Olivia Smith // Blog Director
Since 2009, Undergraduate Students for Publishing has published two books per semester. Even though this semester may look and feel different, the Book Project is still going strong. As always, Pub Club’s imprint, Wilde Press, will be publishing two undergraduate student manuscripts.
In order to submit, there are only three rules you have to follow: you must be an undergraduate student at Emerson College, your manuscript must be previously unpublished, and it must be 50-80 double-spaced pages.
Sound pretty vague? That’s intentional! The guidelines are broad to be inclusive of anything and everything. Any student can apply, regardless of year, major, or previous work with Wilde Press. There is no genre limit because Wilde Press wants each writer’s creativity to be the limit. In the 2019-2020 academic year alone, the Book Project published an historical drama, a collection of bilingual short stories, a poetry collection inspired by gun violence, and a coming-of-age story collection.
Wilde Press can publish fiction, nonfiction, poetry, plays, short stories, a hybrid collection, or any other form you can write. While Wilde Press’ main audience is fellow college students, they aren’t afraid to publish books geared toward younger or older audiences. Basically, if you can write it and write it well, Wilde Press wants to read it.
Aside from having your manuscript edited, published, distributed, and marketed, there are two amazing perks when working with Wilde Press. The first perk is that your book will have an official ISBN, so you’ll be able to easily look it up. The second is that all book sale proceeds will be donated to the charity of your choice. Recent charities include Doctors Without Borders and the Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services.
Submissions are due October 1 at 11:59 PM EST. The Wilde Press Executive Board will read all of the submissions and vote on the top four. The top four submissions will then be sent to the rest of the staff, and they will be critiqued on October 14. The staff will vote on their top two manuscripts. The two with the most votes will be the next two books to be published by Wilde Press. Then the work begins.
Working with Wilde Press to publish your manuscript will be a semester-long commitment with many choices and opportunities. Andi Smith, a sophomore creative writing major and author of Wilde Press’ The Biography of an Unknown Soldier, is no stranger to this process.
“The most rewarding part [of working with Wilde Press] was getting to meet everyone and talking about all the different possibilities and directions the project could take!” she said. “The hardest part was definitely deciding what to focus on, because there were so many great ideas out there that I just couldn’t do them all.”
With all those ideas, Andi’s book turned out amazing, even with some Covid-19 related curveballs.
With the submission deadline fast approaching, see if you’re able to dust off an old manuscript or whip up a new one. I guarantee it’ll be worth it. And if you don’t have time to get it ready, then there’s always next semester.