BlazeVOX [books]

Thankfully, the definition of micropresses is open to interpretation, as BlazeVOX [books] publishes about fifty titles a year. BlazeVOX [books] presents innovative fictions and wide-ranging fields of contemporary poetry. So far, we have 185 books in print and many more on the way, so we fall a bit short by a very large margin. However, we may qualify, in a sense, mainly because there is only one employee who wears many hats. The necessity for our existence is as plain as a pikestaff; we exist because the market demands our services.

I know that this sounds like a very conservative approach to a business, but BlazeVOX is not a model for capitalism; it is a refuge for readers and writers. Book sales are not the motivation for the press. The goal is to put out great poetry and fiction. The number of employees needed to make a book has decreased through technology and the amount of available resources. With our system of print-on demand, we can play, putting out the books we want, without worrying what the market will bear. It makes for a very open atmosphere. Hurray!

The benefits of having a micropress are many and varied. We are able to focus in on one field of literature; we have the ability and agility to provide a real response to a very specific reading audience; and we can produce great titles by working directly with the author in an intimate space that a larger press might not be able to provide. And the best for last, micropresses can take chances on good writing without the hand wringing of investors or large-scale not-for-profits' questioning boards.

Our books have been widely reviewed and praised; many have been placed in top ten and best-selling lists; and many others have simply made their readers happy. We also have an online journal which brings in many writers and readers to the website. We have published about nine hundred writers over nine years, so we have worked very hard to cultivate an audience. I believe that there is a real want for this kind of literature. Our readership is very large for an online entity, so this tells me that there is an audience out there that wants this kind of literature to fulfill its reading. This is a true vote of confidence for BlazeVOX and micropresses. In the end, I do not think we have a right to exist simply to exist; we have a right to exist and be relevant to our authors and, most importantly, relevant to our audiences.