Publishing For Young Readers: Interview with Little Island

Little Island, an independent publisher of children’s literature, shares about creating and distributing products to young readers.

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Staying afloat as a small independent publisher is not an easy task. Publishers have to compete against a deluge of new titles, and they are pitted against incumbents with established brands and massive resources.
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In the midst of such rigorous competition, Little Island Books has achieved phenomenal success across the United Kingdom and in Ireland.

In order to learn more about their journey, Media Context speaks to founder Siobhán Parkinson, a well-known children’s author and the inaugural children’s laureate in Ireland.

We also speak to editor and production manager Matthew Parkinson-Bennett, an experienced editor who has worked with several established publishing companies, including Oxford University Press.

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About Little Island Books
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Little Island Books, an independent publishing house in Dublin, specialises in publishing titles for young readers.  It began as a children’s imprint of New Island Books, an established publishing house for adult literature, and officially became an independent company in 2010.

Boasting more than 90 titles to this date, Little Island Books have won numerous awards and prizes for both their books and their company. Their most recent award is the inaugural Small Press of the Year - Ireland (2019) from The Bookseller magazine.
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Little Island Books discovers and develops Irish talent, and actively collaborates with international partners. The company publishes between six and ten titles per year, usually including one or two translated publications. Their publications are mostly from new and emerging Irish authors. 

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What kind of Books do you Publish?
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According to Siobhán and Matthew, Little Island Books creates original and translated publications for young readers.
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‘Most of our books are written in English by new and emerging Irish authors. We’re also the only English-language publisher in Ireland that do children’s books in translation.

We have published several novels in translation, but as we are now starting to publish picturebooks, we are moving towards picturebooks for our translation list also,’ Matthew explains. ‘Translated titles are always hard to market, because the author is not usually available, but in the case of a picturebook, that is not quite so important.’
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Notable publications

The company’s publications integrate potent themes and novel concepts into their stories. Moreover, Little Island’s nimble editorial team publishes books that they collectively support.
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‘We’re a small company and we find that everyone at the company needs to be enthusiastic for it to work,’ Siobhán states.

Notable examples of Little Island Books’ successful publications include:

• Deirdre Sullivan’s Tangleweed and Brine, which has won the Irish Book Awards YA Book of the Year and the Children’s Books Ireland Book of the Year, is a collection of feminist retellings of traditional fairytales; and
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• Christine Hamill’s The Best Medicine, Winner of a Laugh Out Loud (LOL oe Lolly) Award 2017, which introduces young readers to the difficult topic of a parent with cancer through an engaging, sensitive storyline but with a sense of humour.

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Themes and Genres

Although Little Island Books cover a range of genres, most of their publications cover subjects that are aligned with their brand and expertise.

‘(We occasionally publish) speculative and dystopic fiction with an element of romance and subtle politics,’ Siobhán says.
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‘We don’t do sci-fi or high fantasy because we don’t have the specialist skills. We don’t have a fantasy list, and we’re not the best to market or edit (these publications). We don’t have anything against these genres. We just wouldn’t know how best to publish them,’ Siobhán continues.

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What kind of Authors do you Represent?
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Discovering New Talent

According to Matthew, many publishers may aim to work with high-profile authors who are able to help sell their own books. But although Little Island Books does work with established writers, such as Patricia Forde, who published The Wordsmith (The List in America and Australia), they also choose to discover and nurture new talent.

‘We specialize in debut authors. We have an open submissions policy. Anyone can submit text to us – they don’t need agents,’ Matthew states. Most of the company’s original Middle Grade and Young Adult novels are written by new Irish authors.

Matthew tells us that Little Island Books’ editorial team discovers titles by new authors among the submissions they receive, and their selection process is highly competitive.
‘We receive approximately 10 submissions a week, and we look at everything that comes in. A lot of our books come in that way, but we publish only a tiny proportion of the books that are submitted,’ Matthew explains.
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‘We don’t publish a lot – only about eight books a year, so we’re very selective. We only publish books that reflect our personal tastes. We usually know if a book is not for us after reading the first few pages,’ he concludes.
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Working with existing authors

Little Island Books strive to forge longstanding collaborations with their current writers. They also commission books and they publish repeat books by the same authors.’
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‘We published two authors in our first list in 2010 who are still writing for us today – Deirdre Sullivan and Sheena Wilkinson. Both of them have deals with British publishers now, but they still write for us too,’ Siobhán explains. ‘We are very proud of that.’

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How do you Sell your Books?
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​Siobhán and Matthew explain that  the following factors will affect how a book is sold across different territories:
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1. Length of a Book

According to Siobhán, the length of a book may affect how it is sold.
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‘Some markets won’t translate (a book that is) too long. This is particularly because people won’t buy long books. The more pages a book has, the higher the printing costs.’ Siobhán explains.

‘For us, young adult novels should be no more than 50-60,000 words long. Middle grade novels should be approximately 30-40,000 words long. Picturebooks in the UK and Ireland generally have very little text per page,’ Siobhán continues.

2. An Author’s Involvement in the Sales Process

Siobhán describes how an author’s presence in specific territories may influence how a book is sold.
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‘Translated publications for Young Adult and Intermediate Readers are harder to sell, as their original authors may not be around to promote their work. Books by Irish authors do better, because the authors do a lot of the work of promoting the book, or because they have an established name in our market,’ Siobhán continues.

Siobhán claims that the connection between an author and a reader will influence how the book is received.

‘If you can’t fly an author in from another country, it’s harder (to sell their books). People like to know the story of a story. They like to have an author that they could meet on the street or hear on the radio. They want to feel closer to the author,’ she concludes.

3. Target Audience

​According to Siobhán, the process of publishing for children is different from publishing for adults.

​‘When you’re publishing for adults, you’re marketing directly to your customers. When we’re publishing for children, we have to market (our books) to the children, their parents, teachers and librarians. It’s quite a difference to promote or market (these) books,’ Siobhán explains.

4. Channels of Distribution

Siobhán and Matthew agree that a book’s format may determine how it is perceived by readers in different age groups.
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‘Hard copies sell better than eBooks, mainly because parents don’t want children to read on tablets. Parents want children to have similar experiences to when they were little.’ Siobhán explains.

Moreover, Siobhán predicts that a book’s sales may decline due to market saturation: ‘eBook sales might not increase in the future because there’s a limited market.’
Little Island Books experiments with new formats and complementary products for their existing publications. In addition, their readers may access their books through novel channels of distribution.

‘Audiobooks may increase for children. We have created three audiobooks with Audible. Audible buys the rights, and they pay the publishers an advance and royalties,’ Matthew explains.

5. Reaching out to the Wider Community

Little Island Books is recognised as a reputable publisher in the region. Their reputation lends credibility to their products, and is bolstered by using their expertise to benefit the wider community.

‘We’re well known. We have a good reputation. We’re the only publishing house in Ireland that publishes exclusively for children in English,’ Siobhán explains.
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‘We organise outreach programs to schools with the books that we have currently published. We have more people coming to us than we know how to deal with. We don’t (give advice about specific submissions) very often, but we do it occasionally if something is very good,’ Siobhán continues.

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What kind of Challenges do Independent Publishers Face?
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Bookshops may Return Products

Siobhán explains that bookshops may demand high discounts on books, and may also return unsold stock to the publisher. Moreover, there are no fixed prices for books across UK and Ireland, unlike in the rest of Europe. This has a detrimental effect on a publisher’s revenue.
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‘Book prices are suppressed (in the UK and Ireland), and are considerably higher in other countries, especially for children’s (products). The lower the price, the more advantages a bigger publisher has. Margins are very tight, which is especially difficult for small publishers,’ Siobhán states.
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Competing against Larger Publishers

Siobhán states that small, independent publishers may lack the marketing resources that larger publishers possess. As such, she worries that large franchises may steal attention away from smaller titles.
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‘Huge names, such as Harry Potter and Diary of a Wimpy Kid, are everywhere. Although there’s lots (of room for other products) on the market, there’s limited attention for independent publications,’ Siobhán explains.
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Quick Turnover Time

Siobhán goes on to explain that a book’s shelf life is relatively short, and each title has a limited period of time to prove that it is profitable.
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‘Books are competing for shelf space and have a short time on the shelves. If (a book) doesn’t do well in the first three to six months, it sinks,’ Siobhán states. ‘You have a small window to make something work. The shelf life of a new book is getting shorter. Even (successful) books, which sell every week in the period after publication, (will have) sales that dip quickly. It’s a process that’s been happening for decades.’

Siobhán also explains that whereas in the past, backlist titles (titles published more than a year or two ago) could continue to sell over time and provide the publisher with extra income, nowadays, backlist is much harder to sell, and most of a publisher’s income has to come from new titles. 
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Profitability of Complementary Products

Although Little Island Books is open to creating complementary products, they may not be as profitable as hard copies of their books.
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‘We don’t do too much complementary merchandise. We have sold the rights for motion picture and TV adaptations, but we’ve yet to have anything made,’ Matthew explains.

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How do you Forge Strategic Partnerships?
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Licensing Rights

Little Island Books actively searches for international partners. For instance, their representatives regularly visit book fairs to sell and buy translation rights.

‘We go to Bologna to meet various publishing companies. We license the rights to translate (our content) into English across the UK and Ireland, commonwealth countries, and North America,’ Siobhán explains.

‘We’re always trying to sell the translation rights for our books. We go to two rights fairs every year  in Frankfurt, Germany and Bologna, Italy – to sell our translation rights and to source books from other countries,’ Matthew continues.

Matthew highlights two primary ways that the rights to their books may be sold:

1. Once Little Island Books finalizes their publications, they sell the rights to their titles before their books are published.
   
   
2. Alternatively, after publishing their titles, the company searches for publishers who want to purchase the rights.
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‘The risk is less with Option 1 but the primary way we try to recoup our costs is by trying to sell hard copies of our books in the UK and Ireland. Rights sales are a bonus.’ Matthew explains.

Sales Agents

Little Island Books also works with their international partners to extend their reach into foreign territories.
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‘We’ve recently increased the number of agents in foreign territories. For example, we’ve recently made an agreement with a Spanish language agent in Spanish speaking territories to take on our list of books and represent our titles to publishers. We’ve recently entered German, Portuguese, Russian, Chinese and Korean markets.’ Matthew explains.
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Co-publications and Shared IP

​Siobhán and Matthew explain that ‘co-publications are logistically complicated’. However, Little Island Books may consider collaborations with companies that may benefit from their expertise, such as animation companies that require assistance with publishing books that complement existing shows.

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What’s Next for You?
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In the future, Little Island Books aims to increase their revenue, as well as their list of publications.
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‘Little Island Books plan(s) to sell more physical books and to sell more rights. Next year, we plan to publish eight more titles – we used to do fewer,’ Matthew explains.
‘We work two years ahead. We know everything we’re publishing next year. (Our list of publications for) 2021 is 70% finalised,’ says Matthew.

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