Dzanc Books is an American independent press book publisher. It is a non-profit

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. Michelle Dotter is publisher and editor-in-chief.

Background

Dzanc Books was founded in 2006 by Steven Gillis, a

lawyer A lawyer is a person who is qualified to offer advice about the law, draft legal documents, or represent individuals in legal matters. The exact nature of a lawyer's work varies depending on the legal jurisdiction and the legal system, as w ...

turned

novelist A novelist is an author or writer of novels, though often novelists also write in other genres of both fiction and non-fiction. Some novelists are professional novelists, thus make a living wage, living writing novels and other fiction, while other ...

, and Dan Wickett, a prolific on-line book reviewer. They operated from their homes, near

Detroit Detroit ( , ) is the List of municipalities in Michigan, most populous city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is situated on the bank of the Detroit River across from Windsor, Ontario. It had a population of 639,111 at the 2020 United State ...

Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...

Mission

Dzanc pursues literary fiction and

eBooks An ebook (short for electronic book), also spelled as e-book or eBook, is a book publication made available in electronic form, consisting of text, images, or both, readable on the flat-panel display of computers or other electronic devices. A ...

. They published their own list of independent 20 writers to watch in response to ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. It was founded on February 21, 1925, by Harold Ross and his wife Jane Grant, a reporter for ''The New York T ...

s list of "20 Under 40", which they felt was too establishment-oriented.

Former staff

Former staff includes author Matt Bell as senior editor.

Authors

Published authors include Roy Kesey, Yannick Murphy, Terese Svoboda, Allison Amend, Jeff Parker, Peter Selgin, Laura van den Berg, Anne Valente,

Robert Coover Robert Lowell Coover (February 4, 1932 – October 5, 2024) was an American novelist, Short story, short story writer, and T. B. Stowell Professor Emeritus in Literary Arts at Brown University. He is generally considered a writer of fabulation ...

, Lance Olsen, Joseph McElroy, Robert Lopez, Evan Lavender-Smith, Jen Michalski, Dawn Raffel, J. Robert Lennon, Adam Klein, Okey Ndibe, Mary Biddinger, Charles Blackstone, David Galef, Aimee Parkison, Kyle Minor, Kelly Cherry.

Name

The name "Dzanc" was formed from the initials of the names of the founders' five children. It is pronounced as two syllables, "duh-ZAANCK" or "da-zaynk".

Publication cancellation

Dzanc cancelled publication of Hesh Kestin's 2019 novel ''The Siege of Tel Aviv'' following criticism on social media that termed the book "Islamophobic." Publisher Steve Gillis explained that "It was never our intent to publish a novel that shows Muslims in a bad light... Our mistake was not gauging the climate and seeing how the book would be perceived in 2019."

Imprints

As a non-profit, Dzanc cannot "own" another company, so these are not "imprints" in the usual publishing business sense. * Other Voices, Inc. (OV Books and ''Other Voices'', a literary journal) * Keyhole Press * Istros Books * DISQUIET * '' Monkeybicycle'', a literary journal * '' The Collagist'', a literary journal * Hawthorne Books

Accolades

Dzanc Books has been called "the future of publishing" and "one of the great contemporary forces in independent publishing".

References

External links

* Wickett's book review blog Publishing companies established in 2006 Ebook suppliers Small press publishing companies Literary publishing companies Book publishing companies based in Michigan {{US-publish-company-stub