Last month I was invited to speak on a panel about the arts. I agreed and a month later I received another email, explaining that a woman panelist had canceled and had been replaced with a man. The curator was concerned that having a panel with four men and only one woman might appear to have a lack of diversity. It’s certainly an important thing to consider when putting on a public event. The recent social justice movements around race and gender have gotten gears grinding in people’s heads. At the same time numerous people have expressed to me just how patronizing it feels when the stated reason for sending them an invitation is because of their race or gender, rather than the merit of their work or just how brilliant they are in the first place.

None of these ideas are groundbreaking or unique, but they keep leading me to another thought: When considering public perception of the composition of an event or organization, curators and boards think of diversity in terms of a visual analysis rather than a contextual one. On the surface I’m a white man. At the same time I would bet you that I will be the only panelist that didn’t go to college, let alone one that cost more than my annual income. I suspect that I will also be the only neurodiverse panelist and the only physically disabled one as well. I can tell you this because it’s been true of almost every panel that I’ve been on in my life. The room often gets awfully awkward when people try to compare childhoods or stories with me, because, frankly, my life is so different from almost anyone that tries to relate with me—especially other people that work in publishing or bicycle advocacy.
Obviously these lived experiences inform my perspective and sensitivities but also my take on any subject that I discuss. And often the behaviors that I exhibit as a result of these things is the very reason that I’m not invited to be a part of speaking events in the first place. Social justice movements have done a tremendous service for society by creating an awareness and new language around inclusion and I’m proud to be part of the leading edge of challenging around class and neurodiversity as well!

About six years ago, after much confusion and disagreement about how to decide what Microcosm should publish, I created a set of guidelines for institutional memory in our staff manual.
1) How does this title teach self-empowerment? Does it fit Microcosm’s mission?
2) Will this title consistently exceed minimum sales benchmarks over more than five years? (1,000 copies in first year, halving for each consecutive year)
3) How is this title notably different from existing work on the same shelf?
4) Do we expect this title to turn a profit for Microcosm?
5) Is this work of particular merit? Why?
6) Is there an identifiable and reachable audience of at least 5,000 people who will buy at least 3,000 books?
7) Does this book challenge popular narratives about the subject?
8) Will the author be cooperative and hardworking towards mutual goals?
9) Have the competitive titles sold at least 3,000 copies in Bookscan?
10) Does the market allow U.S. based printing and production costs at competitive pricing to the comps?

A book needs to meet at least seven out of ten of these criteria.

We had published some books that were incredibly successful and others that were great but undiscovered or poorly received. Sometimes we simply were not the right publisher for a given book or couldn’t properly find its audience. But we didn’t always have the same motives. Not every book is designed to make money and the above criteria help to point that out. A book could actually be a financial loss but an important voice in the conversation among its peers and pass a sufficient number of criteria for us to publish it. Similarly, a book might be truly fascinating to a small number of people but not quite right for us or have a big enough audience to make sense. Sometimes a book has such a hyperlocal appeal that the author can’t understand that the entire world isn’t hung up on the same trends or that they’ve grown cold.

My younger self often feared that the market-based and political interests of a book were in conflict. But most of the time we’ve found that the books that we are excited about are also the books that our enthusiasm can visibly propel a book to sell well and become even politically important in the broader conversation on the shelf. And that might have been the most fascinating lesson that I’ve learned in twenty years of publishing.

One day I received a phone call from Meadow Shadowhawk, a Native American woman who explained that she had a children’s book about a gigantic bird that lives in their suburban home that was seeking a publisher. I explained how our submission process worked and that we don’t publish children’s books. A few days later she called again, explaining a bit more about her family and her son and the awards that he had won, including one from Dr. Jane Goodall. Meadow explained that Dr. Jane would be willing to contribute a foreword.

I was intrigued enough to google the bird, which was a rhea, a South American flightless bird that is mostly raised for meat in the U.S. Their family had rescued one and she began sending me photos of it in their living room. By chance, I was heading to South America later that week so I told her to email me and that I would think about it.
By the time I returned to Portland, with even more photos of the rhea, Amica, in my inbox, I realized what bugged me about an illustrated children’s book: It would be lost in the end matter that the story was real. I decided that it would make a lot of sense to do a photo book of Amica because he is quite idyllic and the story was so interesting and unusual. The family and Dr. Jane agreed and a near-miss was turned into a very exciting book prospect for this November. I hope that you can enjoy these photos of Amica as much as I do!