A Chat with Lauren Steele | Big Green Experts

Tell us about your new project and what inspired you to work on it.

The Indie List is a new and free directory of independent publishers in the UK and Ireland. Arranged alphabetically, each publisher has their own entry with links to their website, newsletter, blog and shop and a little bit of information about their projects and what they specialise in. The site also features an interactive map showing where the publishers are based and a ‘Publisher of the Month’ announcement on the homepage. Little Toller Books is our Publisher of the Month for April.

It’s free to access and can be found on my blog, LozLit. I hope that it will be able to provide a way for readers to connect with some great publishers, help writers find publishers who might be interested in their work, and even provide job-seekers with more information about the industry.

The idea came about after I wrote a piece about supporting independent bookshops but I was already aware of a very excellent list of them. I was contacted by Sandstone Press who reminded me that many independents sell through their own websites. That got me thinking about how we could boost them too.

What do you think independent publishers and bookshops can offer that the mainstream can't?

Working for a mainstream bookshop and loving independent publishers means I straddle both camps and have to be very diplomatic with my answer! Firstly, and this is often said of independent publishers and bookshops, is that these places are very flexible and can move very quickly to keep up with current affairs and trends. It means that readers can get great titles that are relevant to the times. Secondly, independents foster an incredible sense of community and everyone is so supportive. It can never be a bad thing to find lovely like-minded people!

You also blog in your spare time - how have you managed your workload?

I’ve always really thrived when I’m busy, but managing a workload is a lot easier when you’re on furlough and you’re essentially creating work for yourself. Because I love books, I have to be very careful not to turn what I’m doing into hard work. I always start my day with a To-Do List and I keep a diary to make sure of any upcoming publication dates that I need to review for.

How has your time in bookselling influenced your blog and The Indie List?

Before I started selling books, I didn’t have an acute awareness of which publishers I was reading. Often when you see imprints of the Big Five as a reader you don’t realise that they are part of these giant companies. Working as a bookseller has allowed me to branch out and find some really amazing but quite niche titles to talk about in my own work. In turn my work has given me a greater awareness of who publishes which books which I use to help curate diverse spaces in the bookshop.

What have your reading habits been like in lockdown and which book has been your favourite?

I think like everyone, concentration can often be hard to come by so the amount I have been reading has fluctuated massively. In the first lockdown I was easily reading a book every few days but now I seem to be finding it more difficult.

My favourite book has come about right at the very end of lockdown and is Am I In the Right Place? by Ben Pester. It’s a collection of short stories that are all very mind-bending and surrealist. The stories often start in realistic settings – an office, on a train, in a cafe – and then start to get very strange. It’s so captivating and the author really plays with the form of the book too with black pages here and there to symbolise darkness. I love it.

What do you have planned for the future of The Indie List?

Ah, there are already lots of plans that I definitely do not have time for at the moment! The Indie List is by no means comprehensive yet and I will continue to add publishers. I want to create a specific area to The Indie List that is dedicated to independent children’s publishers; it’s not an area I’ve really thought about much, but their work is obviously as important and worth highlighting.

I’m not a web developer, but I do hope to eventually explore functions such as searching and filtering, which could really benefit the site. So yes, big plans and I’m very excited.

Find The Indie List at lozlit.wordpress.com/theindielist and connect with Lauren on Twitter @shteeeley