I'm Building a New Home for Jewish Voices

What if you are offered the opportunity to build something that you have spent much of your career writing about? What would you do?

Over the past few years, I’ve helped chronicle the marginalization of Jewish voices in the literary world, especially since October 7, 2023. Jewish, Zionist, and Israeli authors are being canceled and silenced by agents, publishers, booksellers, literary organizations, reviewers, influencers, and more. I’ve also laid out the choices before us. We could try to change the system from within or do what Jews have always done when we’re shut out of a profession: launch our own alternatives that, eventually, become so successful, they match and surpass whatever came before.

In June, I put most of my thoughts together in a kind of wish list on what I would do if I could run a Jewish-friendly publishing company. I spent some time talking to a few people who are doing just that. Many groups are converging on this idea from different directions. An organization that believes in my vision gave me the green light to implement much of what I had planned.

The only thing I could do was say yes. Emphatically. Right away.

And that’s how Canary Publishing was born. I’ve been named CEO and Editor-in-Chief.

First, why Canary? As I told JTA in this article, “Jewish voices have long been the canary in the coal mine, the song that signals whether the air is still safe to breathe. When we are silenced, everyone should worry.”

We will publish exceptional fiction and nonfiction the literary world has pushed aside. That means we will feature talent that has been silenced. Big-name authors don’t need our help. And, of course, we will be unapologetically Zionist. That does not mean we will publish works that feature only one particular political point of view. The only thing that is off-limits is anti-Zionism. We believe in the existence of Israel, the indigenous homeland of the Jewish people.

Above all, Canary Publishing will be author-centric: we pay our authors, including advances.

Since news got out, I’ve been asked many times what kinds of books I consider to be Jewish enough for consideration. I answer that question with another question. What was Jewish enough to have been canceled by the mainstream literary community? I will consider books that were dropped or quietly shelved. I will take submissions from authors whose agent walked away, whose publisher demanded the Jewish content come out. I’ll be looking for stories behind the story.

Our audience is already organized, and we’ll go straight to them, especially book clubs and online forums filled with thousands of authors and readers who are fighting back against the Jewish blacklist. We are not building an audience from zero; we are tapping an ecosystem that is waiting for these books.

Since the JTA report came out last week, I’ve been inundated with interest from Jewish literary professionals of all kinds, and I’m keeping track of everybody, so please keep it coming. As for manuscripts: submissions will open soon, when our website launches with full guidelines. Until then, hold on to your manuscripts.

This is the moment one person, one book, one house can change what gets read. Where the industry enforced silence, Canary Publishing will answer with our voices.