As the light grows short and October closes out, we at Angel City Press have reached the twenty-fifth anniversary of our founding and are rounding the corner toward the subsequent publishing of our first title.
Early on in this process we learned that being an independent publisher isn't like having a "normal" business. In normal businesses profits are predictable and can be managed, after a fashion. And in normal businesses the creators of competitive products are closed-mouthed and a bit suspicious of one another.
Publishing is not normal, and good publishers are positively abnormal. The best of them are opinionated, brilliant, surprising, and generous to a fault.
Gibbs Smith, who passed away on Saturday, October 28, was all those things — a polestar for hundreds of publishers, authors, and employees. If you take a few minutes to see him speak about Joe Hill, the subject of his first book (yes, he was an author and historian too), and read a bit about his life and the press he founded (and grew, and turned over to his employees in 2015), you will understand why we will miss him terribly.
[30-Oct-2017]