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Wishing our readers a wonderful winter season, safe travels, and lots of good reading! See you in 2016!

Kelly & JJ

How did you get your start in publishing?

The old-fashioned way: networking. And by accident.

I had been writing and reading for as long as I could remember, but never thought much about the process by which a book is made. I mostly imagined them springing onto my bookshelves fully formed, a la Athena from the head of Zeus. After graduating college I emptied my bank account, stuffed a red Jansport backpack with as many clothes as it could hold, and ran away to New York City to find my fortune. There may also have been a handsome guy waiting for me at Grand Central Station—most of the questionable decisions I’ve made in my life involve a handsome guy. Although I had no apartment of my own I got a job in a restaurant on the Upper East side that same day and spent the next few months couch surfing and loving life, as only a 22 year old girl could do. But I knew I didn’t want to wait tables forever.

At the time a friend was doing reader reports for a literary scouting agency. When she got a full-time job at a big publisher, she recommended me to the agency and I took up the task.. After a few months another friend introduced me to the head of the internship program at a prestigious literary agency and encouraged me to apply. I almost didn’t. Things had ended terribly with the handsome guy and I was content to spend the rest of my life in my pajamas waiting for the next disk of Buffy to arrive from Netflix (this was back in the olden days, before streaming). But allure of all those shining, possible books was too much to resist. I was granted an internship and upon completion of the program I was hired on as an assistant. Things took off from there, and nearly a decade later I’m still working in this industry and love it as fiercely as ever.

We both love archetypes, so I have to ask: Which member of the Babysitters Club are you?

I’m Mary Anne. I’ll own it. With maybe a smidge of Dawn.

For years and years and years, I resisted being labeled Claudia because I didn’t want to be identified with the only Asian girl in the group. (C’mon, too obvious!) Also Claudia wasn’t a good student, which offended my straight-A sensibilities. However, I have finally come around to admitting that, yes, I am Claudia Kishi, and I’m okay with it.

JJ and Kelly, at a bar on the Lower East Side with a bunch of other publishing people, back when they both lived in NYC. Also, check out the couple visibly making out on the street behind us.

We go out and suddenly it’s no longer a PubCrawl but a Pub BRAWL! What weapon are you wielding?

Hermione Granger’s wand. Boss witch.

If you could craft the perfect “literary cocktail”, what would it contain?

Friendship, adventure, a generous sprinkling of humor, deft and wonderful prose, riveting conflict, and a touch of believable romance. Magic often helps.

KELLY VAN SANT is a Publishing Gal Friday with nearly a decade of experience in the industry. Currently she handles contracts for Quarto Publishing Group and provides a variety of services through Pen & Parsley Editorial.

What made you interested in publishing as a career?
I have always loved books. I love writing them, I loved dissecting them, I loved researching how they’re made and how they work. Books like Harry Potter, Sabriel by Garth Nix, and The Fionavar Tapestry by Guy Gavriel Kay informed my own writing and my curiosity about books from a young age, and continue to do so. I’ve always been interested in how books speak to people, how prose can enhance or take away from plot and characters, how genre can inform how we view the world from a young age.

But for some reason I always thought of Publishing as this far-away place I could never go. I never actually thought I would find a way into that world.

How did you get your start in publishing?
My degree is in writing and directing for film and TV, and I was so sure I was going to head to LA to fight for an opportunity to write for TV. When my boyfriend got a call from a New York production company, everything changed. Suddenly, publishing didn’t seem so far away. I started scoping out agents on twitter, and when some of them starting tweeting about remote internships, I sent out some resumes and managed to snag a remote internship with a great agent. It was a start, and I was a go for New York.

Once I got here, with the help of said agent I managed to impress Adam Silvera enough to recommend me for a job at Books of Wonder, a fantastic children’s bookstore in the city. An internship at Soho Press followed that, and finally I ended up as a full-time literary assistant.

What is the most surprising thing about publishing that you’ve learned thus far?
The publishing world is very small. Much, much smaller than I ever thought possible. This is partially because so much of the industry is in Manhattan – the offices of the Big Five publishers are all just a train-ride away from one another. Literary agencies have a bit more flexibility when it comes to location, especially thanks to social media. But the industry was built on the creation of close relationships, and that still holds true today.

What are 3 of your favorite books from this past year and why?
Marie Rutkoski’s WINNER’S CURSE series. It’s beautifully written, incredibly well researched, with smoldering characters who are intelligent and terribly flawed. These are considered fantasy because they take place in a world Marie created – but there is no magic. They feel very much like a time in our own history. This is, in a way, true, because these books are based on historical empires. Also, there is angsty romance galore.

Jandy Nelson’s I’LL GIVE YOU THE SUN. Beautifully written (are you sensing a pattern here?) contemporary YA told from two perspectives: a brother and sister who are both artists, at two separate times in their young adult lives. It’s an incredible portrayal of art, first love, grief, and the bond family.

V.E. Schwab’s A DARKER SHADE OF MAGIC. This is not considered YA though it features protagonists who are still quite young, and since Victoria also writes YA it seemed to fit. This book is dark and scary with fantastic characters and a crazy plot that made complete sense thanks to skilled storytelling.

I also have to shout out to Adam Silvera’s MORE HAPPY THAN NOT. When I read it, I had just moved to New York and it was not yet the beautiful hardcover it is now. But I loved that it proved YA can be serious, affecting, important, daring.

If you weren’t in publishing, where would you be?
I’d be elbowing my way into writing for TV, auditioning for roles in film and/or television, or just generally trying my hand at that industry. It is, after all, what I studied. But I am a storyteller first and foremost, no matter what format I’m working in. My heart will be spinning stories until I’m being spoon-fed mushy peas and dancing with my creaky walker in assisted living. Hopefully, there’ll be other old storytellers dancing with me.

Hannah Fergesen is formerly a lit agency and small press intern. Currently a literary assistant, writer, geek, and coffee-binger. The rest of the time: Tardis-dress-wearer and worshiper at the altar of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

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So…as you might noticed, PubCrawl looks…different today.

We have some changes being implemented around here, one of which is a website redesign. On the front end, the reader experience should be improved with cleaner, minimalistic layout and good typography, while on the back end, the posting process should get streamlined for us.

In theory.

Your humble self has undertaken the task of updating PubCrawl’s design to take advantage of mobile reading devices as well as the desktop screen. Read it on your phone or tablet! No really! And then tell me if it looks okay. PubCrawl 2.0 is still very much in beta, but we don’t want to deprive our readers of content any longer than necessary, so click around. The posts are still there (formatting will be, uh, a little helter-skelter for some of them until the clean-up crew—i.e. me—goes in there and tidies things up).

If the blog looks a teensy bit (okay a lot bit) like a hack job at the moment…that’s probably because it is. Sort of. (I’m self-taught.) However! It should not remain this way for long. Based on your feedback, I can make changes as necessary, so please leave comments and let us know what you think, what you miss, what you’d like to see.

Thanks for your patience!

I just discovered that our domain, windowsill.net, has expired. This will probably get cleared up pretty quickly. In the meantime, this alternate address can be used: http://www.armory.com/~web/