Chapbooks Explained:

The Prolific Press Chapbook Series celebrates the tradition of chapbooks by offering a publication venue intended to support writers. Chapbooks are usually short collections of poetry, but might also be used for short stories or plays. Traditionally, chapbooks provide a sampling of a writer’s voice, and occasionally include orphaned works that are not being included in traditional publishing efforts. What results are unique offerings that are interesting and pleasurable to read. Need More Information? Check the FAQ page too! 

Production methods:

Our chapbooks are printed (in-house) on either 24# or 28# archival-quality paper (for less bleed-through). Covers are printed in full color on 110lb paper (thick and durable). Chapbooks are moved to our trimming station where they are folded and bound (by hand) using a commercial-grade saddle stapler. Each book is carefully trimmed using a hand-operated 17″ guillotine trimmer, making the outside edge crisp (just like perfect bound books have). Every book is sealed in a clear-plastic sleeve to keep your books clean and new-looking until they are sold. The extra effort means our hand-crafted chapbooks are more expensive to produce, but beautiful and highly collectible. Because chapbooks are produced in very small numbers, we believe it’s important to ensure that the author’s voice survives the ravages of time. Quality is key. We build our books to last.

Submissions and Publication:

Very few publishers offer chapbooks because they are rarely profitable. Some chapbooks sell fewer than 50 copies, while others do better. The small numbers generally make the overall investment (professional readers, editing, design, formatting, cover art, ISBN, setup and printing, etc.) a loss for the publisher. Even so, some things are more important than money! We offer our chapbook series as part of our mission to support the arts. Our chapbook program falls outside of our general publishing platform. We only offer our chapbook series in the Prolific Press Bookstore online, and do very little to market these books outside of our publishing network.

Selected authors receive 10 copies and publication as payment for the short collection. Although chapbooks are not typically treated the same as full offerings in the marketplace, Prolific Press does purchase and provide a unique ISBN and barcode. We make this investment to help ensure that our chapbooks can be collected and traded long after they are out of print, further preserving the voice of the writer.

Authors can leverage special discounts in order to profit from selling chapbooks at book readings and events. Author discounts are based on quantity. Shipping is a flat rate of $10 no matter how many you purchase.

  • 1-50 Copies (15% Discount)
  • 51-99 Copies (25% Discount)
  • 100+ Copies (50% Discount)

We do not charge reading fees (or any hidden fee) to the author. Our chapbooks are professional publications, not self-publishing. Publication is absolutely free from start to finish. Prolific Press is responsible for the book cover and layout. We also provide all the accompanying editorial services. Copyright notices are in the name of the author, and rights to republish content in another format revert to the author after publication.

What we want you to include when you submit a manuscript:

  • Your FULL manuscript in MS Word format. (No sample chapters please.)
  • Name your file like this: Smith1 (Last name followed by the number of submissions you have sent.) If this is your first submission to Prolific Press, then follow your last name with the number 1.
  • Your real name.
  • Your pen name (if any).
  • Your biography.
  • Number of words or pages.
  • Your real physical address (Not work or your PO box).
  • Your mailing address (if different).
  • Your email address.
  • Your phone number.
  • How you plan to market your book.
  • Why did you choose Prolific Press?

We prefer that you submit online using our Submission Manager.

We do not accept manuscripts by email; however, if you prefer not to use a submission manager, we will still accept manuscripts by snail-mail.

If you prefer to submit by mail, send your manuscript in MS Word format on a USB Memory Stick to Prolific Press Inc., P.O. Box 5315 Johnstown PA 15904

Allow several months for us to read and consider your work.