One of my very favorite parts of the year is when I begin to see the slow trickle of new work coming in when the open submission period begins. It's usually a small burst the first day, and then 1-3 on subsequent days and then a flurry of activity in that last week or so This year, I will probably start reading in earnest in July (I'm bogged with some large book orders this month and am still playing catch-up on spring orders for some titles, so I'm pushing other things off.) I am also working on layouts for the summer titles and some stragglers from spring. Summers are meant for reading though, for proofing galleys My schedule changes up and the days don't seem so frenetic.
It's hard to believe this is the 15th birthday of the press--that in 2004, I was just beginning to put together what would be our first official title release that fall, the snowball of which has been rolling ever since. Hard to believe that it even could have been that long, since, I feel like I blinked and more than a decade passed. There have been so many books, so many amazing authors, many of whom are doing grander and bigger things now. Many of whom continue to send projects my way even still that I love.
While it's a lot of work, and sometimes I struggle with balancing press life with library work life, and both of those lives with my own creative life, it's so amazing to collaborate with the authors to make awesome little books. To build this collective thing that has a life beyond me. poems do this sometimes, so do my own books, but the press seems multiple and vast, and the net of things grows a bit larger every year. I love looking at lit journals and seeing how many dgp-ers are in its pages. I love when news comes my way of the thrilling things they are up to, winning awards and kicking ass. To have made this thing with others that breathes on its own.
