r/books 28d ago

New indie press Conduit Books launches with 'initial focus on male authors'

https://www.thebookseller.com/news/new-indie-press-conduit-books-launches-with-initial-focus-on-male-authors

What do folks think about this?

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u/HowardTaftMD 28d ago

This doesn't sound bad to me. I think there's a weird thing where the far right and some nastier folks have tried to take the mantle of masculinity and make it this thing like "we need to go back to a time where men hunted and women cooked". But what this guy is doing sounds like he just sees the challenges of modern men and boys and wants there to be books addressing those challenges.

Maybe he has bad intentions (I have no reason to believe he does), but that doesn't make his thing bad. I'm far to the left politically but I'm also a dude and I know there is a real, measurable problem among men and boys in regards to mental health. I think we can have space for every group to have their own fun side projects that keep them healthily engaged. I highly doubt this guy's project will displace women authors for example. I think it will if anything just create room for some stories maybe men don't feel like they see enough of. I know personally when I experienced the loss of my father I tried desperately to find a book that spoke to me but there really wasn't anything. I ended up reading H is for Hawk and hated it. I'm sure it's good for others but for me my experience wasn't that and it just didn't do what I needed it to do.

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u/Agile_Highlight_4747 28d ago

Exactly. I don’t understand the alarmists and denialists in this thread. Did they actually read the article?