Third Circle Press is an independent publisher of literary fiction and nonfiction, rooted in Tennessee and open to the wider world. We publish slowly, carefully, and on purpose.
The press takes its name from a simple figure. The first circle is the self. The second is the people immediately around us: the family, friends, and colleagues whose lives run close enough to ours that we can hear them moving in the next room. The third circle is wider. It is the reach of a book — the circle in which a life in Tennessee can touch a life anywhere, and an idea from anywhere can take root here. Third Circle Press exists to make that circle, slowly, one title at a time.
Our fiction list is devoted to literary novels and stories about the intersections of life. We want work that takes seriously the place where one person meets another, where one idea crosses another, where memory collides with a moment. A great deal of modern fiction happens at speed, in places of noise. We are drawn, quietly, to the other kind: books that slow the reader down to exactly the pace a good sentence deserves.
Our nonfiction list has a different purpose but the same temperament. We publish nonfiction to help people, Tennesseans and others, live a better and more fulfilling life. That includes memoir, personal essay, books on craft and vocation, short field guides on subjects our readers actually live with, and accessible writing from scholars who still believe that a good idea deserves a good sentence. We are not interested in borrowed formulas or shortcuts. We are interested in honest, useful books written by people who have earned the right to say what they say.
We would rather publish four books a year well than twenty books a year adequately.
We are a small press. That is a statement of intention, not of apology. Small presses can read carefully. They can keep a book in print because it is a good book, not because it is a fast book. They can take risks on writers whose work does not fit neatly anywhere, and they can give those writers the editorial attention the work deserves.
We work closely with our authors on every stage of a book's life: acquisition, developmental editing, line editing, design, and the long, quiet work of keeping a book alive after it has been published. We are patient with drafts and uninterested in trends. When a book is not ready, we wait.
The press is based in Tennessee. Some of our writers live down the road, some live across the country, and some live across an ocean. We read widely and we publish widely, but our center of gravity is here, in the hills and cities and small towns of this state. We have a dedicated Tennessee Voices series for work by and about Tennesseans, and a small, intentional list of translations, because the wider world is part of our reading and ought to be part of our publishing.
General correspondence, rights inquiries, review copies, and event requests should all be addressed to editors [at] thirdcirclepress.com. Submissions are temporarily paused; please see the submissions page for current status. To hear about new titles as they come out, you are welcome to leave your email for our occasional letter.