In one short year, Hill Street Press has scored an unusually fast start with a predominantly literary, Southern-oriented title list. As the small house, based in Athens, Ga., begins its second year, it hopes to expand its national impact with an ambitious crossword-puzzle line that debuted on October 21.
The new imprint, Hot Cross Books, will begin with The Southern Crossword, New York Crossword and San Francisco Crossword, to be followed in November and December by Feminist, Jewish, Baseball, Movies, African American, Hipster and Book Lover's Crossword volumes. "At least 20 more will be added next spring," president Tom Payton told PW, and 100 overall titles are projected by the end of 2000. Each of the uniform line's 160-page trade paperbacks (all $9.95), he added, "is intended -- with some obvious exceptions -- to be a fun exercise in cultural literacy, designed for niche marketing in the book trade as well as gift and special sales avenues."
Despite Payton's enthusiasm, an introductory announcement of Hot Cross Books was intentionally omitted from Hill Street's fall catalogue. "It's surprising that no other publisher has done anything like this before, and we didn't want anyone from New York or elsewhere to duplicate our idea," said Payton. "Even with trademarking, it's very stealable." Indeed, the line was developed by using puzzle software from Varsity Games in Salt Lake City. But each paperback's 55 puzzles were adapted from Q&As amassed by individual compilers for Hill Street.
Nonetheless, Hill Street's trade stealthiness hasn't precluded input from its commissioned sales reps or LPC/InBooks, its distributor. This summer, the company began introducing the soon-to-be expansive line to their respective accounts with "very encouraging results," Payton said.
"We immensely liked the imprint's creative idea when Tom first presented it to us," recalled Susan Smith,
LPC's director of sales and marketing. "Puzzle books remain popular, and we think Hot Cross Books will generate nationwide sales consistently for the foreseeable future. Their broad range of subjects and targeted audiences make them suitable for a wide range of outlets, from book and gift stores to national park and airport shops."
Capitalizing on that forecast, the new line will be launched with what Payton termed "an aggressive marketing campaign" that includes ads in major book media and direct mail to booksellers. In December, Beyond The Cover, Ingram subsidiary White Bridge Communications's book entertainment monthly, will begin running crossword puzzles from Hot Cross Books in each issue. And early next year, Hill Street will debut www.hotcrossbooks.com for interactive use by crossword devotees.
