Occupy Literature!

• Beyond bringing blankets and soup to protesters camped out at your local city hall, what’s the best way to support the 99 percent this holiday season? How about buying books published by small presses and sold at independent bookstores for 100 percent of the people on your gift list? Small presses give voice to writers and viewpoints overlooked by the mainstream. Indie bookstores let you be a literary locavore. And subscriptions to literary magazines are gifts that keep giving all year long. Consider the lists below your holiday literary activism starter kit. Happy browsing!Southern California-based Presses: Ammo Books (www.ammobooks.com): one-of-a-kind titles featuring amazing design, thoughtful writing, and exquisite printing
• Angel City Press (www.angelcitypress.com): nostalgic yet cool illustrated books
• Arktoi Books (www.arktoi.com): poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction that give lesbian writers access to “the conversation”
• Beyond Baroque (www.beyondbaroque.org): books by local, emerging, overlooked, and previously out-of-print poets
• Cahuenga Press (www.cahuengapress.com): poetry that honors creative freedom and cooperation
• Cloverfield Press (www.cloverfieldpress.com): books as visually beautiful as they are intellectually and emotionally stimulating
• Dzanc Books (www.dzancbooks.org): literary fiction that falls outside the mainstream
• Green Integer (www.greeninteger.com): essays, manifestos, speeches, epistles, narratives, and more
• Les Figues Press (www.lesfigues.com): aesthetic conversations between readers, writers, and artists, with an avant-garde emphasis
• Otis Books/Seismicity (www.otis.edu/academics/graduate_writing/seismicity.html): contemporary fiction, poetry, essays, creative non-fiction and translation
• Perceval Press (www.percevalpress.com): art, critical writing, and poetry
• P S Books (www.psbooks.org): micro-press that publishes conceptually motivated series on a project by project basis
• Red Hen Press (www.redhen.org): works of literary excellence that have been overlooked by mainstream presses
• San Diego City Works Press (www.cityworkspress.org): local, ethnic, political, and border writing
• Santa Monica Press (www.santamonicapress.com): offbeat looks at pop culture, lively how-to books, film history, travel, and humor
• Tebot Bach (www.tebotbach.org): strengthening community and broadening the audience for poetry
• Tsehai Publishers (www.tsehaipublishers.com): literary fiction and serious nonfiction, with an emphasis on first-time authors and writers from under-served communities
• What Books Press (www.whatbookspress.com): books by L.A.-based writers whose work spans the full scope of the past quarter century

Independent Bookstores:

• Book Soup, West Hollywood (www.www.booksoup.com)
• Beyond Baroque, Venice (www.beyondbaroque.org)
• Chevalier’s Books, Larchmont Village (www.chevaliersbooks.blogspot.com)
• Diesel, Brentwood and Malibu (www.dieselbookstore.com)
• Eso Won Books, Leimert Park (www.esowon.com)
• Family, Fairfax District (www.familylosangeles.com)
• Flintridge Bookstore and Coffeehouse, La Cañada (www.flintridgebooks.com)
• Hennessey + Ingalls, Santa Monica and Hollywood (hennesseyingalls.com)
• The Last Bookstore, Downtown (http://lastbookstorela.com)
• Libros Schmibros, Boyle Heights (http://librosschmibros.com)
• Portrait of a Bookstore, Studio City (www.portraitofabookstore.com)
• Skylight Books, Los Feliz (www.skylightbooks.com)
• Small World Books, Venice (www.smallworldbooks.com)
• Stories, Echo Park (www.storiesla.com)
• Tia Chucha’s Centro Cultural & Bookstore (www.tiachucha.com)
• Village Bookshop, Glendora (www.villagebookshopglendora.com)
• Vroman’s Bookstore, Pasadena (www.vromansbookstore.com)

Happy holidays from the Future of Publishing Think Tank!