Literary Press Group suddenly loses federal funding

The Literary Press Group, which represents many small book publishers and markets their lines through small magazines, has confirmed that it is losing this year's funding from the Department of Canadian Heritage. Last year, the organization received $235,000. According to a story in Quill & Quire,the federal decision was communicated on Monday and executive director Jack Illingworth called the likely consequences "devastating".

“We believe that this decision is seriously misguided and has the potential to irreparably damage literary publishing in Canada. It just isn’t good public policy to fund the production of books and attack their connection to readers in the most destructive way possible.”