I’ve been waiting to say anything about this venture or this site until I could make this announcement, which I think is one of the coolest things I’ve ever been involved with. Perfect Skin is one of my favorite novels of all time, so I’m honored and thrilled to be part of bringing Nick’s work to new readers.
Read the press release after the jump.
–For Immediate Release–
Bestselling Author Nick Earls Signs Major 12-Book Digital Publishing Deal
Australian author Nick Earls, whose bestselling novels include Zigzag Street, Bachelor Kisses, Perfect Skin, and 48 Shades of Brown, has signed an exclusive digital distribution deal for 12 books with independent publisher Exciting Press. The deal includes several novels and novellas, a collection of short fiction, and individual short stories, most of which were originally published by corporate publishers including Penguin and Random House, but which have never been available in digital form.
While the majority of the work will be published during the spring and summer of 2012, readers will get some of the books in time for the holidays. This includes two short stories, “The Italian Job” and “The Secret Life of Veal,” and a novel, Monica Bloom, of which The Age wrote “Nick Earls is on a literary road trodden by J.D. Salinger.” The new publication will include a never-before published novella, Grass Valley, as bonus content. The novella will later be published individually.
“E-books present the greatest opportunity readers have ever had to find each other,” Earls says. “It’s a chance for stories written for paper to find new life, and a chance for new stories to appear, freed from the constraints of paper publishing. Novels that have previously appeared in only one country – Australia in my case – can now more readily become widely available. Novellas and short stories can finally have lives of their own. I want to be part of all that.”
About the Author
Earls, whose work includes twelve novels and two collections of short stories, is the winner of a Betty Trask Award (UK) and Children’s Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Award. His Perfect Skin was the only novel to be a finalist in the Australian Comedy Awards in 2003, and was adapted into a feature film in Italy (Solo un Padre, Warner Brothers/Cattleya). His novel 48 Shades of Brown was a Kirkus Reviews (US) book of the year selection. His most recent novels are The True Story of Butterfish and The Fix.
About Exciting Press
Signing Earls–whose work has been published by Penguin, St. Martin’s, and Random House–is a coup for Exciting Press, a Pittsburgh-based start-up publisher focusing on digital distribution and redefining the publishing business model. Director and CEO Will Entrekin founded Exciting Press after studying writing at USC and strategic marketing at Regis University.
“Calling Exciting Press a micro-press is probably a degree of magnitude too big,” he says. We’re a nano-press, and our main goal is to return power and control to authors. We want authors to have a degree of participation in publishing they haven’t had since the days of Poe and Twain. We also want to keep rights with authors, and make sure authors get the highest percentage of any sale.”
If that sounds friendly to authors, it may be because Entrekin is one himself and has two novels and several short stories available on Kindle. “Amazon has been terrific about giving authors access to the Kindle platform. It may have up-ended the corporate publishing model, with its returns and retail distribution, but it’s created an entirely new relationship between readers and writers. It offers writers a way to reach readers without needing a corporate publisher.”
Earls notes, “I’m very glad to be working with Will Entrekin and Exciting Press to bring my work into the world’s biggest digital marketplace. After this festive season, more readers than ever will have devices in their hands and they’ll be on the lookout for stories. Any writer with stories to offer needs to have them ready and waiting.”