Introductions

For the first many years of my career in crafts and publishing, I was a blogger. For the next many years of my career, as I focused more on the creativity side of things and also worked as a freelance editor, I wrote a weekly email newsletter. Since I co-founded a tiny Canadian non-fiction press in 2020, I've mostly written social media posts, Kickstarter updates, and marketing emails. But I've wanted, for months, to get back to ideas-focused writing, because writing is how I make sense of the world, and specifically I've been wanting to write about my experiences getting Nine Ten Publications off the ground.

For about twenty-one years I have worked in one way or another in craft publishing. I got started by accident when I created an online crochet magazine after posting a rant on the internet. A few years later I was hired as the editor of a print crochet magazine. I've written seven traditionally published books with four publishers—six about crochet and one about creativity. I edited books as a freelancer both for publishers and for self-publishers. Between full-time work, self-employment, and freelancing, I spoke at conferences, led workshops on making ugly things on purpose as a creativity exercise, and developed a whole lot of opinions about books, magazines, crafts, online community, in-person community, and how all intersect in ways that affect our creativity for better or worse.

All of the publishers I ever worked with were American. While I was born and raised in the U.S., I have lived for most of my adult life in Vancouver, BC. I have an immigrant's love of my country of choice and as I approached middle age I began to wonder why we don't really have niche publishers north of the border, while they are abundant south of it.

When the COVID-19 pandemic struck and I had nothing left to lose professionally, it seemed like the right time to both find someone to partner with and to see if we could create a Canadian niche non-fiction press.

Now, it's been a couple years since our first print books were released, and I know a lot more about what I don't know than I did when I first started this effort. At the same time, I know that the more I learn, the farther I'll get from the frantic, overwhelming days when I knew almost nothing. I want to get some writing out that might help ease the overwhelm of others just starting out. And I want to share the challenges and successes I navigate as I continue working feverishly to establish Nine Ten as a sustainable publishing business.

Come along for the ride, eh?

A Note About Comments: Please use them. I can blather on endlessly from the vacuum of my mind, but I'd much rather address questions you have, learn from you, and see if we can't get some conversation going. So comment lots!