Book publishing is changing--as it always has, since people first began putting stories into pictographs and hieroglyphic renderings. As the U.S. publishing industry consolidated into what is not-so-fondly called The Big Five, small and medium-sized presses, including university presses, became the saving space for writing that wouldn't guarantee a commercial profit. Some would call this the leading edge, the place where writing pushes past tried-and-true, past tired-if-still-true, and well beyond not-so-true-after-all. Here readers get the chance to listen to long-silenced voices that call into question versions of reality that have trapped us in narrow beliefs. Here: expansion, expansiveness, abundance. Broad opportunities for exploring.

At this year's National Book Awards ceremony, Percival Everett's acceptance speech for his novel James (now also the Pulitzer winner) included a shout-out for his long-time independent publisher Graywolf Press, which published the 2015 story collection Half an Inch of Water shown above. The cover art will catch the eye of folks familiar with Wyoming's famous bucking horse logo, and yes, these stories reflect familiar Wyoming landscapes, albeit in unfamiliar ways. Everett is well-known for pushing edges of all kinds, and so is Graywolf, just one of numerous independent presses that serve society first. Because that can leave profit trailing behind, the American public has benefitted from the National Endowment for the Arts as it supported the work of these presses.

Looking over the finalists and winners in the National Indie Excellence Awards announced today, you'll find some presses turning up repeatedly, presses also found on the list of those whose previously awarded grant funds have been unceremoniously rescinded by a DC administration opposed to (afraid of) the arts and humanities. The University of NE Press (Bison Books) published my debut novel after many agents considered it "not commercial enough" to land a berth at a Big Five. This press proudly continues its commitment to diversity and to asking questions that broaden and deepen our discourse despite governmental efforts to restrict our reading and imprison our understandings. Today's top-four showing for The Scent of Distant Family in the NIEA contemporary novel category might help more readers find it. My larger hope is that more readers will look to independent presses instead of gravitating without conscious thought to whatever the algorithms keep showing us. The world needs us awake, so life may stay alive.