F.A.Q.s
Q: What is Local Gems Poetry Press?
A: Local Gems Poetry Press is an independent publisher of poetry that was founded in 2010 on Long Island and has since expanded it's audience to 5 different continents around the world. We specialize in our unique anthologies and also publish individual author collections. We publish poetry of all different walks of life, we believe in poetic activism or poetry for a purpose or social change and we believe that poetry can be used to make a difference.
Q:What type of poetry does Local Gems Publish?
A: We publish poetry of all forms and all styles and judge each poem based on the content. What we currently look for varies from anthology to anthology as we do quite a few books with specific themes such as comedy, autism, retail, fantasy, meditation, etc.
Q: Do I retain the rights to my poetry?
A: Yes, the author keeps all the rights to their poems we only take the right to print it in our anthologies and maybe place them on our blog as a poem of the week (if it is so voted) but the poet keep all rights associated with their poems--its your poem after all. The only thing we ask is that if you submitted it to us for publication and it is accepted, that you wait until after it comes out with whatever book we are publishing it in until you submit it anywhere else. (And generally a 30 day grace period after that is nice, but we're not going to nit-pick about it.)
Q: How Do I submit my poetry to Local Gems?
A: All submissions are done via email. The email address is different depending on which anthology it is being submitted to. For more information visit our general submission guidelines section.
Q: Do I have to be local to submit my poetry?
A: For most of our anthologies, no. While we do publish anthologies exclusive to the poets of a certain area, most of them are open to submissions from anywhere around the world.
Q: Do you take unsolicited manuscripts?
A: We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts at this time. We do accept queries from poets who we have published in our anthologies.
Q: I see individual author collections in your bookstore. How Do I Publish A Book With Local Gems?
A: We tend to publish books from people we know. We typically like to form a relationship with the poet before taking the plunge to do a book with them. A good way to start is to publish poetry in several of our anthologies so we get to know you over time and then send an email query about a potential book. We also tend to be more favorable to books that have some kind of a loose theme or anchor point to them, but we have no strict strict guidelines. However we only publish a certain amount of books a year and we do have a waiting list so from query to publication (in the event of acceptance) can take some time.
Q:Does Local Gems Do Live Events?
A: Without a doubt--performing the poetry is a big part of what we are all about. As much as we love books, we believe that there is a special power to hearing the author perform the words live. All of our books have at least one live event--a good chunk of them go on to have entire book tours. Mostly around the Long Island/NY area. A good way to be notified of upcoming events is to join the newsletter.
A: Local Gems Poetry Press is an independent publisher of poetry that was founded in 2010 on Long Island and has since expanded it's audience to 5 different continents around the world. We specialize in our unique anthologies and also publish individual author collections. We publish poetry of all different walks of life, we believe in poetic activism or poetry for a purpose or social change and we believe that poetry can be used to make a difference.
Q:What type of poetry does Local Gems Publish?
A: We publish poetry of all forms and all styles and judge each poem based on the content. What we currently look for varies from anthology to anthology as we do quite a few books with specific themes such as comedy, autism, retail, fantasy, meditation, etc.
Q: Do I retain the rights to my poetry?
A: Yes, the author keeps all the rights to their poems we only take the right to print it in our anthologies and maybe place them on our blog as a poem of the week (if it is so voted) but the poet keep all rights associated with their poems--its your poem after all. The only thing we ask is that if you submitted it to us for publication and it is accepted, that you wait until after it comes out with whatever book we are publishing it in until you submit it anywhere else. (And generally a 30 day grace period after that is nice, but we're not going to nit-pick about it.)
Q: How Do I submit my poetry to Local Gems?
A: All submissions are done via email. The email address is different depending on which anthology it is being submitted to. For more information visit our general submission guidelines section.
Q: Do I have to be local to submit my poetry?
A: For most of our anthologies, no. While we do publish anthologies exclusive to the poets of a certain area, most of them are open to submissions from anywhere around the world.
Q: Do you take unsolicited manuscripts?
A: We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts at this time. We do accept queries from poets who we have published in our anthologies.
Q: I see individual author collections in your bookstore. How Do I Publish A Book With Local Gems?
A: We tend to publish books from people we know. We typically like to form a relationship with the poet before taking the plunge to do a book with them. A good way to start is to publish poetry in several of our anthologies so we get to know you over time and then send an email query about a potential book. We also tend to be more favorable to books that have some kind of a loose theme or anchor point to them, but we have no strict strict guidelines. However we only publish a certain amount of books a year and we do have a waiting list so from query to publication (in the event of acceptance) can take some time.
Q:Does Local Gems Do Live Events?
A: Without a doubt--performing the poetry is a big part of what we are all about. As much as we love books, we believe that there is a special power to hearing the author perform the words live. All of our books have at least one live event--a good chunk of them go on to have entire book tours. Mostly around the Long Island/NY area. A good way to be notified of upcoming events is to join the newsletter.