Mud Luscious Press, a small press in Fort Collins, Colo., founded by J.A. Tyler in 2007 to publish "raw and aggressive works by writers unafraid to destroy and re-suture words,” shut down its operations Monday. Tyler, the founding editor, announced on the press’s website that the move was made “in equal parts failure, defeat, and sadness.”
“This decision wasn't made lightly,” Tyler wrote on Mud Luscious Press’s Facebook page, which filled up yesterday with posts from mourning small press fans. He then added: “But suffice it to say, the time has come to shut it down.”
Tyler told PW that Mud Luscious books were selling “unexpectedly well” to the point that producing and promoting them was “stealing from the future budget" and creating a "financial shortfall."
“I never entered it as a business,” Tyler said. ”I entered it as an artist. And it grew too fast.”
Mud Luscious, which typically published four titles each season, including Cataclysm Baby by Matt Bell (2012), and, most recently, Michael Kimball Writes Your Life Story (on a postcard) by Michael Kimball (Feb.) was distributed by Small Press Distribution. Its titles are still available through SPD, as well as from Amazon.com and Powell’s Books.
“Hopefully,” Tyler told PW last night, “We can get a lot of these books to other publishers to be reissued.”
While Nephew, a Mud Luscious imprint, which published 3-5 titles each year, has also shut down operations, Blue Square Press, another imprint, which was launched by Ben Spivey and David Peak in 2010, intends to continue publishing. Blue Square publishes 2-3 “experimental” titles each year.
“We were an independent press before becoming a Mud Luscious imprint,” Spivey told PW yesterday evening, “We’ll become an independent press again.”
