Oleander is an independent publisher which, for over forty years, has been publishing an eclectic, esoteric and, sometimes, eccentric range of titles in the heart of the university city of Cambridge.

--Submissions Policy --

NO UNSOLICITED SUBMISSIONS PLEASE AT THE MOMENT - SORRY BUT WE ARE ABSOLUTELY SWAMPED. If you’re a budding author and want to get more advice on your work we recommend you check out the amazing on-line novel-in-progress review machine that is Authonomy!

If you have an agent, or you are known to us or recommended to us by someone we know, you are welcome to submit proposals in all genres except fiction. You can see from our list what we like. In particular at the moment we're quite interested in new Travel, Diet, 'ologies and Self-help.

In the first instance a brief summary of the project accompanied by a precis of the contents and one or two sample chapters will be sufficient for us to form an opinion as to whether we'd like to take a relationship to the next stage - if so, we'll contact you in due course.

Please be aware of some things. We are a very small company. Dealing, on a daily basis, with sales, marketing, current authors, pre-press projects, new projects, editorial concerns etc means that we're using all the fingers of our already full hands to keep the ship moving. This obviously leaves only our own time in which to read and review your submission. As such, your 'baby' will be stacked in the office for quite a while before being attended to. We understand the frustration this causes (in my case personally!) Months and/or years of graft have gone into your book and we are proud to have been given the opportunity of bringing it into the literary light; unfortunately this doesn't make it any the likelier to be picked up.

Please be prepared for it to be turned down - not necessarily because it's no good; more likely we just don't have the money, time or space to add it to our list. Also, we may not think it commercially viable - as much as it may be hilarious / hard-hitting / dramatic / extraordinarily insightful or just rockin' - we still need to pay the bills; or more specifically my wages. There is, of course, also the chance that it's just not very good.

If, for whatever reason, it doesn't work for us I'm afraid that you'll only get a short non-specific email / letter rejection due to the circumstances listed above. Your book may well be perfect for another publisher and we sincerely wish you the best of luck in placing it.