The house

A small press
with long
memory.

We founded this press against the industry's closed doors: less bureaucracy, less judgement by pedigree, and more serious attention to the book in front of us.

Origins

The Calthorpe Press takes its name from Calthorpe Street, where its founders first shared an office. Both had worked for larger publishers and had seen good manuscripts rejected because nobody could agree how to position them. They set up the press to publish some of those books, particularly first novels and translations.

The first was a novel that three London houses had declined. It sold steadily, was licensed in eleven languages and paid for the following year's list. It also showed that a rejection from a large publisher was not a reliable measure of the number of readers a book might find.

We now publish around eight titles a year. The staff is still small: editorial work is shared, rights are handled in the same office, and submissions are read and answered by people who know the list. You get more than a receipt from a system; you get the attention of an editor.

Our position

We judge the book.
Nothing else.

Traditional publishing can ask a writer to pass through an agent, a submissions window, a market category and a chain of internal approvals before the work receives sustained attention. We chose another way.

We do not judge where you studied, whom you know, whether you have published before or how neatly your novel fits a sales meeting. We read the work. If there is something alive in it, we stay with it, discuss it and give it a considered answer.

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Working practices

We publish slowly

We publish about eight new books a year. That gives the editorial and production team enough time to work on each one properly, without rushing it through a crowded list.

We keep books in print

Our backlist matters as much as the new season. We reprint in modest quantities and do not drop a title simply because its first year has passed.

We pay translators properly

Translators are credited on the cover and title page. We pay a fee and a royalty, and involve them in the edit rather than treating the English text as anonymous copy.

We read every submission

Writers may submit to us directly, without an agent or introduction. Every manuscript enters the ordinary editorial workload and is read by an editor, not filtered by a checklist or left for spare time.

Rights and export

A London list, with readers and publishers elsewhere.

We sell translation rights directly to publishers in Europe, the Americas and East Asia. Export distributors carry the English editions farther afield. The arrangements vary from book to book, but the rights work is done here by the same team that acquired the title.