Dzanc Books is an American independent press book publisher. It is a non-profit
501(c)(3)
A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of the 29 types of ...
private foundation
A private foundation is a tax-exempt organization not relying on broad public support and generally claiming to serve humanitarian purposes. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is the largest private foundation in the U.S. with over $38 billion i ...
. 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 practices law. The role of a lawyer varies greatly across different legal jurisdictions. A lawyer can be classified as an advocate, attorney, barrister, canon lawyer, civil law notary, counsel, counselor, solicit ...
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 writing novels and other fiction, while others aspire ...
, and Dan Wickett, a prolific on-line book reviewer. They operated from their homes, near
Detroit
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...
,
Michigan
Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and t ...
.
Mission
Dzanc pursues literary fiction and
eBooks
An ebook (short for electronic book), also known as an e-book or eBook, is a book publication made available in digital form, consisting of text, images, or both, readable on the flat-panel display of computers or other electronic devices. Alt ...
. They published their own list of independent 20 writers to watch in response to ''
The New Yorker
''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
s list of "20 Under 40", which they felt was too establishment-oriented.
Former staff
Former staff includes author Matt Bell as senior editor.
Allison Amend
Allison Amend (born May 20, 1974) is an American novelist and short story writer.
Early life
Amend was born in Chicago, Illinois, attended Stanford University, and received an MFA from the Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa.
Car ...
Peter Selgin
Peter Selgin (; born 1957) is an American novelist, short story writer, playwright, essayist, editor, and illustrator. Selgin is Associate Professor of English at Georgia College & State University in Milledgeville, Georgia.
Biography
The son of ...
,
Laura van den Berg
Laura van den Berg is an American fiction writer. She is the author of five works of fiction. Her first two collections of short stories were each shortlisted for the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award, in 2010 and 2014. In 2021, she ...
Robert Coover
Robert Lowell Coover (born February 4, 1932) is an American novelist, short story writer, and T.B. Stowell Professor Emeritus in Literary Arts at Brown University. He is generally considered a writer of fabulation and metafiction.
Background
...
,
Lance Olsen
Lance Olsen (born October 14, 1956) is an American writer known for his experimental, lyrical, fragmentary, cross-genre narratives that question the limits of historical knowledge.
Biography
Lance Olsen was born in New Jersey. He received a ...
J. Robert Lennon
John Robert Lennon (born 1970) is an American novelist, short story writer, musician and composer.
Early life
Lennon was raised in Phillipsburg, New Jersey. He earned a B.A. in English from the University of Pennsylvania (1992) and an M.F.A. (19 ...
Okey Ndibe
Okechukwu "Okey" Ndibe (born 1960) is a novelist, political columnist, and essayist of Igbo ethnicity. Ndibe was born in Yola, Nigeria. He is the author of ''Arrows of Rain'' and ''Foreign Gods, Inc.'', two critically acclaimed novels published ...
,
Mary Biddinger
Mary Biddinger (born May 14, 1974, in Fremont, California) is an American poet, editor, and academic.
Biography
Mary Biddinger received an Honors B.A. in English with a Creative Writing Subconcentration from the University of Michigan. She ...
Kyle Minor
Kyle Minor (born 1976) is an American writer. Born and raised in West Palm Beach, Florida, Minor lived in Ohio and Kentucky before settling in Indiana. He studied writing at Ohio State University, where he was a three-time honoree in ''The Atlantic ...
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
* Starcherone Books
* Istros Books
* DISQUIET
* '' Monkeybicycle'', a literary journal
* ''
The Collagist
''The Rupture'' (formerly named ''The Collagist'') is a literary journal founded in 2009 by American author Matt Bell. The first issue appeared in August 2009. It was renamed ''The Rupture'' in 2019. It is one of the longest running online liter ...
'', a literary journal
*
Hawthorne Books
Hawthorne Books is an independent publisher founded in 2001 in Portland, Oregon, U.S., specializing in literary fiction and creative nonfiction original trade paperbacks.
Authors
* Kristen Wiig has optioned the film rights for Monica Drake' ...
Accolades
Dzanc Books has been called "the future of publishing" and "one of the great contemporary forces in independent publishing".