Lunewick Books
An independent imprint on the Lune estuary, publishing strange fiction with its feet in the mud.
We started in 2022 with one novel and a spreadsheet of two hundred people who had asked to be told when it came out. Both are still the foundation of the business.
What we publish sits somewhere between folk horror, the gothic and literary science fiction, and we are not interested in tidying that up into a cleaner category. What the books share is a particular seriousness about place. The marsh in Esme Cardew’s trilogy is a real marsh, surveyed and walked. The factory in Idris Amankwah’s novel is a real factory in Port Talbot with the names changed. We think that groundedness is what makes strangeness land, and manuscripts that could be set anywhere tend not to get past a first read.
We are small on purpose. Four writers, seven books, two of us doing the editing and one freelance designer. That means we can pay a real advance and a real royalty, and it means we say no to almost everything.
We sell ebooks from this website and through the usual retailers. Buying here means the files are unlocked and roughly seventy per cent of what you pay reaches the writer, against about twenty-five through a retailer. We would rather tell you that than pretend the difference is about convenience.
What we won't do
- Lock the files. DRM breaks on a device you’ll own in five years and does nothing about piracy. Every file carries your name on the title page instead.
- Run a countdown timer. The price is the price. If it changes, it changes quietly and permanently.
- Publish an unfinished series. Both of ours are complete before book one goes on sale.
- Use a reader’s address for anything but the letter. No list rental, no ad pixels, no retargeting.
- Charge for the novella. It exists to introduce a writer. Charging for it would defeat the point.
The Lune runs out into Morecambe Bay past a stretch of saltmarsh that floods twice a day and has drowned a fair number of people who misjudged it. A wick is a dairy farm, or a creek, or the bit of a candle that burns. All three seemed about right.
Where the money goes
We publish the split because it’s the reason to buy direct, and a claim like that is worth nothing unless it’s specific.
| On a £4.99 ebook | Direct | Retailer |
|---|---|---|
| To the author | £3.49 | £1.25 |
| Payment and delivery costs | £0.45 | — |
| Retailer’s share | — | £1.50 |
| To Lunewick | £1.05 | £2.24 |
Illustrative, and it varies with the payment method and the reader’s country. UK ebooks are zero-rated for VAT; elsewhere tax comes off the top before this split.
Who we are
Marged Prys — publisher and editor. Twelve years at two London houses before deciding she would rather do four books a year properly.
Dan Okonjo — editor and rights. Handles translation, audio licensing and the contracts nobody enjoys reading.
Ivo Sedláček — cover design, freelance. Responsible for the cloth-binding look, which is a deliberate argument that an ebook can still be an object.
Lunewick Books Ltd · 3 Damside Street, Lancaster LA1 1LX · Registered in England & Wales