The first thing I can recall reading about Vanessa Veselka's Zazen was this review on my favorite website about books, The Millions. To be honest, it was probably the book that triggered the whole concept of having this small press collection.
Zazen was published by Red Lemonade which is the newest publishing venture from Richard Eoin Nash. Nash ran the excellent Soft Skull Press throughout the first decade of this millennium, even after he sold it to Counterpoint Press. There are few people as passionate about independent publishing as Nash is. I find him to be inspiring in his passion and am glad we can support his efforts.
Lo and behold, in the midst of my writing this blog post, my second favorite website about books, The Next Best Book Blog, ran this review of Red Lemonade. It talks a bit more about Nash and Red Lemonade.
Getting back to the book itself, the author, Vanessa Veselka, celebrated her book release in an unusual way. She went out and got a tattoo on her arm of the lion in front of the New York Public Library with the Library of Congress catalog number below it. Her author blurb on Zazen states "She has been, at various times, a teenage runaway, a sex-worker, a union organizer, a student of paleontology, an expatriate, an independent record label owner, a train-hopper, a waitress, and a mother.". And now she can add author of a well-received book to the list.
I'm looking forward to reading this book (and, hopefully, every other book that is added to the collection). I also hope this post gave you some links so that you can learn more about independent/small publishers and their books.
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