Lobster Press

Stephanie Hindley, Director of Sales & Marketing

How long has Lobster Press been around, and was there a particular title that launched the press?

Lobster Press was launched in 1998 with a series of family travel guides. Each guide focused on fun things to see and do with your kids when visiting a particular North American city. The guides were very popular, and soon we branched out to picture books and chapter books for early readers. Right off the bat, we had some award-winners, including When Pigs Fly (2001) and The Hockey Card (2002). We now publish books for all sorts of young readers, including YA fiction, nonfiction for tweens and teens, and most recently, board books for toddlers and preschoolers.

When did you start the Lobster Press Blog? Do your children and young adult readers visit your blog? What do you think young readers use blogs for?

The Lobster Press Blog began a few years back. We had a few wonderful interns who were ambitious enough to set it up and consult with me on the content. We aim to have a diverse collection of posts. Some will focus on news, reviews, awards, and author events, to keep people up to date with what's happening at Lobster. We frequently post author interviews and highlight featured titles. We make a point of also including original articles, written in-house, that touch upon topics relevant to readers, parents, educators, and industry folks. At the moment our readership is primarily adults—reviewers, book buyers, parents, and educators. However, as we receive more coverage on other blogs—especially book review blogs that have a large youth audience—we hope to see more visits and comments from young readers.

What is it about your books that encourage reluctant readers to read?

When we choose to publish a title for reluctant readers, also known as a high-low novel, we have very specific guidelines in mind. First we follow the standards of having manageable vocabulary, short chapters, and relatively low page counts that won't intimidate struggling or ESL readers. Then, of equal importance, is the content. Characters must be engaging and the plot must be exciting, preferably with fast-paced action. If we are dealing with a high-low novel for teens, we need to make sure that the plot will be of interest to a high school aged reader, while generally keeping the reading level between 4th and 6th grade. The goal is to get non-readers hooked on books. If that means offering them a 144-page action novel that they can polish off over a weekend, fantastic. The more they read, the more challenging texts they will be willing to take on.

What technological changes are most affecting the children and YA publishing industries?

There are a lot of opportunities out there, especially for children's publishers. In addition to the ebook market, which is affecting everyone, we are also working with different companies to develop and distribute animated and online audio versions of our books, and more. ReadHowYouWant provided us with an especially unique opportunity, not only to get alternative editions of our books distributed, but to deliver multiple formats directly to consumers, digitally. The biggest change for us is simply time management. We now need to make time to focus on these new markets, while still maintaining and growing our line of print books.

Are there one or two titles or series that you are especially excited to see available in large print and accessible editions?

I would say our Grim Hill fantasy series for tweens, which will be up to five titles in the Spring of 2011, and also our Abby and Tess Pet-Sitters series, which is for beginning readers. Kids love series, and it is quite thrilling to know that a whole new audience is discovering these popular titles.