A Tribute to Billie Johnson and Oak Tree Press
Many of you have never heard of Oak Tree Press, nor do you know the person who founded it and grew the company, Billie Johnson. Because Billie died last week after a long illness, you will not get the opportunity to meet her or read the Oak Tree books. We have lost Billie, but not what she accomplished.
Billie published the second mystery series I wrote. My other publisher was a regional publisher and wasn’t interested in books outside New England, but I had written a quirky story set in rural Florida. It featured a protagonist who was a retried preschool teacher turned bartender. Billie didn’t care that the setting was odd (who else sets a book among the cattle, cowboys, swamps and alligators of the heartland of Florida?); Billie liked it and sent a contract and then sent another one for the second book. I just published the third one in the series in September (Scream Muddy Murder).
I like working with small publishers because of the personal touch the small publisher provides. Oak Tree Press was more personal than any other I know because the authors there was so supportive of one another. I credit Billie with providing the atmosphere that fostered camaraderie among all of us. She accomplished this with her personal manner, through the blog that Oak Tree Press provided for all its authors, and the writing contest the press ran for several years. And, oh yes, like all small publishers, Oak Tree had its share of difficulties such as the usual issue of not providing promotion and publicity opportunities for the authors. Yet this proved to be a blessing in disguise. It made all of us self-sufficient enough to find ways of promoting ourselves and of publicizing our books, skills that any writer needs in this competitive market. And, speaking of a competitive market, that is one thing I never felt among the authors of the press: we never competed, but helped one another through advice and shared knowledge. I do not know all the authors, but I count many of them as internet writing friends. Many of us collaborated on a cookbook entitled Recipes by the Book: Oak Tree Authors Cook. It’s still available because one of the Oak Tree authors reissued it for us:
I included one of my bartending protagonist’s favorite recipes for a pomegranate martini, of course.
Billie and I parted ways long before the illness which led to her recent death. We did so as professionals. She gave me the courage to go on to self-publish some of my work. I negotiated with Billie to obtain my rights to the books and published them under my own imprint. There was no argument over leaving the press nor bad feelings on her part or mine. I was moving on, and Billie understood that.
With no one to take over the press now that Billie is gone, Oak Tree will close, but its authors will continue their work. Billie could always spot a good story. The authors published by her have found homes elsewhere or will do so. Mike Orenduff of Aakenbaaken and Kent https://www.aakenbaakenandkent.com/ has published some of the authors. No small publisher or reader can go wrong with an Oak Tree Press author, their having been vetted by Billie Johnson’s keen eye for good plots and interesting characters.
The Oak Tree authors have decided to maintain the Oak Tree Press digest, the online vehicle through which we communicated with one another. That is goes on after Billie’s death is another tribute to how she supported and encouraged her authors. Although I left the press several years ago, I think many of you like me find the loss of yet another small publisher a tragedy for the publishing community. Small publishers are both a place where many writers get their start as well as the preferred place to publish for many of us. I encourage the authors of Oak Tree to continue their work by finding another publisher or by self-publishing. Billie didn’t take a chance on us for any of us to give up. She would expect us to succeed. We are her legacy.
I invite all of you who knew Billie, worked with her or knew of her to add your comments to my acknowledgement of her contributions to publishing.