By now I'm sure there are a few rumors going around about what happened to the company. Why was BL Twist canceled? What happened to Queer Magic and Home On the Range? Why no appearance at Yaoi-con?
The short story is, Iris Print ran out of funding. Orders for in-stock books are still shipping, and refunds for BL Twist are being issued, slowly but surely. But there hasn't been enough money coming in to support this venture for a long time, and to be honest, the plug was pulled a lot later than it should have been.
Iris Print has been essentially a one-person operation. Just me, editor/owner Kellie Lynch. There are no co-owners or employees; there's no national headquarters. I work out of a shared office, and communicate via e-mail with a couple dozen very talented freelance artists, writers, and graphic designers. I travel around the country to sell books at conventions, and at 90% of the shows I man the booth alone. I read submissions after dinner at home and in my hotel room when I'm on the road. It's a very small business, and unfortunately I haven't been able to recover from the sort of hits that a larger business might be able to soak up.
The first convention I attended as Iris Print was Yaoi-con 2006, and it was a fantastic success. Encouraged, I focused heavily on conventions in the subsequent months, but I never had another successful con, and I lost a lot of money trying to change my strategy, booth setup, and selection to change that. Web sales were similarly disappointing; Amazon has been the only source of consistent book orders for the company.
To get the books in bookstores two distributors were required: one to handle graphic novels, and one to handle novels and anthologies. It took some time to find a distributor for the novels, and when they were finally picked up, it caused a serious glitch in the other distributor's system, resulting in a lot of lost book orders. This seriously hurt sales, and I don't think Iris ever really recovered from it.
In early 2007, it became apparent relying on book sales simply wasn't going to work. That's when BL Twist was conceived: a magazine, published a few times a year, was much more viable given the limited audience, and much easier on the artists involved.
Unfortunately, getting BL Twist underway was a lot of extra work for me. I was traveling a lot, not sleeping enough, and overworking myself, and I ended up coming down with mono during an incredibly busy month. Since Iris is, as I've said, a one-person operation, my illness was pretty much the end of the company.
Canceling BL Twist was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. People were excited about it, I was excited about it, and there was some wonderful content lined up for the launch issue. I would have simply postponed the launch if I could have, but the financial situation was so bad at that point that the launch needed to happen on schedule if it was going to happen at all.
Iris Print was funded on personal lines of credit, and those lines of credits are maxed out. I'm returning to a regular nine to five job to settle this looming debt. While that won't give me enough time to run Iris with the dedication it deserves, I'm still not sure I'm ready to give up. For one thing, there's all the talented artists and writers who have put together some top-notch work for Iris Print, and they absolutely deserve to have their stuff seen and appreciated. And I've gotten some very touching letters in recent months, and it's clear that there are at least some people out there who want more of what Iris Print has to offer.
If you're one of these people, here's what you can do to help:
1) Pre-order a book. Queer Magic and Home On the Range have both been postponed indefinitely, as there are not enough pre-orders for either title to justify a print run. To make print runs viable, it would take 150 pre-orders of Home On the Range, and 250 pre-orders of Queer Magic. If you have been considering purchasing either of these titles when they come out, please consider placing a pre-order now. Pre-orders will be available through January 31 for these books, and if the target numbers have not been reached at that point, the books will be officially canceled, and all existing and new orders will be refunded. I will be updating this blog in the coming days to let you know where we stand on pre-orders and whether these books will be hitting shelves after all.
2) Join Iris Print. After Queer Magic and Home On the Range, one thing is certain: I can't do it alone anymore. If Iris Print is going to put out any new books, then I'm going to need some help. I'm looking for people with experience in any number of areas: proofreading, comic lettering, typesetting, graphic design, web programming, illustration, or pre-press. Let me be perfectly clear that there would be no pay involved, but you would be fully credited for the work done. I'm looking for people who share my dream of seeing high-quality western boys' love romance sitting on bookstore shelves, of seeing the genre break out of its Japan-centric yaoi mold, of seeing boys' love fiction held to the same literary standards as regular fiction. People who agree that two men kissing doesn't automatically make the story good. If you think you can help out in some way, please use the contact form to let me know what you're willing to contribute.
3) Take a survey. This is something that costs no money, and takes only about 10 minutes of your time. I've put up a survey that will help determine which direction Iris should go next. Please take a few moments to answer these questions about your reading and buying preferences, and your answers will help shape Iris Print's future.
Iris Print has been a long, scary ride for me, and the future is uncertain, but I wish to extend my heartfelt thanks to everyone who has made it possible thus far: Tina Anderson, R.W. Day, Chrissy Delk, Caroline Monaco, Mia Paluzzi, and all the other amazingly talented creators who wrote and drew the books; every person who has bought an Iris Print book, whether in person at a convention, or at a bookstore, or on Amazon.com, or anywhere else; and every person who has shared their encouragement and kind words with me--those letters and smiling faces have kept me going in the darkest of times.
Let's see what the future holds.
(1) Discuss on the forums.