Adventures in publishing. Warts and all

Welcome, one and all, to the blog of Nemesis Publishing.

We’re about to set off on a long (and, frankly, petrifying) journey into the world of books, as we try to get a small publishing house off the ground and fight for a seat at what appears to be an already crowded dinner table of crazed zombies ripping each other’s heads off in search of the tastiest morsel of flesh.

But we want in there.

We want to get a foot on that first rung of the ladder. And keep climbing. And we want you along for the ride.

We’ll be updating this blog regularly – daily, when feasible – and it will be a warts and all look at how the business develops. Your input is welcome; if there’s anything you want to ask about Nemesis, or publishing in general, leave a comment and we’ll endeavour to answer. If you have an idea for a blog topic, let us know.

Right, let’s rewind a little.

Nemesis began to take shape a couple of years back, when we had the idea of providing a platform for Isle of Man fiction writers. The plan was to publish a regular anthology, in typical paperback format, featuring long ‘short stories’ – 5,000 words or so, give or take the odd thousand.

And thus, Vertigo was born. The concept was simple – hard-edged, gritty and dark stories, in any genre, from crime to kitchen-sink drama to fantasy. We got the publicity machine rolling and the submissions started coming in.

Now here we are, in July 2009, with the first edition of Vertigo set to be in shops for Christmas this year, and a second in the pipeline.

But we’re not stopping there.

We have several non-fiction projects in the pipeline, and, through word of mouth, some full-length fiction manuscripts have been turning up on our doorstep and in our inbox.

We won’t be flooding the market with half-baked ideas in order to make a quick buck. We aim to start slowly, a book or two for the first couple of years, and build from there.

Our website is being developed, under the care of the crack web team at Isle of Man Advertising & PR, and until that is up and running, submissions can be sent to us at nemesispublishing(at)gmail.com – for fiction, a cover letter, one-page synopsis, first three chapters, Times New Roman and double-spaced. You know the drill.

What else?

You can follow Nemesis on facebook here

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You can follow us on twitter here

And that's about it for now, folks. Thanks for reading. We hope you stick around and enjoy the ride.

Cheers
Emma and John Quirk