Posted on by M2M Books

Publishing Beyond the Diversity Calendar

Marginalised writers are customarily employed as a form of seasonal window dressing. There is a month for every identity, a short period when a few representative authors are invited to perform their trauma for a curious public; a fleeting moment when the publishing industry undertakes a desperate bit of box-ticking and then reverts to its default settings. This is not a picture of positive publishing; this is opportunistic virtue signalling.

M2M Books has no interest in tokenistic diversity calendars; not interested in marginalised communities being offered up to the mainstream as seasonal decoration; consigned to the loft for the majority of the year; writers finding themselves exactly where they were before the brief flurry of activity; out of sight, out of mind; exposed and unsupported; publishers immediately racing on to the next marketable trend.

And in these occasional periods when publishing houses appeal for diverse manuscripts, they are often looking for a specific kind of trauma narrative composed for the Hay Festival demographic. They want to publish the Racism or Homophobia 101 explanation; a comfortable self-serving product drafted for the gaze of the well-meaning liberal. Literature of misery and existential justification.

So, while the industry awaits the next political trend to dictate what is marketable, our mission remains fixed. M2M Books is committed to curating robust literary infrastructure for a spectrum of marginalised audiences – an Internal Library that will remain available and active 365, year after year after year.

This is why our submission window does not close when a heritage month ends. Our submission window remains permanently open; the urgent need for the literary fortification of under-represented communities does not have time for an off-season.

What Submissions are M2M Books Looking For?

We prioritise the complex, the authentic, and the internal; literature that will resonate with marginalised communities, rather than books that beg the world for permission and understanding. We want to publish fiction, nonfiction, and poetry that offer solace, resilience, and intellectual armour to our various marginalised communities in an increasingly hostile political climate.

Sanctuary for the Serious Writer

If you are a writer who is tired of being treated like a seasonal guest, a case study, spokesperson, or representative of your community, M2M Books is your sanctuary. We are not looking for your anger or suffering to be used as an educational tool for others. We are looking for your literary craft to be deployed as fortification for your own community.

This important work continues. We are building something permanent. We are building for ourselves.

Gareth James – Chief Reader

Link to Submission Info
Posted on by M2M Books

The Trap of the Artistic Face-Off

A high-contrast, black and white photograph of a densely packed bookshelf. The rows of books are layered with a mix of leaning and stacked spines, creating a textured, monolithic wall of literature. The top shelves fall into deep, dramatic shadows, evoking a sense of an endless "Internal Library."

Speaking to Our Own Communities in an Increasingly Hostile World

It is not the job of Black writers to explain to white people that racism is wrong. If, after 500 years, whiteness hasn’t yet grasped the irrational evils of their racial bias and discrimination, there is little we can say that is going to change a thing. Racism is a conversation whiteness needs to have with itself. It’s not our job to debate racism and not a good use of our time – especially right now.

Right now, not just for People of Colour, but for those of almost all marginalised communities, the political horizon appears increasingly dark and indifferent, if not downright bleak. So, rather than moaning and groaning to people who do not care, our time as marginalised artists is better employed equipping our communities with art that will provide the armour, the uplift, and the resilience required to survive and thrive in increasingly right-wing societies.

I completely understand the impulse for the marginalised artist to turn outward: to face off against injustice, to shout into the storm, and to rage at the architects of systemic failure. But we should be honest about the nature of protest in art. Raw anger is a valid response, of course it is, but it is rarely an original one. When we create solely out of anger, we allow other people’s intolerance to dictate the shape of our art. In a literary sense, fury follows predictable patterns; it is reactive, defined entirely by the injustice it opposes.

Worse, this artistic rage vainly addresses a mainstream society that isn’t listening or paying attention, when we could and should be speaking directly to our own communities – under-pressure communities who are desperate for both intellectual reassurance and artistic solace.

So, rather than using the manuscript as an ineffective shield against injustice, we must employ books and The Arts more broadly as powerful tools with which to fortify the internal structures of our own beleaguered communities.

M2M Books is intent on building “Internal Libraries” for marginalised communities. To become a curator of narratives that act as psychological and intellectual fortifications; fiction, nonfiction, and poetry that provides much-needed support and motivation at a time when external politics offer little in the way of remedy.

Because these books must fortify a community, the literary craft must be uncompromising. For example, M2M Books is not interested in a Racism 101 narrative aimed at a mainstream audience, but in a sophisticated internal dialogue that will resonate within the community. Any marginalised community under pressure needs a sturdy artistic structure, and weak, reactive writing cannot provide that.

Building this kind of literary infrastructure cannot be rushed. It takes time to move past the immediate scream of protest and into the important work of community fortification. This is why the M2M Books’ submission window remains permanently open for works that focus on the authentic and complex dialogue of a marginalised community.

If you are ready to start contributing to an internal library for your own marginalised community, we are ready to read your work.


Gareth James – Chief Reader

Posted on by M2M Books

A Permanent Invitation

A Reminder Why the M2M Books’ Submission Window is Always Open

Following the successful launch of M2M Books as Wales’s freshest publishing house, and our commitment to increasing the availability of quality literature for underrepresented communities, we are often asked, until when is our submission window open?

The answer is simple: the M2M Books’ submission window remains permanently open.

This is because M2M Books operates to an ideology, not a schedule. We believe that the quality literature we will publish, the kind that speaks to marginalised audiences with complexity and authenticity, need not be hurried to meet an arbitrary timeline. Your best writing should be submitted to us only when it is ready.

Furthermore, M2M Books appreciates that achieving the literary standard of speaking to, and not simply about, a specific marginalised community often requires a comprehensive rewrite of the manuscript. This takes time, and we respect that process. We also understand that many of the texts we will wish to publish are yet to be written.

This long-term commitment to diverse literature is why M2M Books remains open to submissions across all genres (Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, and Children’s books). The complex experience of marginalisation demands that these little-heard narratives are told across every form of literature.

So, our rolling invitation to submit your work to M2M Books is permanent. Though our mission and our standards are non-negotiable.

We invite you to study our mission and submit your manuscript when it is ready.

Gareth James, Chief Reader

Full Guidelines & Submission Details:

Submissions

Posted on by M2M Books

Taliesin’s Legacy: Positioning M2M Books in the Historical Continuum of Welsh Literature.

M2M Books’ relocation to Taliesin, just a few miles up the road from Aberystwyth, is as inspiring as it is serendipitous. We find ourselves geographically as well as philosophically positioned within the historical continuum of complex Welsh literature – learn more about Taliesin the Welsh Bard.

But this adventure, however scenic it may be around here, is not some romantic Celtic jolly. The not un-terrifying undertaking of closing Irie’s Bar in order to establish a publishing house is a committed transference of everything.

I do this because M2M Books has become the unavoidable extension of a belief, an argument, that there should be far more fiction and nonfiction published for (as opposed to about) marginalised audiences.

But this daunting project is not entirely doom and gloom, we have a few things in our favour to provide us with a little confidence:

  • Support: The immediate, crucial backing from our mentor and distributor, the Books Council of Wales, who recognised from day one the fundamental difference between ‘for’ and ‘about’ when it comes to literature and marginalised communities.
  • Synergy: The move to Taliesin provides not only literary and poetic inspiration, but also offers a synergetic and fascinating aspect to these early steps of our publishing journey.
  • Global Mandate: Aberystwyth securing UNESCO City of Literature status and how the genesis of M2M Books played a small part in that massively significant achievement. All eyes on us. All eyes on mid Wales.

M2M Books believe the experience of marginalisation requires an immediate and multi-genre response, demanding the highest level of literary craft across the board – nothing less than this total response stands any chance of rebalancing store and library bookshelves with more literature aimed towards marginalised communities.

This total commitment to diverse literature is why M2M Books remains permanently open for submissions of all genres for marginalised audiences (Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, and Children’s books). So, M2M Books invites authors to submit manuscripts aimed at marginalised audiences now or at their leisure.

We shall delve deeper into M2M Books’ submission requirements next week. Please share our invitation with other authors you know.

To stay informed, subscribe to M2M Books‘ blog and our social media pages:

https://www.facebook.com/M2MBooks?

https://www.instagram.com/m2m_books?

Speak soon,
Gareth James – Chief Reader


Full Submission Guidelines: m2mbooks.com/submissions

Posted on by M2M Books

Publishing for Children – Excluded Voices

– a Call to Action for Authors and Illustrators ✍🏾

A priority for M2M Books is to publish an increasing number of baby and toddler books, picture books, and fiction featuring characters and storylines relatable to children, from toddlers to teens, who find themselves excluded in British children’s books by their ethnicity, culture, neurodivergence, or disability.

M2M Books are treating this early-reading audience as a priority because we understand that the next generation of diverse authors, editors, proofreaders, illustrators, librarians, retailers, reviewers, literary agents, printers, and publishers, can only emerge from a generation of children that love books. And for diverse children to learn to love books, we need them to become immersed in a steady stream of engaging stories that relate to their lived experiences and include characters that represent their perspectives.

If any of us required further motivation to give this initiative the full beans, the recently published 2025 Excluded Voices Report provides stark evidence of the importance of succeeding in our mission.

As a UK publisher, it is also a priority that M2M Books publish titles written and illustrated by UK-based authors and UK-based artists who share the same marginalised identity as their main characters (own voice). For when a character’s identity is central to a story but the creators are not from that community, more often than not, there are problematic aspects to the depiction (ask Jamie Oliver!). For example, tokenistic representation such as a main character wearing a hearing aid as a superficial nod towards disability. Or, in a Peter and Paul story, just colouring Paul brown and adding a predictable subplot about the evils of racism. We agree with the report’s conclusion that ‘however well researched a work might be, the lack of lived experience shows. Own Voice stories generally bring depth that such books entirely lack’.

So, if you are a UK-based author or illustrator from a marginalised community, with an idea for a baby and toddler book, picture book, children’s fiction, or another style of book appealing to children aged 1-9 from the marginalised community you identify with, we would love to see your idea.

British own voice representation in children’s literature is extra crucial right now because the Excluded Voices report highlights a worrying upward trend in UK publishers commissioning children’s books from overseas. So, instead of investing in British talent to diversify their portfolios, in order to plug the diversity gap, mainstream UK publishers are favouring international talent for British editions. For example, repackaging African-American titles as tick-boxing substitutes for commissioning UK-based creatives from African or Afro-Caribbean heritages.

Submissions
Contact M2M Books

Key Takeaways from the Excluded Voices Report

  • Main-character representation in baby and toddler books is extremely low across all marginalised groups, representing just 2.8% of output.
  • Black main characters in baby and toddler books dropped 21.5% between 2023 and 2024, now featuring in a measly 1.9% of the entire published output.
  • In 2024, no baby and toddler books offered neurodivergent or disabled representation at main-character level and just two picture books were published with neurodivergent main characters.
  • Only two baby and toddler books were by British own voice authors.

‘My heart sank when I read about the limited representation in Baby and Toddler books. I can’t express how important this category is. The warmth of hearing my own toddler excitedly exclaim, “that’s me” as we read together, I understand how impactful this is for early reading experiences. The absence of neurodivergent or disabled main characters highlights a persistent gap. Structural barriers in publishing must not excuse the lack of investment in inclusive early years content. Prioritising Own Voice creators is essential if we are to build meaningful representation from the very beginning.’

The Black Nursery Manager, Liz Pemberton

  • In children’s fiction, the output of books with Black main characters was down 50% between 2023 and 2024 (George Floyd and BLM trend publishing).
  • Despite 2.6% of England’s school and nursery population having East and South East Asian (ESEA) heritage, during 2024, only 0.8% of children’s books published for one-to-nine-year-olds featured ESEA main characters.
  • Representation of Middle Eastern or North African characters was even more pitiful. And nearly half of the output in this category was based on war or refugee narratives.
  • Disabled representation at main-character level has entirely faltered with numbers of published books too small to be meaningful in terms of discerning any real trend.

So, tokenistic, trend-driven, grant-securing, one-hit-wonder publishing of books for marginalised children is the depressing norm in the UK and the situation is getting worse. Our job, therefore, is to buck this trend and to publish the books our diverse children will want to read, to invest in and nurture UK-based authors and illustrators from diverse backgrounds, and to demonstrate that publishing for children from minority communities is a viable and worthwhile strategy for mainstream publishers. M2M Books are working right now to publish our first picture book around Easter 2026. And we want to publish more.

Share your own experiences in our comments. Get in touch with your ideas.

M2M Books believe that creative talent is everywhere – it’s only the opportunity that’s missing.

Submissions
Contact M2M Books
Read the Report

Posted on by M2M Books

M2M Books Submissions and Publishing Program

In the Pipeline

With publication day (25th September) for our debut titles upon us, and with the storm of activity this has required all but subsided, it is time to focus on future offerings.

For some months, Cardiff-based writer, Theresa Mgadzah Jones, has been collaborating with M2M Books on three new titles for young children. For us, the importance of these texts cannot be overstated as books written for children from diverse backgrounds are rare, whilst children’s books written about diversity are not nearly so uncommon – these perspectives are not the same.

It is our purpose to address this publishing discrepancy for no better reason than many future writers from marginalised communities will begin their literary journey in childhood, as engaged readers. Therefore, publishing attractive and relatable reading material for children from diverse backgrounds underpins M2M Books’ overall mission of publishing for marginalised audiences. We hope to publish Theresa’s three new books in 2026.

M2M Books are also in the process of commissioning a revelatory nonfiction title – more details to come.

Submissions

The success of M2M Books will not only hang on sales, but also in establishing a regular publishing program. With this in mind, we are still actively seeking submissions of fiction, nonfiction, and children’s books that speak to marginalised audiences. Before submitting your work, please read these FAQs and guidelines. We look forward to reading your work.

Order our Books…

Our debut titles, I Zig and I Zag and Love and Happiness, can be ordered directly from M2M Books online here or picked up at our launch event on Thursday September 25th 2025 at Irie’s Bar, Aberystwyth.

You can also secure your copies from Amazon, Waterstones, and all good bookshops.

Posted on by M2M Books

Don’t Mess with Harri!

Every day is an exciting day in the run-up to publishing our first editions on September 25th. The cover and the internal files of our first novel, Love and Happiness, are currently with the printers and we are expecting a sample edition of our very first book within the next few days. Very exciting.

We are also finalising the typesetting and formatting of our first poetry anthology, I Zig and I Zag. It is a beautiful and wonderful work, supported by Books Council of Wales. Well done the poets. We expect the cover and internal files to be completed and with the printers by the end of next week.

Find out more and preorder these titles.

More info

We are in the process of commissioning three children’s books and a non-fiction title. We will get better at keeping you posted.

N.B. We are still seeking submissions of manuscripts aimed at marginalised audiences.

Posted on by M2M Books · 2 Comments

M2M Books First Editions

Please excuse the radio silence – more graft in forming a publishing business than anticipated – but we’re getting there!

We hoped to be publishing our first three books this September, but were pipped at the post by an established publishing house for Alex Hubbard’s debut novel Storm. We wish Alex well with Storm – it’s a mighty good read!

However, we remain on schedule to publish two important texts

I Zig and I Zag – Poetry Anthology

Masaka Madeda, Eric Ngalle Charles, Brân Denning, Ciel Saludes, Luke A. Blaid, Rosamund McCullain, Mohammed Abdoel, Gareth Alun Roberts, Rakyah Assam, and GI James.

This poetry anthology, featuring thirteen poems by nine British poets, is followed by an epic poem by Kenyan poet Masaka Madeda. The two worlds are markedly distinct. The anthology’s opening presents poems from marginalised writers, interlacing darker myths, memories, and landscapes into lyrical explorations of identity, loss, and transformation. This stark contrast is further emphasised by the epic poem. Click to Preorder

Love and Happiness – a Novel by GI James

In the 1970s Cheshire, Harriet Bush, a mixed-race schoolgirl and adoptee, grapples with her identity, family secrets, and the tragic death of a schoolmate. This novel explores important social and cultural issues that are still relevant today, particularly those related to belonging. 

The story, told in an intriguing and captivating narrative, begins with Harriet’s childhood perspective and gradually hardens as we witness her journey into adulthood.  Shaped by her experiences as a mixed-race adoptee in a predominantly white environment, Harriet confronts themes including race and racism, adoption, alcohol abuse, end-of-life care, the challenges faced by mothers in the social care system, misogyny, and suicide. Click to Preorder

Open for Submissions

M2M Books remains open for submissions.

Posted on by M2M Books

A Happy New Year from M2M Books

(to Marginalised Writers in Particular)

Yeah I know, a touch late. But life has been meandering between chilling and digesting the first batch of manuscripts and poems submitted to M2M Books. If you have already sent us your writing, thank you, and you will be contacted within the next few weeks.

If you have not submitted, please do (Submission Guidelines). We want to see your writing, specifically:

Literary fiction – quality writing, novels, collections of short stories that will resonate with and appeal to marginalised audiences (predominantly UK).

Children’s books – we would love to publish (illustrated) children’s books for the diverse audiences found in all UK schools. In particular, we are looking for books that feature marginalised characters but with narratives that are not focussed on their diversity.

Poetry – definitely getting there with our planned poetry anthology but still want more poems. Get busy and please submit your contributions.

Prediction – 2025 is the year conversations shift away from marginalised writers and more towards marginalised audiences.

Any questions? I am at my desk.

Gareth James

Chief Reader info@m2mbooks.com