Cecil Staton, the publisher of Stroud & Hall, has a small catalogue. So small, in fact, that it contains only one book. But that book has been a bestseller for two months, lifting Stroud & Hall to one of the most improbable success stories of the last year.
The publisher's only title is A National Party No More by conservative Georgia senator Zell Miller, which was number 9 on the New York Times bestseller list for December 29. Staton founded Stroud & Hall in August, when Miller started talking to him about a manuscript he had written criticizing the state of the Democratic Party. Miller, a Democrat who has compared his party to a leaky old house that he can't bring himself to leave, had toured some New York publishers but found none interested in turning it into a book within a month, which was when Miller thought it should be published. Staton knew Miller from when the politician was governor of Georgia (he'd published his memoir at the Mercer University Press) and liked his idea. A month later, he decided to start a publishing house, taking a small office in Atlanta and hiring three employees, so he could bring out the book.
Staton has gone back to press for the fourth time on Party for a total of 200,000 copies. He has no distributor (and doesn't want one—he uses wholesalers and sells books directly off his Web site) and no publicity director. With some of its newfound revenue, the house can certainly afford to publish more. But Staton said he is wary of overextension. He'd like to do three or four books a year, mostly on politics and current events, and might even hire one or two more employees in 2004. "We're not in a hurry. There are ways to respond to this success that would be foolish," he said.
"Everyone's commented on how this isn't supposed to happen in the publishing world," Staton said. "And I have to say, we never imagined it would be like this. But we just struck a chord with people. It's a regional book, but I think it's become a national phenomenon as well."
