were even printed.
We also broke into ebooks – right now we have fifteen digital books available on both Kindle and in epub across the web. (See the list further down.)
Here are some samples:
Sean McMullen's Changing Yesterday: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B006VXOL3W
Paul Collins's Mole Hunt: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B006VXXHB4
Foz Meadows's The Key to Starveldt: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B006VXONGC.
Here are some links to reviews:
Candida Baker gives In the Beech Forest a feature review in the SMH: http://tinyurl.com/7rv2hm4
Dyson's Drop: http://tinyurl.com/d7n8zws
Gamers' Challenge: http://narrellemharris.wordpress.com/2012/07/28/review-gamers-challenge-by-george-ivanoff/
Trust Me Too: http://georgeivanoff.com.au/2012/08/05/in-the-news-with-trust-me-too/
Riggs Crossing: http://tazziebookreviews.blogspot.com.au/2012/09/reviwe-by-tracey-of-riggs-crossing-by.html
The Down-under 12 Days of Christmas: http://tazziebookreviews.blogspot.com.au/2012/09/review-by-tracey-of-down-under-12-days.html
Greylands: http://www.kids-bookreview.com/2012/09/review-greylands.html
Ships in the Field: http://tinyurl.com/8j8ggmk
One of the advantages that major publishers have over small presses is that they have strong foreign rights sales. Our own agent, Mary Hare, managed to sell six books of ours during 2012. JE Fison's Hazard River series sold to The People's Oriental Publishing Company.
Our new catalogue can be viewed on the website at www.fordstreetpublishing.com or at: http://tinyurl.com/d34qpbr
2013 will see a huge jump in the number of books we're publishing. To kick off the year we have The Lost Tail by raconteur Patricia Bernard and Tricia Oktober, followed quickly by the ever popular Phil Kettle and Susan Halliday's Toocool/Marcy 10-book boxed set (two book clubs have pre-ordered thousands of copies), Gracie and Josh by our favourite Susanne Gervay and Serena Geddes (Variety is getting behind this title!).
We'll also publish Pirate Gold by the charming Michael Salmon, Chasing Shadows by newcomers to Ford Street, Corinne Fenton and Hannah Sommerville, Far From Gallipoli by another first-time Ford Street author, Pamela Rushby, Il Kedra by Paul Collins, Gamers' Rebellion by George Ivanoff, Riley and the Jumpy Roo by Tania McCartney and Welcome Home by Tasmanian Christina Booth.
There will be one or two others! (As a taster, I think I've discovered another illustrator, who I've again coupled with Gary Crew -- and maybe a YA novel by Archie Fusillo. Stay tuned!)
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Creative Net Speakers' Agency
