Uglytown on hiatus

Lee Goldberg links to a missive from Publishers Weekly yesterday that breaks the sad news: Uglytown is suspending publication until next spring:

[Tom] Fassbender  said

UglyTown has been plagued by cash-flow problems after the Words bankruptcy in

2004 and the house’s switch to PGW for distribution.

“It’s been hard on smaller publishers,” said Fassbender about the soft market

conditions. “We’re slowing down our plans. Bookstores are just not ordering

titles in the quantities we expected.” Fassbender said he was pursuing a number

of financing possibilities for the press. Founded in 1998, UglyTown has

published about 14 books.

Like Goldberg, I am truly sorry about this, because Fassbender (with partner Jim Pascoe) consistently publish quality books that look amazing. But when the distribution isn’t there, it’s really difficult to break even, let alone make any money.