Basement sweet
BY Ilana Stanger-Rpss
Alisa Gordaneer and Marc Christensen have two children, two cats, a smattering of chickens and, oh yes, a publishing house—all within the confines of their cozy home. The press’s small size hasn’t stopped it from trying to publish big ideas. “Each book is a light read but with a strong impact, meant to make you reexamine yourself and your thinking about the world,” says Gordaneer.
For the Victoria couple, starting Emdash Book Publishing felt practically predestined. Christensen’s mother banged out catalogues, envelopes and political propaganda from her basement print shop, instilling her son with a “hunger for bookbinding.” Gordaneer provided the poems for Emdash’s first two chapbooks—an experience that hooked them both. Now nights find them side by side in their basement headquarters, feeding pages into their binding machine while trying not to step on the cats.
After launching in November 2006 with Wendy Morton’s diminutive memoir, Six Impossible Things Before Breakfast, Emdash has published Alan Cassels’ The ABCs of Disease Mongering, and Julie Paul’s outstanding debut collection, The Jealousy Bone, which has two stories longlisted for the Journey Prize.
“We’ve set the bar high,” Gordaneer notes of Emdash’s initial offerings. With a plan to publish four to six books per year, Emdash seems poised to move out of the basement and into the consciousness of Canadian readers.
