By the Books: Interview with Greenery Press Founder Janet Hardy

Janet Hardy has not only been a voice for kinksters, polyamorists and other sexual “outliers,” she’s also worked to amplify the voices of writers, sex educators and more through the decades. But now, after 27 years, she is stepping away from publishing and her company, Greenery Press, a division of Aaron Blake Publishing. Hardy—who has also been published as Catherine A. List and Lady Green—is perhaps best known for authoring The Ethical Slut. In all, Hardy has authored or co-authored almost a dozen books, and is a frequent collaborator of Dossie Easton. Hardy’s Greenery Press is known for specializing in publishing books on BDSM and polyamory and has more than 50 titles available. While it’s all led to Hardy being recognized as an icon in the field, it’s not what she ever set out to do, let alone expected to happen. “I started my writing career working in advertising, writing ad copy mostly for high-tech clients,” Hardy told AVN. “When I lost my last job in advertising—I believe they were listening in on my personal phone calls, and then manufactured a reason to get rid of me—I found myself in a new city (I’d moved from Sacramento to the Bay Area to take the job), with no contacts and no assets. I wrote the material that evolved into my first book, The Sexually Dominant Woman: A Workbook for Nervous Beginners, in a desperate try to stave off bankruptcy. (It’s worth noting that a completely new graphic version of this book came out last year, called The Sexually Dominant Woman: An Illustrated Guide for Nervous Beginners.) My then-partner Jay Wiseman had recently finished his book SM 101: A Realistic Introduction. We quick-printed some copies of each book, started selling them in sex shops around San Francisco, and it all grew from there.” In 1992, Hardy opened Greenery Press and began publishing her own works. And, she said, as with any other life venture, there were successes and challenges along the way, forcing her to make adjustments. “A couple of big changes … The first was when I took on our first book by an outside author, Miss Abernathy’s Concise Slave Training Manual, which is still in print in an omnibus edition called Erotic Slavehood,” she said.  “The next was when I incorporated the business, sought outside shareholders and hired employees—which happened at the peak of the dot-com boom, and which became a financial and personal disaster when the economy tanked. I salvaged the company by asking for donations, letting go of all but one employee, and moving both my business and my home into an inexpensive loft.” But running a successful business isn’t always easy, Hardy noted. “There was never a year of running Greenery in which I wasn’t terrified about money,” she said. Those concerns prompted her to sell the company in 2010 to SCB Distributors—the distribution company for Greenery Press. “With them running the money stuff, I was free to focus on acquiring new books, which suited me better. “The main goal, though, stayed the same: to shine light on aspects of human sexuality that nobody had written about before, and to treat our readers responsibly and with respect,” she added. Her dream book to publish would have been a how-to book on a topic no one had addressed before, and utilized a distinct and conversational voice, Hardy said. But despite experiments with fiction, anthologies and other genres, she found any deviation from the company’s core formula would lose money. She was lucky, she said, that the alt-sex scene is filled with talented writers. “I’m very proud of the writers whose first book I published, many of whom have gone on to mainstream success—Charlie Jane Anders, Hanne Blank, Midori, Dossie Easton, etc.,” Hardy said. But now, she said, the time has come to stop publishing new works, though the company will keep its existing list in print for as long as sales justify it. Hardy said as she approaches her 65th birthday, and since she recently had a positive change in personal finances, she now has the opportunity to work on projects near and dear to her heart. “On a more global basis, we’re in the middle of a global sex panic, as evidenced by SESTA/FOSTA here in the U.S.,” she added. “Our usual venues for publicizing our work are running scared right now and I don’t blame them. But it makes it very difficult to get the word out to the people who would like to read our books, and also more difficult than it’s been in decades to find shelf space in bookstores.” And while Greenery Press will no longer be actively publishing new voices or first-time authors, Hardy isn’t ready to stop giving advice to those looking to punish, or even open their own publishing house. “Start cheap,” she said. “Digital printing (or even quick-printing) these days makes it possible for you to publish only as many books as you know you can sell. Of course, it’s better if you’re sure you can sell a thousand books—if you can get your book onto an offset press, you’ll be able to sell it much cheaper. But if you at least start out digitally, you won’t wind up with a garage full of unsellable books, and you’ll also be able to correct any errors or omissions right away, instead of having to sell out a whole press run first.” And despite Greenery Press closing, Hardy won’t leave writing and publishing altogether. “I intend to write, draw and teach for as long as anybody’s interested in what I have to say,” she said. “I’m working right now on an essay about my father’s death, with the intention of perhaps developing an anthology of essays by people who have been involved in a loved one’s death with dignity. (Sex and death are not as far-fetched a combination as one might at first suppose.) “And my new memoir, Impervious: Confessions of a (semi)Retired Deviant, came out last month from SinCyr Press,” Hardy added. “I have a couple more hot book ideas on the back burner, but it’s a bit too soon to talk about those.” And Greenery still has one more book to promote: Alton Fulmen’s The Dominance Playbook: Ways to Play With Power in Scenes and Relationships. The book, which addresses the D/s lifestyle and how to bring those principles into practice, is part of the legacy Hardy developed through Greenery Press: making it known there is a market “for intelligent, responsible nonfiction about alternative sexualities and relationships,” she said. For more on the titles available from the publishing house, visit GreeneryPress.com.