Caption: The Horseshoe Press recently held a bookmaking workshop at the makerspace in the Centre for Research and innovation.

Avid readers know there no replacement for a physical book - the cover design, the feel of the pages, and the smell of the ink are important parts of reading experience.

Three professors at Grenfell Campus, Drs. Tom Halford and Adam Beardsworth from the School of Arts and Social Science and Prof. Andrew Testa from the School of Fine Arts, had an idea to create a publishing operation that included not only author and literature selection, but the actual physical creation of the book. The result was the Horseshoe Press publishing house.

The Horseshoe Press supports the local writing community by collaborating with the Corner Brook Public Library and working with the local Library Writing Group. The Horseshoe magazine, created in 2022, has published two issues of literary work so far but book publishing is a different project.

"With Horseshoe Press, we're interested in printing and publishing original work of talented local authors in book format," said Dr. Halford.

The publishing house seeks local community members who have an interest in publishing their own short work. This project celebrates local community authors and utilizes resources (equipment and faculty) at Grenfell Campus.

Through this collaboration, the hope is to foster a sustainable local publishing house that will continue to propel local authors and encourage local community members to participate in creative writing, according to Dr. Halford.

A Quickstart Grant was secured to buy equipment to cut and staple books. Student assistants were hired to help with the copy editing and the physical construction of the books.

"The material book, for me, is an extension of the story," said Prof. Testa. "The font, paper, cover, size, weight, construction, and overall feel all play a role in how someone experiences a story. My favourite component of this book is the cover made by local paper maker, Leslie Lundrigan (Purple Butterfly Paper). By utilizing her paper we not only produce one-of-a-kind book covers, but get to continue our celebration of local creatives."

An event was held last summer to celebrate the first book to be published - a collection of short stories by Mervyn Dean titled "The Photographer" and "Three Haunting Tales."

"This book represents exactly what I was hoping to do with this project," said Dr. Halford. "Mervyn is an active member of the writer's group here in the library. He's been writing and going to readings for years. He knows his stuff and he's a strong writer. Sometimes, at university, maybe we ignore genre authors. We focus on the literary.

People outside of the university might, however, be more interested in ghost stories or crime fiction or science fiction."

The project is also about partnership - artists supporting artists.

"We also have a chance to celebrate some local tech at Grenfell by using the laser engraver to create unique way of etching the cover which depicts a drawing of the Leica camera mentioned in Mervyn's story drawn by local artist and current BFA Grenfell student, Laine Skinner," added Prof. Testa. "This project is a celebration of local creativity, and it is so exciting to be a part of!"

Copies of the book are available in the Grenfell Campus bookstore.