Tag: Editing

Planning Poetry – a glimpse behind the OB Books publication schedule

At Otter-Barry Books we’ve planned for five poetry titles to publish in 2020. This is the optimum number of poetry books we can handle editorially and give the necessary marketing time to, given our small team, and it feels the right number for the market too.

We’ve been in business for three years and our poetry list has developed a reputation for quality, diversity and inclusion – so it’s important that our 2020 titles build on this. I thought it might be interesting to explain a bit about the way we’ve planned the year’s publications…

So… our two February term-time slots go to two poets who work a lot in schools.

Paul Cookson’s There’s a Crocodile in the House is a performance collection, pitched a bit younger than his previous collections and we really like that it works for KS1 as well as KS2, that it’s funny and will appeal even to children who think they don’t like poetry – and that it has friendly, clear instructions to the adult on how to perform the poems and get the children joining in. Paul will be taking the book into hundreds of schools this year. It’s going to be perfect for World Book Day and has brilliant illustrations by Liz Million.

Alongside this we’re publishing Justin Coe’s The Magic of Mums. A companion to The Dictionary of Dads, his successful 2017 collection, this one is perfect for Mother’s Day. We’ve worked hard to select a strong balance of comic, heart-warming and thought-provoking poems and the final selection includes Two Mums, Windrush Mum, Action Mum, Earth Mother, Everybody’s Mum and Dad-Mum – 46 mums in all. It’s a beautiful celebration of every possible kind of mother, with huge performance potential – and with great pictures by Steve Wells.

Our August slots are back-to-school pub dates, but also with summer holiday and festival sales potential. We’ve planned two amazing collections for 7-11s for this month.

I’ve loved Mandy Coe’s poetry for a long time, both her adult and children’s poems, and we are thrilled to be publishing her new children’s collection. Mandy is a poetry powerhouse, with fantastic links to the lively poetry scene in the north-west, and the soon-to-be-opened Manchester Poetry Library. Belonging Street is a wonderful mix of poems about nature and the environment, family and community – peppered with puzzles and wordplay. All illustrated by Mandy herself. A beautifully crafted collection that works equally well on the page and in performance.

Also in August we’re proud to be publishing Laura Mucha’s debut solo collection. Laura burst onto the children’s poetry scene quite recently but she’s already been widely anthologised and won two prestigious prizes, plus her high-energy performances are becoming legendary! We were blown away by the quality and maturity of Dear Ugly Sisters. Fairytale, magic, science, nature, feelings – it’s an incredibly wide-ranging and exciting debut and we can’t wait to share it. The illustrator is Tania Rex, an emerging illustrator who’s perfectly captured the atmosphere of the poems.

Last but not least, in September comes the new collection by Joseph Coelho. We believe that with Joe’s profile and award-winning track record we can publish this book in hardback in the September hot spot and it will be a stand-out title for our customers – and readers. The Girl Who Became a Tree is Joe’s first teen collection and it’s a powerful, original and extraordinary ‘ story told in poems’ with links to the Apollo and Daphne myth. Growing up, bereavement, fantasy, gaming, family relationships. All these and more are woven into the poetic narrative, matched with amazing illustrations by Kate Milner.

So, five very different poets, five distinctive and powerful voices. We believe passionately in the importance and value of their work and we’ll be working closely with all of them in 2020 to make sure their books reach the widest possible audience. Happy new year!

Janetta Otter-Barry

Janetta Otter-Barry is the founder and publisher of Otter-Barry Books, an award-winning independent children’s publisher with a focus on diversity and inclusion. Otter-Barry publish picture books, young fiction, graphic novels and information books as well as an acclaimed poetry list. The first books were published in May 2016, since when six poetry titles have been shortlisted for the prestigious CLiPPA award. Otter-Barry Books.