The following interview with Georgia Jones, founder/owner of Ladybug Press, is reprinted from an interview which appeared on December 15,1996 |
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GEORGIA JONES PUBLISHER
San Carlos resident Georgia Jones has done a great deal of writing in her life, but recently she ventured into the publishing business as well. "Women on a Wire" is the initial offering from her Ladybug Press.
The book contains the work of 29 poets from Writer's Shed, which, besides being the nickname of Jones' San Carlos office, is a popular forum on Compuserve's Women's Wire. The book also has information on domestic violence and where to get help. And all of the books royalties will benefit the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence.
Jones edited, designed, and marketed "Women on a Wire" and is working on getting audio samples and books on her WEB site. She said that online communication and the stories people feel more comfortable sharing in its setting can be an important link to reality.
"Women on a Wire" is available for $11.95 through Ladybug Press. The company's mailing address is 751 Laurel St. No. 223, San Carlos, CA 94070- 3113. To order by phone, call (888)-892-5000. Online, type http://www.
| What did you do before you got involved with online forums? Well for the past three years, I've been doing online writers workshops with Women's Wire. And I focus a lot on poetry. That's one reason this book is poetry, because I think that's very important for writers to work on. So even my non-poetry writers who came into my workshops all end up having to learn a little bit of poetry. In the 1970s I was a freelance journalist. I wrote some for radio, and I've written some radio plays that have been on public radio stations. And short stories, poetry, the usual. How did this project come about? I was the host of the Women's Wire poetry forum starting at the end of 1994. When we moved over to Compuserve, we had been doing some very good work in the poetry forum and a lot of the poets were showing such growth in their art that I suggested I would try and market a book, a collection of their work. When we came to Compuserve I added some of the poets from Compuserve as well. I started marketing that book, and a number of other things just all sort of came together at once. We had Sandra Martz, who's the owner of Papier Mache Press -- they publish the "When I'm an Old Woman I'll Wear Purple" books. We were talking about publishing and I had always rejected the idea of being a publisher, because I'm a writer and I thought hat it was to close to vanity publishing if I was both. So I make a very clear line there as a publisher. Just talking to Sandra I decided, that's what I'm going to do -- I'm going to start a publishing company. Since I'm dedicated to the project I'm the logical publisher. How did you select the poems that were going to be in this book? I tried to represent everyone who had worked hard and progressed. I tried to select the best of what each one of them had done. And then, the last |
consideration was how it affected the shape of the book itself. But, generally, it's representative of the work that this group did over a long period of time. It seems like almost every poem from the first third of the book is about relationships. Was that intended? I divided it pretty much by theme, and I tried to give themes around life growth, starting with relationships, and I think the next one in there is family, job, children. I purposely ended it with the poems about self, self- realization, old age, and death. Because not only are old age and death obviously the end of life, but realization of self is the point of life, so they seem to go together Is poetry going to be your main thing? What types of books are you looking to publish besides this? The description of the company is that we publish books that are of interest to women. Now, I phrased it that way, rather than to say "women's books" books that are of interest to women are anything. But they have to be written in a way that is useful and appealing to women specifically. The ones I've got in the works are a self-defense book that's going to have a section in it specifically aimed at domestic violence. I've got another woman who will be doing a book on domestic violence issues. One is about helping women get jobs in technology and advance in technology jobs. I'm looking for something on women's sports, women and aging. What are your goals in publishing this book and books in the future? Well, I'd like to publish really good books for women, and make a nice profit for myself, and out of that be able to donate a nice amount to causes that I and the authors believe in. Of course, the artists side of me would like to win some awards for the best- looking books, the best-designed books, the best-written books.
- Michelle Marcucci |
