When Monster House Publishing gets to celebrate a milestone of being around for a solid ten years, I’m sure Founder and CEO Paul McAllister could not be any happier. He began this business after getting his first children’s book, There and Back Again, A Herman Tale, published, and realising there are others like him from his home province who love to get their ideas in print. That first challenge is often difficult!
If it had not been for the caring influence of teachers, librarians, family, and a well-timed visit to his elementary school by a local author carrying the message that “Anyone can become an author,” he very well could have slipped through the cracks. For much of his life, his ADHD and dysgraphia was a hurdle, and to see him overcome that to become the success that he is now is encouraging!
Today, Monster House Publishing aims to inspire a love of literacy in children across his home province, throughout Canada, and beyond by bringing fun and engaging stories by Maritime authors and artists to life. I had time to talk to him about how he got started, and where he’s at now since to persevere in today’s publishing climate is tough!
McAllister responded, “New Brunswick is a small province, and it’s a small industry comparatively speaking, and when I reached out to my contacts in the arts that I wanted to publish my story about Herman, I quickly found out that there wasn’t any anglophone children’s publishing company in existence here. So, on a whim, I decided to self-publish. When I was registering the ISBN, through Library and Archives Canada, they asked what publishing company’s name–so right off the top of my head, I said Herman’s Monster House publishing–I made it up right there.
“I’ve been working in the Arts for the last 20 years. And so I had quite a few connections in the local visual arts and music community. My goal has always been about telling stories, sharing stories and promoting literacy. It’s simply the love for reading.”
And when the publishing industry is facing a lot of challenges with rising costs of paper and the dominance of the market from the bigger publishing companies, it’s tough.
What’s difficult when you’re just publishing works specifically designed for children?
Honestly, I imagine it’s probably easier because there are more children’s publishing houses in this province now. There’s Bouton d’or Acadie, which has been around for quite some time, and it’s a predominantly francophone publishing company. They’ve had quite a lot of success. But when children’s books can only have a thousand to two thousand words maximum, there are a lot of challenges.
That limit is not so much for the reader, but also the parent or guardian sharing this experience (to read it out loud). It should take around 10 minutes to read before bed.
The biggest hurdle I find is getting a story’s worth of content. You really have to make sure things are streamlined. Once I have an idea formed, it doesn’t really take me long to get an outline on paper, and because of my dysgraphia, it’s sometimes prohibitive to get it all down. The editing process takes a long time.
What are your plans for growing this publishing house’s properties? That is, will there be expansions to other markets?
We’re looking at expanding in three ways. One is to gamify literacy. Because I use Duolingo every day, which helped me learn how to speak French, I hope to have something to do the same thing with teaching how to read. We are also testing the waters with graphic novels; we have a few potential authors that have experience in that medium whom we can tap. And also, we are looking at producing animated shorts from our young adult novels.
I wouldn’t mind adapting some of our Herman adventures into this format.
For people who haven’t read your Herman series. How would you sum that up?
He’s a cute little green monster, who works at a café, and he’s one of the first monsters that’s willing to integrate with the human world. There’s a life lesson in each book, and we also make sure that our monsters are very relatable. Emily Brown is our artist for this series, and I’d describe her style as creepy and cosy.
How many titles in this Herman series are there?
We just came out with our fourth, and I am currently working on books five through nine. The reason I’m working on so many books all at once is because they’re actually all taking place in the same day. They’re told from a distinct character’s perspective, and our goal is to release a book a year.
When we started, I quickly discovered that there were so many other stories from other local authors, and set Herman aside and helped focus on getting other authors’ content published.
How do you find your artists?
Before, I used to run an arts organisation called Feels Good Community, where we put on shows, arts openings and had these people doing their work live. With so many talents in New Brunswick, I established really great contacts. I had connections with over twenty visual artists. There must be something in the air here that stimulates their creativity.
When we bring on a new project, one of the first things we ask the author to do is go to the library and select five or six different children’s books that speak to them. And then we’ll look, we’ll go through our portfolio and find an artist that matches what they want.
When the reader gets their hand in that final product, I hope they can see themselves, and the world around them, which is the window to our world. Also, we want to make sure that everybody that’s reading one of our books feels they are also represented. It’s also really important to have these different cultures represented, and to have stories for everyone to enjoy, including the indigenous communities that live here.
Expanding your Herman series into other mediums. And what are your hopes like in terms of maybe finding the end goal of a movie?
Last year, we were at the Bologna Children’s Book Fair, which is the largest children’s book fair in the world. We had a meeting with DreamWorks about the Herman books and said we were on their radar.
Are there other titles from Monster House they were considering?
There’s a really lovely series written by Sarah Jane Conklin called What’s in Flora’s Shoebox? which is all about environmental conservation. It’s beautifully illustrated by an artist who goes by the pen name of Venus Angelica. There’s also What’s in Alanna’s Secret Sauce? Which is about sharing; it’s got a bit of a Robert Munsch vibe.
Kaitlin Hoyt‘s Fleurlings Alphabet is just gorgeous. It’s an alphabet book (there’s not much content to it) but in what she created are these creatures that are part animal and part flower. I think there’s a lot of potential there as an animated work.
For your flagship series, have you considered making a web series instead?
Yes, we’re working with Loogaroo Studios and we’re planning on producing twelve animated shorts, and hope to launch those within the next year. Emily has worked with the bigger studios, and has lots of contacts who might help. You might have seen her name in My Little Pony and the last LEGO Star Wars release.
In closing, what advice do you have for folks who want to get published? Some people may think writing for a specific audience is easier than others.
I would reach out to established authors and publishers who are willing to provide feedback. I’ve always made that a priority. And today, it’s probably one of the better times to self-publish. It’s more accessible and user-friendly than ever. Also, you gotta be self-motivated; with submissions, there’s only so many books publishers with a quota to fill per year.
But what’s to stop you from going out and actually just doing it yourself. That’s what got me started and that was before. Direct publishing, even 10 years in, I’m still finding challenges. When you have a dream, don’t let failure stop you.
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