About Alma Books

Alma Books was set up in October 2005 by Alessandro Gallenzi and Elisabetta Minervini, the founders of Hesperus Press. Publishing between twenty to thirty titles a year, mainly in the field of contemporary literary fiction, Alma takes sixty per cent of its titles from English-language originals, while the rest are translations from other European languages. Alma will also publish a handful of non-fiction titles each year.

Alma is Spanish for 'soul', a well-chosen name for a company that regards a book as an aesthetic artefact rather than as a mass-produced commodity. The company's whole emphasis lies on quality over quantity, all the way from choosing projects for publication to creating the physical look and feel of the books. Alma works closely and intimately with authors to develop the best possible finished scripts, and displays a commitment to the kind of professional editing, copy-editing and proofreading that is dying out elsewhere.

In April 2007, Alma Books, in partnership with Oxford-based non-fiction publisher Oneworld, has launched a new classics list, Oneworld Classics and acquired Calder Publications and the Calder Bookshop.