Homeward Books, a new independent publisher cofounded by writers Lara Elena Donnelly, M. Huw Evans, Rachel Sobel, and Rebekah White, is wholly—but not only—a product of its time.
Based across several time zones, Homeward is a small press dedicated to many things, including “splendor over mediocrity,” "books that defy the constraints of genre," and "effervescent fun and capacious depth," according to Homeward’s now-closed Kickstarter campaign, which raised over $30,000 between October and November of last year.
Its first title, J.M. Sidorova's The Witch of Prague (March), is a magical realist novel starring a dyslexic teenager in Cold War–era Czechoslovakia. The Perilous Life of Jade Yeo, Zen Cho’s equally quirky epistolary romp through Roaring Twenties–era London, will follow this summer.
Homeward is unified, and perhaps defined, by a romantic maxim: to become “the home for books without a home.”
“We just want to publish good books, regardless of the sort of the complexities that might make somebody say, “oh, it's hard to market, it's hard to sell,” said Sobel, a speculative fiction writer and teacher based in Seattle.
Evans, who is also Seattle-based, and Donnelly, who is based in New York, planted the first seeds for Homeward when they met in 2016 at the International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts. A few years later, Donnelly roped in Sobel—whom she had met as a teenager at the Alpha Workshop for Young Writers—and the three gave the the idea form. White, a science journalist and magazine editor based in New Zealand, joined later, enlisted by Sobel for her production expertise.
Speaking to the similarities between the journalism and book markets, White observed that Homeward is situated at a lucrative junction. “What's successful now, in the business of global journalism, is either you’re a really niche product speaking to a specific set of people, you're a really beautiful physical product, or, ideally, you're both. And this, to me, is both.”
But Sobel said that Homeward is ultimately “agnostic” toward business concerns which, even she admits, is “a little idealistic.” The press is aiming to become self-sustaining after publishing its first two titles.
The four make a well-rounded team: Evans and Sobel are experienced editors, White knows production, and Donnelly contributes “incredible business administrative acumen,” in Sobel’s words. And Homeward’s Kickstarter success demonstrates a subtler marketing savvy which has so far helped bridge the gap between its lofty ideals and the harsh realities of running an indie press today.
The press also has a knack for community-building, hosting a series of book recommendation parties on both coasts. The events—which require only a space, a bookseller, and a critical mass of book lovers with their favorite titles on hand—have proved popular.
Attendees “go around the room, and if the conversation ever falters, you say, ‘What book did you bring, and why?’ And now you're having a conversation about this incredible book that you've never heard of before,” Sobel said.
One of these parties was held in a warehouse owned by Asterism—the Seattle-based small press distribution collective that launched in 2021, and which Homeward is now signed with. Presses that use Asterism have the option to rent physical warehouse space, or simply take advantage of Asterism’s online wholesale portal tailored to indie booksellers and do their own fulfillment.
The book recommendation parties, which Homeward plans to bring to more cities, always have an indie bookseller on-site. Donnelly said that witnessing how attendees interact, and how the bookseller translates these conversations into sales, has shown her how powerful the “interpersonal aspect of book buying” can be.
“We've discovered, while setting up the small press, that the #1 way to sell books is a bookseller,” Donnelly said.
Though they'd never boast about their business acumen, the co-founders have the benefit of being enmeshed in the culture of their prospective audience. “Huw [Evans] has fairly unerring instincts about things that will like that booksellers will like, glom onto,” Donnelly said, when asked about the minimalistic design of the galleys for The Witch of Prague. The hand-stamped covers—featuring simple serif text set against a plain, papery green—recalled a time when barebones advance copies, or even bound manuscripts, were the norm for pre-pub marketing.
“We were like, no one's doing that these days,” Donnelly remembered telling Evans. “I think what ended up happening is we just didn't have the cover in time to print the art.” (Evans, it turns out, was right—the booksellers loved it.)
Homeward’s launch falls in step with a broader march back to analog forms of cultural consumption that has picked up speed over the past few years, with specialty brick-and-mortar bookstores thriving and reading parties, book bars, and audiobook walking clubs becoming some of the hottest tickets in New York.
Ultimately, the Homeward team is looking not just to publish strange, quirky books, but to build a thriving in-person community around those books. “We’ve always gone at this with the attitude of it being primarily a community project,” Sobel said. “It’s about connecting the art that we’re making with people who will appreciate it.”
