Firefallmedia, our publishing company, has spawned
a literary agency. There is a need. We've multiplied. 
Our nursery of projects has grown too large however, 
and we can't feed all. Most of the projects are wholly
formed, but till they're in book cloth, they're invisible 
to everyone else. The next books, planned and ready, 
are stunners, and deserve more than we can give them
in advance advertising and promotion. We also prefer 
the birth-place to the marketing battlefield. And, to 
realize our full potential, we need to reorient digitally. 
Yes, Firefall-Literary offerings are the babies we'd like to 
see grow up, that they can walk on their own in the world.
So, we've created a new company to that purpose.

We have, besides our current base near San 
Francisco, offices on the outskirts of Washington, 
New York, and Paris. The center will shift with the 
project and the focus of the moment, but Washington
is distribution, San Francisco production, New York 
editorial, and Paris, so far, is for the fun of it.

A personal, many-windowed, literary realism:
to visualize and reveal the otherwise invisible - 
the unique, at a near distance -
"to be the penthouse of the imagination-tm" -
and to ultimately produce a completely visual novel,
in the heat of transformation.

Dear Petra, (at Literarische Agentur)

Firefall as a name was originally applied to events in California's
Yosemite Valley early in the century. Burning embers from wood fires
were pushed off the cliff in a 1000 foot shower of sparks every summer night. 
This was outlawed, brought back, and outlawed again. Seventy five years
later at the fiftieth anniversary of the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco,
master fireworks makers from France transformed the bridge dramatically.
They lined the length of the central span with fireworks that exploded 
simultaneously, creating a cascade of intense beauty, that fell colorfully, 
reflectively, on the dark rippling water below. In 1979 at a rodeo in 
Livingston Montana, fireworks dropped to within arms reach of the crowd 
in the grandstands. The audience stared enraptured at the sparks 
extinguishing just above them. 

Our experience of these events in actual and literary fact inspired
the imprint and its definition. Jon D'Arc wrote a statement for us: 
"The object is to lift powerful voices from the well of anonymity, 
to release the heat of literary fever, to spark the air with insight. 
In time we will develop the visual novel, a new American idiom, and 
a future-vision. Yes, we seek to develop a cosmic form of communication
that will inspire even NASA." The Pseudonymous Series-tm followed. 
It is an extension of imagist thinking. As fireworks don't reveal the powder 
maker or the cannon shape, so each author prefers his or her dark anonymity,
to let the light be his book. Yes, the use of pseudonyms does get attention, 
and it is a marketing strategy, but it also allows the authors freer expression.
It relates the books without making them dependent on each other. The subjects 
now are shared universals: the limits of vision, the physicality of running,
and cultures in conflict, but the setting is San Francisco. Each book begins 
in a different neighborhood, and at once fictionalizes and factualizes the city,
one of the most popular in the world, but primarily visited for its scenic wonder.
In our novels, the city is a game board mapping the fate of its players. 
The characters are local but quirky in their own right and, like most 
Americans, have a family history that began in Europe, and that can be 
returned to. Yet, everyone is transformed by the American experience. 
But romance in motion, the varieties of vision, and cultural change 
are universals. That is, they are a shared condition, independent of specific
locality. And each book is a world in itself. Of course our imaginative reach
is greater than our actual grasp, and not every book will ignite, delight and
shower down on an audience. But every book is a new exercise or experiment, 
and our grasp becomes firmer and stronger with each release. In these days of 
electronic virtuosity, of voiceless sightless communication, we are trying to 
bring the audible, tactile and visual to a new level. We had to begin in the 
present though, and so our first effort was a book literally about injecting 
vision into the eye. It is a completely unique and important book.
That is the origin and the reasoning behind Firefallmedia's first success.

Firefall's pseudonymous policy allows authors the freedom
of anonymity, the freedom that comes with a new identity,
enabling each author to escape his or her established
reputation and journey into new avenues of expression.

the role of women
 explained in 
editorial correspondence

Dear Kate (at Conde/Nast)

Throughout the Pseudonymous Series-tm, women play a dominant, expert role. 
In Don't Drink the Eye Drops, Dream Rider, Dr. Alisa Grey is the professional 
in charge, trying to create a future for herself. Her quest determines the visual 
fate and the fate of vision for the other characters. Of course she too is at the
mercy of her abilities, but even defeat increases her expertise. In Greenlings, 
Andrea Rose Kelley is the winning professional, teaching the lazy lustful male 
narrator to run. In On the Crest of Time, Sara Berlin is an astro-chemist, 
seeking to unite her scientific, cultural, and romantic quests, and the male 
protagonist must help or fail her. In Zero is the Hero, the narrator this time 
is a woman making her own way in the underground music world.

Most of the books are written by men, and narrated by male characters, 
but the women are the experts and lead the way. The men must go to them
for guidance. Sometimes the women stumble, mislead, or act out badly, 
but they all learn and expand their horizons. Though these books are 
all part of a series, they are unique, originals, yes, one of a kind. However,
they stand or fall on their own. So do the female characters in the books.
The men come to them for guidance, submit themselves to the feminine 
experience and expertise, and both suffer and benefit accordingly. 

That the books are happening this way isn't a matter of design or intention, 
but an expression of the literary moment. We are happy to present it, 
and push our authors accordingly, to develop their characters to the fullest.
No doubt they will change in time, but hopefully be enjoyable indefinitely.