Finding new writers for people to read has become increasingly simple. With sites like Wattpad, Tumblr and Reddit, writers draft entire books and short stories and post them for everyone to read. Even sites like Amazon allow writers to selfpublish their works and sell them in online bookstores with all kinds of strange and exciting content from people from all walks of life. Simple romance novels, great horror stories, and a plethora of peculiar fan fiction flood the internet. A quick click or tap can lead to becoming a self-published author. But where does this leave publishing houses, especially smaller, independent ones?
Giant publishers such as Simon & Schuster, McMillan and Random House generate millions of dollars annually, publishing big names who likely have agents working for them. Then there are those smaller presses that focus on a niche and look out for local writers and poets. In the Desert Southwest, writers can turn to Mouthfeel Press, founded, owned and operated by Maria Miranda Maloney. Its mission is “to foster readership by publishing high-quality books from emerging and established writers. [They] seek to uplift, cultivate dialogue, and promote social and personal transformation. [They] are committed to publishing underrepresented writers from the United States and beyond, writing in English or Spanish, or both.”
Image caption: Maria Miranda Maloney. Courtesy of Maria Miranda Maloney.
Maloney is a Latina poet, editor, and bilingual publisher, and Mouthfeel Press has been a significant source of success for many authors in the borderland taking their first steps into publishing. Born in El Paso, Texas, and raised in a small farm community of primarily immigrant families in Socorro, Texas, Maloney is a mother of three, a bilingual woman of color, and a UTEP graduate. She writes on her website that “her family’s outings consisted of crossing the U.S-Mexico border every Sunday to visit family in Zaragoza, a town outside Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, México. She learned to navigate two different worlds, including language and traditions.”
In a KTEP interview with “State of the Arts,” Maloney delves into the backstory that led to Mouthfeel Press. She says she had written for over 20 years in different capacities. Struggling to find a press interested in her Latinx voice, a voice of Chicanas and Chicanos, prompted her to create her own publishing house. However, her story began earlier than that. In elementary school, at age 10, she was blessed to be in Ms. Collins’ class, a teacher Maloney describes as “fabulous and amazingly creative.” Wanting to read what others were reading, she struggled with English. Ms. Collins assigned an art project of the children’s choice, and Maloney decided to create a book. She used cardboard paper for the cover and wallpaper to cut out the title she created, World of Fun. Highly captivated by the children’s magazine Highlights, Maloney’s title highly resembled the Highlights branding. With the help of Ms. Collins, she found poems, printed them, and pasted them into her book. At that moment, she realized at such a young age that she wanted to be a writer and be involved with books. With Ms. Collins’ encouragement, she was reading at an upper level in no time.
Deciding to become a journalist and attending journalism school, Maloney took on various writing jobs, but after getting married, she soon realized it was time to write for herself. She figured other writers were also encountering publishing obstacles, eventually leading to Mouthfeel Press’s opening. Keeping the press small, she published early on over 30 titles. Maloney describes Mouthfeel Press as a bridge connecting new voices, helping writers get into the world of publishing.
While in high school and college, she became heavily involved in writing and public relations. She even held a job at a company heavily focused on marketing and marketing materials. In a “Words On A Wire” interview with Daniel Chacon, short story writer, novelist, essayist, editor, professor, and radio host, Maloney states, “I was exposed to the business side of marketing,” later working for the University of Houston Health Center and TX DOT, where she put together many projects. She describes this part of her journey as “being nurtured into the business.” After 15 years of writing for other people and abandoning her Master of Business Administration degree, Maloney finally decided to get her Master of Fine Arts in 2010 from the University of Texas at El Paso. Maloney was about to emerge onto the El Paso scene as not only a role model pioneer in the literary world, but also, with Mouthfeel Press, as a publishing gateway for writers and poets of color infused with the richness of the border culture.
However, Maloney was a writer before she entered the publishing field. She made a name for herself in poetry, having written three poetry books: The City I Love, The Lost Letters of Mileva, and Cracked Spaces, a book whose title resembles her dissertation, Cracked Spaces and Body Acts. Katherine Hoerth, author of Goddess Wears Cowboy Boots, writes, “Cracked Spaces straddles borders of innocence and experience, languages, cultures, environments, forms, and, of course, nations in the borderlands of Texas/México. With ardor, candor, and craft, M. Miranda Maloney illuminates these liminal spaces in verse. Be prepared to see them in dazzling light.” The poems in Cracked Spaces possess an exquisiteness and profoundly speak to anyone whose eyes fall upon each graceful word.
Maloney’s poem “American Me” is dedicated to her father, but it runs far more profound to newgeneration women. Maloney writes, “Crossed the bridge in ’55 / In faded blues, Fruit of the Loom / Shirt on my back.” Lines like these, whom many can relate to, are scattered throughout the poem. Maloney elegantly puts into words the embodiment of the struggle of many Mexican American ancestors. She pours emotion into her words that describe the efforts of those before us: “Then bussed my ass / To Okie town to the onion fields / Of Bakersfield,” encompassing the sacrifices our fathers and grandfathers made. “Kissed your white land, / Broke my back, sweated tears, / For a piece of the American dream.” These lines capture what an immigrant might experience when coming to America: The idea of the American Dream is all yours, so long as you destroy yourself with labor for it and remind yourself of humble beginnings. “Still smell the onions / On my fingertips,” she writes intensely, driving into readers’ hearts the pains among Mexican Americans.
Chacon dives into the story of the actual publishing house. The word “mouthfeel” is not a standard, everyday word or even known by many. Maloney digs deep into the story without hesitation when asked how she produced the name. Her eyes glisten as she recounts, “When I was looking for the name of my business, I wanted it to be something special. I wanted it to be different. I spent about three years looking for the name, to be exact. Three years! One day, I was at a bookstore and came across a calendar with different vocabulary. But this calendar was interesting, because it was a calendar of words that were never really used. I flipped though it and there it was, ‘Mouthfeel.’” For the curious, “mouthfeel” is the physical sensation in the mouth produced by certain foods and drinks. When Maloney saw the word, she thought of El Paso sunsets, how the beautiful colors linger in the mind, their beauty impossible to forget, much like a delightful taste can remain in our mouths.
With a mission to make a difference in her community, Maloney started the press in 2009. The Mouthfeel Press website states that she began the publishing house “with the goal of publishing emerging and established poets from the U.S.-Mexico borderlands, writing in English and Spanish,” an objective Maloney and her team have held. Mouthfeel Press publishes a variety of books from many of the borderland’s finest literary talents, such as Laura Cesarco Eglin, poet; Lawrence Welsh, poet; Larry D. Thomas, 2008 Texas Poet Laureate; Xanath Caraza, poet and short story writer; Joe Benevento, poet and novelist; Emilia Chuquin, the voice of millions of native people in the Andean region of South America; and many other inspiring bilingual authors.
Although Mouthfeel Press is an El Paso staple, it took Maloney some time to handle her business when she began. In the “Words On A Wire” interview, Maloney explains to Chacon, “I didn’t think much about the business aspect. For me, it was just this passion that I needed to create books, and I didn’t think of what was going to follow after you have a book.” Now, years after being a part of this doublesided business world, she is learning from her mistakes. With the help of her husband, who has an MBA, she has evolved Mouthfeel Press into a very well-rounded and professional publishing house.
Maloney continues to write now and then but mainly focuses on the reopening of Mouthfeel Press. She, unfortunately, shut the press down for a few years after moving to Huntsville, Texas. Maloney felt her children were having trouble adjusting to a new school system and culture in that part of the state. Faced with a challenging decision, Maloney ultimately closed Mouthfeel Press, but she always knew she would return to her work. She tells Chacon, “The moment I decided, I don’t really know when it happened. I just said that I needed to start the press. I have been anxious about it, and I have been thinking about the books.” She eventually attended George Washington University, obtaining an MA in publishing. Her goal with her degree was to see what else she could offer her writers.
Authors can go to her website, Mouthfeelbooks.com, and send their manuscripts for consideration. The website contains the press’ history and mission statement that wonderfully intertwine with one another, the end goal being printing books in English and Spanish, which allows our entire community to read Mouthfeel Press books. El Paso is in store for some fantastic books in the next few years, as Mouthfeel Press is back in full swing.
Throughout the “Words On A Wire” interview, Maloney lights up when speaking about her work in our community. She is an incredible woman with years of experience and makes for a wonderful mother, poet, educator, and publisher. The literary community can look to her as a role model of female empowerment and a skilled poet. They can capture the little spaces in our culture and ancestry in her words and spin them into the beautiful and intricate web of Mexican American life today.
Maloney has stamped Mouthfeel Press into El Paso’s history as a place for any author and poet to express themselves. Her focus on making books in English and Spanish opens doorways for new writers to make a name for themselves in our prolific writing community. When asked during the KTEP interview what advice she can offer to up-and-coming writers, Maloney quickly responds, “Do your research,” feel comfortable with the publishing house you are looking into, and “submit, submit, submit.” Maloney expresses that rejection is part of being a writer, but “don’t give up!”
Maloney’s work has been vital in El Paso literary spaces, and as she continues, we can expect more unique pieces from the borderland to hold a place in our nation’s bookshelves.
Budding poets can genuinely admire and look up to Maria Miranda Maloney. When worried that no one will read their work, they can bask in her words and remind themselves that El Paso writers pack a unique punch in their writing. Mouthfeel Press exudes a good taste, ideally suited for this Southwest region. Writers who fi nd themselves searching for a publishing outlet would be hard-pressed not to seek Mouthfeel Press
