As part of a tactical reorganization, this summer Ink & Paper Group said a fond good-bye to our house on SE 7th and set up a high-tech network of home offices. (Our phone number, website addresses, and e-mail addresses remain the same.) Our book distribution has undergone a change as well, and we are pleased that our books are now available through Partners West (wholesale) at 800.563.2385 or orders@partners-west.com.

While regrouping and temporarily redirecting our energies, Three Muses Press has postponed the release of two titles until 2010. Bowler Hat Comics adjusted the release date for Kid Beowulf and the Song of Roland—now Spring 2010—and we are thrilled by the early response to galleys for this, the second book in the Kid Beowulf graphic novel series. (Watch the Bowler Hat site for an announcement regarding the all-ages Kid Beowulf series). Dame Rocket Press has been the focus of our attention this summer, with the release of Give My Love to Everybody: Letters from a World War II Soldier and Magic Gardens: The Memoirs of Viva Las Vegas, each of which is exceeding our expectations.

As with books, revision can tighten and energize a company. We are both excited and optimistic about Ink & Paper Group’s future, and we hope you will enjoy the changes we have in store. More soon…

Onward!

Welcome to the new and (hopefully) improved format of Ink & Paper Group’s monthly newsletter, Inside Ink. Based on your feedback from our recent survey and from other outlets, we’re going to try and keep our monthly news short but sweet. Now you’ll find brief bursts of information based on our three main areas of focus: traditional publishing, custom publishing, and classes/events. And if there are any larger articles or commentaries to share, we’ll link to them in our Misc. section. “Stet Says…” will also continue to be a regular feature.

We hope you’ll enjoy this new format, but we welcome your feedback either way. Please feel free to send your thoughts to jen.weaver-neist@inkandpapergroup.com, and thanks, as always, for your continued support of our business and its mission.

Sincerely yours,
The Ink & Paper Team

TRADITIONAL PUBLISHING (a.k.a. Our Books)
We’re looking forward to the May release of three upcoming books at Ink & Paper Group, the first two being young adult fiction from Three Muses Press, and the third being a 10-year nonfiction project that’s finally come to fruition for Dame Rocket Press publisher (and editor/author), Jen Weaver-Neist. You can learn more via the following links:

• Desiderata, by Judy Ferro
  
• Morgan’s Pasture, by Wallace J. Swenson
  
• Give My Love to Everybody: Letters from a World War II Soldier, edited by Jennifer Weaver-Neist

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CUSTOM PUBLISHING (a.k.a. Your Books)
It was our sincerest pleasure to be involved with the production of two recent projects by two local authors, one being poetry and the other fiction. Keep an eye out for these self-published writers and their lovingly created pieces, which will be available for orders soon!

• Far From the Edge, by Lynn Thompson: “Thompson has chosen poems for Far from the Edge that extend the reader’s sense of his playfulness, poems that feel like friendly conversations, words meant to be shared, spoken out loud, or considered over a cup of coffee. The subject matter tweaks the seemingly mundane: daydreaming in bed, standing in line, gardening, grocery shopping, reminiscing about childhood, reflecting on growing older—the usual subjects.”
  
• Summer Snow, by Amy Warwick: “Four women. Different lives bound in ways even they cannot imagine…. There is a storm brewing in Glendale—a storm that will chill the hearts of many, a storm that will change things forever.”

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IMPORTANT NEWSFLASH: Starting in April 2009, Ink & Paper Group will be offering a $100 appreciation gift to anyone who refers a custom publishing client to us that later turns into a SIGNED contract. The gift can either be a $100 certificate to Powell’s or the cash equivalent, and it’s all yours as long as a custom book comes from the connection. Help us to help each other during these financially difficult times by passing on the word when:

• you have a freelance client who loved your editing and is now looking for a means of publishing,
• you come across a friend or colleague who works for a nonprofit that is looking for new ways of promoting its mission and/or fostering donations,
• you hear about a photography project or family story that deserves to be shared but may not have the mainstream appeal necessary to warrant a larger print run,
• you know about someone who’s given up on publishing and thinks there is no room for their book in the current economic climate,
• you know of anyone who wants to take publishing matters into their own hands but still wants a quality, professional product out of the deal.

You get the idea. We invite you to CLICK HERE to learn more about how this referral program works.

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CLASSES/EVENTS Consider signing up to benefit from these upcoming classes at the Ink & Paper Group house, and please keep our unique space in mind for your own upcoming events and/or classes. Again, we’re here to be a resource to you (and vice versa) during a time when sticking together and sharing resources couldn’t be more important.

• This Wednesday, April 8, 2009, $20 (6:30-8:00 p.m.): “Manuscript Formatting: A Quick Guide to Manuscript Preparation and Clean-up” (or “What to Know Before you Submit Your Work to a Publisher”), instructed by Linda M. Meyer
• Next Saturday, April 18, 2009, $100 (1:00-5:00 p.m.): From Write to Read: A Book Marketing and Promotion Guide for Authors, instructed by Lake Boggan
• Friday, May 1, 2009: Local Creatives Networking Event (Further details TBA)
• Saturday, May 9, 2009: Duet with Hummingbird Mother’s Day Tea (Details TBA)

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MISC. Mark your calendars for Portland’s annual Stumptown Comics Fest (April 18 & 19, 2009), where Bowler Hat Comics will have a table again this year.

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STET SAYS… This month features a quote from Morgan’s Pasture, the young adult novel due for release from Three Muses Press next month.

IVY LEAGUE STRIPPER WITH BREAST CANCER BARES BODY AND SOUL IN PROVOCATIVE NEW MEMOIR

This month, publisher Jen Weaver-Neist was thrilled to sign local talent Viva Las Vegas as Dame Rocket Press’s newest “eclectic and passionate” author. Replete with star backing and starry-eyed ambition, Magic Gardens: The Memoirs of Viva Las Vegas does not disappoint.

While seeking a publisher this past fall, Viva had to shift her focus when she discovered that she had breast cancer, which she writes about in “The Last Days of My Left Breast” in the March 2009 issue of Portland Monthly. While undergoing surgery and chemotherapy treatments, she continued her quest with an even greater determination, eventually partnering with Dame Rocket Press to deliver this story of the early days in her exotic dancing career.

Here’s what people are saying about this Dame Rocket Press discovery:

• The memoirs of Viva Las Vegas are “Pure Viva.” —Gus Van Sant, filmmaker (MILK)
• “In the sea of memoirs…Viva’s story is an island.” —Andrei Codrescu, Jealous Witness: New Poems
• “Seeing life through this broad’s eyes is a strange and beautiful blessing the likes of which words bring.” —Nick Tosches, journalist and author, King of the Jews
• This book is “the how-to manifesto of a Diva of the Demimonde, and a love song to life on the shady side.” —Katherine Dunn, author, Geek Love

Whether naked onstage at a dive bar in Portland, Oregon, or walking the red carpet at Cannes, Viva brings passion to her performances and audiences to their feet.

A preacher’s daughter and a graduate of Williams College, Viva could’ve been an Ivy League diva but found her calling as a stripper. Magic Gardens is her story, a memoir both gritty and glorious, taking readers through the murky caverns of the sex industry. She offers intelligent and witty arguments in support of the trade, her passionate, smart, entrepreneurial co-workers—a mother of three, a law student with loans—dancing right into our hearts.

While most stripper memoirs distance themselves from the sex industry, Viva brings her stripper family home. She dares us to embrace the humanity within to engage the humanity in them. Women are well paid and appreciate their bodies—unlike the corporate world, she argues, where women are stuffed into ill-fitting pumps and cubicles, doing data entry for meager wages.

For Viva, stripping is an art form as valid as Manet’s depiction of “Olympia” or Degas’s ballerinas. Audiences revel in her gifts. She is a sage, an activist, a compassionate voice that rocks polite society.

Dame Rocket Press is also happy to enlist the publicity expertise of Connie Kirk for this project, and looks forward to getting the word out to all of Viva’s coast-to-coast haunts. (Connie is the promotional genius behind Portland’s KenArnoldBooks).

Stay tuned for more information in the coming months, including the upcoming launch of Viva’s site, Vivacide.com.

Here’s another installment that arrived over the holidays from Hate Mail‘s fiendishly festive author, m.m. garcia. (Please forgive the tardy post.)

Fun U.K. Christmas Facts:

1. Children leave mince pies and whiskey for Santa. I can’t decide if it’s because they love him or hate him.
2. Mulled wine, or spicy red wine, served warm is a popular beverage. Warm red wine.
3. Her Majesty, the Queen, gives an annual holiday speech that nobody watches. I watched it, and I offer this quote that I think sums up everything the aristocracy has stood for over the ages: “Over the years, those who have seemed to me to be the most happy, contented, and fulfilled have always been the people who lived the most outgoing and unselfish lives.” Too true, your Majesty, too true.

Here’s hoping nobody gives you a Christmas cake, and if they do, may it be marzipan free!

~Monica

If you’d like to see the first overseas correspondence from m.m. garcia, please poke here.