PUBLISHING IN THE TIME OF CORONAVIRUS: Michael Deves on how to hunker

Michael Deves, Wakefield Press typesetter and production all-rounder, talks today about his uplifting personal favourite books, just right for the prescribed hunkering down.

 
I was outside communing with nature on the weekend after being cooped up during the week. Raking a few leaves, deadheading a few roses, enjoying the coming cool of autumn after the sweat of summer. My favourite time of the year. ‘Season of mist and mellow fruitfulness.’ But maybe not quite so mellow this year.

 
 

The Big Wide World is in turmoil, and we are not used to this. Everyone is involved, not just some other poor blighters.

Assuming we get through the health hazard – let it be quick smart! – we have to face the problem of the economic damage that is being done. How do the businesses that have to shut down restart? How do those laid off regain work? It’s not just a problem for big business, but for smaller businesses closure or even just a period of quiet strangulation could prove terminal.
Wakefield Press is a small/medium business, and we, like other SMEs, have to man the pumps to keep afloat. Like the bookshops that we work in tandem with. We survive only through the commitment of dedicated workers, who see the making and selling of books more as a vocation than a paypacket.
But these small businesses can be sustained with public support. Especially from dedicated book readers. Like many restaurant and café businesses, bookshops and publishers are offering novel ways to buy their products. We already offer online sales, but special offers are being added to make it easier for customers. And – believe or not – you can also find ‘drive-through’ (or should that be ‘drive-thru’?) book purchasing. At Wakefield (and some bookshops) you can ring and order, pay by card, and drive to our shop. Just park outside, ring when you’re there, and we’ll pop out with your book! No touchy-feely stuff.
For me, autumn is a time for hunkering down with a warm fire, a purring cat if one is available, a good book, and a glass of red. (Our sponsors at Coriole can oblige there – Shiraz is never amiss.)

And Wakefield has a great autumn list of new titles. A couple of uplifting personal favourites, just right for the prescribed hunkering down.

 
Ali Whitelock’s latest collection of poems, The Lactic Acid in the Calves of Your Despair. A heartlifting approach to surviving dire times (such as a Scottish childhood). Crackling language, laugh-out-loud moments. For aficionados of Ali, her memoir Poking Seaweed with a Stick is just as side-splittingly affecting, and it illuminates her poetry.

 
 
 
Taking Down Evelyn Tait, which parades as Young Adult fiction but works just as well for Older Youths. Learning to understand and appreciate others. Not always easy, but not impossible. Written with subtle intelligence.

 
 
For simple escapism, The Girl with the Gold Bikini is a romp through societal silliness, a satiric take on social trendiness. Nori rolls, anyone?
 
 
 
 
So please support us, and other small businesses in your locale. If you can no longer pop in, just do take-away.

Michael Deves, permanently self-isolated Wakefieldean.

Support Wakefield Press by buying our beautiful books!  Visit our website or contact us on 08 8352 4455 for more information, or to purchase a book (or three!). We can post your purchase to your doorstep!