A little history and reasons for publishing with Siri Scientific Press

Siri Scientific Press (SSP) has quickly made a name for itself in producing high-quality scientific books and monographs that deal with natural history. Admitted, SSP has a niche product, but one that they excel at producing (Priscum, Winter 2015 [academic book reviewer])

Siri Scientific Press has quickly grown in stature and is regularly producing important contributions to several natural history disciplines (The Grapevine No. 2, June 2015 [newsletter of Natural History Book Service Ltd.]

Siri Scientific Press was set up by Dr David Penney DSc, PhD, FRES, FLS, FRSB, CSci in 2008 for a book he had written on the palaeobiology of fossil spiders preserved in amber from the Dominican Republic. The book had been submitted to various publishers and was sent out to review by a major university press. However, despite receiving excellent reviews recommending publication it was rejected on the grounds that it would probably not make sufficient profit for them. Since publication the book has sold several hundred copies and received excellent reviews in professional and amateur newsletters and journals and is still selling 15 years on.

It became apparent that there was an opportunity for mutually beneficial co-operation with other potential authors who would like to get their work out in the broader public domain in addition to circulated amongst academics, but who would presumably be rejected by the larger publishers for the same reason that I was. Hence, a monograph series was established, which aims to publish relatively short print runs (ca. 500 copies) of semi/specialized topics aimed at forming basic reference works for academics whilst also being accessible to the educated layperson. We have also produced several titles in initial print runs of 3000 copies. This is an excellent opportunity for early stage researchers who would benefit immensely by having a published volume on their cv, particularly in the current highly competitive academic environment.

We also publish compiled edited volumes, field guides, photographic atlases and more general works with relevance to the natural or physical sciences. Contributions from colleagues in the UK, Germany, France, Belgium, Italy, Denmark, Sweden, Spain, Portugal, Austria, The Netherlands, Poland, Switzerland, Kazakhstan, Hungary, Slovenia, Czech Republic, Israel, Ukraine, Russia, Canada, USA, Australia, South Africa and Lebanon have already been published. Most of our authors are based at universities around the world and other prestigious research establishments such as the Natural History Museum, London; Museum fur Naturkunde, Berlin; Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle, Paris; National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C. and the American Museum of Natural History, New York, to name but a few. We welcome you to join our growing authorship of highly recognized international researchers.

Why publish with Siri Scientific Press?

What sets us apart from other publishers is our personal and dedicated approach. All projects are produced by a highly experienced scientist who understands the nature and demands of academia. We take a personal, yet highly professional approach to all projects submitted, which are always dealt with speedily and comprehensively. We can deal with all stages of production if necessary, but are equally happy to receive print ready pdf files. Whereas some publishers can take up to three years (or more) to publish a book following the initial submission of manuscript and figures (often making the information out of date by the time it becomes available) we have a turn around time of as short as two months from submission to production of the final book. In order to maintain the highest standards we do not outsource any of our production to third world countries with cheap labour and little interest in the environment. We support British businesses that hold FSC accreditation and ISO 9001/ISO 14001 certifications and thus are committed to minimal environmental impact.

All our printed books are listed on the Nielsen Book database and are taken by many major academic and museum libraries around the world. They are also distributed via specialist natural history and entomology book dealers (e.g. NHBS, Pemberley Books, Subbuteo Natural History Books, etc.), who regularly feature our new titles in their global email promotions in addition to in their printed catalogs. We also export to major retailers overseas. For some titles we produce colour flyers for distribution via specialist publications of relevant societies such as the Royal Entomological Society or the Palaeontological Association. For others, we advertize in magazines such as British Wildlife, which has a readership of between 20,000-30,000 per issue. Most of our authors are experts in their respective fields and often present their work via public interest media outlets such as radio and TV interviews. Hence our books also feature in the reading lists for such broadcasts, e.g. BBC radio 4. 

We operate out of dedicated office and warehouse facilities at Arrow Mill, Queensway, Rochdale, Greater Manchester, UK. Review copies of all our titles are provided to relevant academic and professional journals and newsletters, etc. and to date all our books have received excellent reviews in professional journals and newsletters (excerpts from published reviews can be seen on our product pages). Our book Dinosaurs of the British Isles by Dean Lomax was submitted in consideration for the Royal Society Winton prize for science books 2015 and the Society of Biology general biology book award 2015. Our 2015 book Homo Sapiens: An Appraisal of Modern Humans by Rajan Jaisinghani will be submitted for the same prizes in the 2015-2016 session. Our volume Nomosystematics: A Closer Look at the Theoretical Basis of Biological Classification by Boris Zakharov, published in 2013 was listed in the top 10 Biology Teaching Academic Philosophy books in the following blog: http://bioteaching.wordpress.com/2013/10/29/2013-shopping-academic-philosophy-books/ Our Monograph volume on True Bugs of the World (2nd edition) won the Royal Entomological Society Westwood Medal in 2021.

All hard-copy titles are available online through our shop or through major online booksellers such as Amazon, Waterstones, Blackwell etc. In addition, we regularly attend trade fairs and scientific conferences in order to promote our titles and as a result of sponsoring these meetings our logo appears alongside other major supporters.

Setting up a display table at the Royal Entomological Society Insect Festival 2015

We have sponsored or are currently sponsoring the following scientific meetings:

• Progressive Palaeontology (UK 2013)
• PalAss 57th Ann. Meet. (Switzerland 2013)
• 28th Eur. Cong. Arachnology (Italy 2014)
• 4th International Palaeontological Congress (Argentina 2014)
• PalAss 58th Ann. Meet. (UK 2014)
• 29th Eur. Cong. Arachnology (Czech Republic 2015)
• PalAss 59th Ann. Meet. (UK 2015)
• 20th Int. Cong. Arachnology (USA 2016)
• Progressive Palaeontology (UK 2016)
• 7th International Conf. on Fossil Insects, Arthropods & Amber (UK 2016)
• PalAss 60th Ann. Meet. (France 2016)
• 30th Eur. Cong. Arachnology (UK 2017)
• Progressive Palaeontology (UK 2018)

Vera Opatova (Czech Republic) being presented with a SSP sponsored award for the second best talk at the European Congress of Arachnology, Torino, Italy, 2014. Well done Vera!

The Abstracts Volume we prepared in support of the 7th International Conference on Fossil Insects, Arthropods & Amber (UK, 2016)

We encourage and support our authors at various events:

Dean Lomax with his highly prestigious Mendel Gold Medal awarded for first place in the Biological and Biomedical Sciences exhibition of Set for Britain 2015, held at the Houses of Parliament, London, UK. Pictured alongside Dean is Dr David Penney of Siri Scientific Press, holding a copy of Dean's recent SSP book Dinosaurs of the British Isles.

We undertake school outreach activities:

We promote the fascinating sciences of palaeontology and entomology through visiting schools and talking to the kids.

 

Explaining trace fossils at St Edwards Primary School, Rochdale

We support local community initiatives:

We are proud to sponsor Queensway ABC, Rochdale. We funded the production of the team jackets, using a modified logo of a spider rather than our usual insect wing. The team are very happy with them!

A selection of the Queensway ABC team wearing their SSP sponsored jackets with our sponsorship covered in the local media (below)

 

We are also proud to be part sponsors of the Trophy Awards Ceremony of Shawclough Football Club.

Shawcough FC Under 9s at one of their Sunday League fixtures and local media coverage of their tournament success

Grants in aid of publication:

Financial support to authors for production of SSP titles has kindly been provided by a number of high profile learned societies, including The Systematics Association, The Linnean Society of London, The Fisheries Society of the British Isles, The Institute for Grassland Studies (Kansas, USA) and the Fundacao Butantan (Brazil).

Quotes from some of our authors and customers:

• Siri Scientific Press (SSP) has quickly made a name for itself in producing high-quality scientific books and monographs that deal with natural history. Admitted, SSP has a niche product, but one that they excel at producing (Priscum, Winter 2015 [academic book reviewer])
• The book looks absolutely stunning. I am very pleased with it. I have enjoyed working on the project with you. Thanks again for all your help and your keen editorial eye (Phillip Isotalo, Ontario, Canada [author])
• Your layouts are beautiful! The book is clearly on its way to becoming something that we will be very proud of. I cannot thank you enough! (Kenneth [Chris] Gass, USA [author])
• The books arrived safely and they are beautiful! The photographs look even sharper and with more color than they appear on my laptop. I am extremely happy with your results and with the reaction others have when they see the book (Kenneth [Chris] Gass, USA [author])
• I’m really pleased with this volume and want to thank you for the incentive and for all the hard work of putting it together. It will be an excellent resource for many years to come and an inspiration to students to take up challenges in spider research (Prof. Yael Lubin, Ben-Gurion University, Israel [author])
• You have done a brilliant job in the production of it – congratulations (Dr. George Beccaloni, Natural History Museum, UK [customer])
• Editing of "biodiversity of fossils in amber" was one of the best ideas in last decade (Christel Hoffeins, Germany [customer])
• It looks really nice, I just ordered a second copy for our departmental display case (Prof. Jessica Garb, University of Massachusetts, USA [author])
• Splendid! Very well done and with a perfect lay-out … You did a very efficient and no-nonsense job. Thanks a lot (Dr. Rudy Jocque, Royal Museum for Central Africa, Belgium [author])
• I am very pleased with your production. I am grateful to you for work in making the text and tables more readable and for the indexes. The figures look particularly good and the pictures are as good as it was possible to make of the original material (Dr. Michael Archer, York, UK [author])
• Just received the book, and it’s a cracker! Thanks for making it a reality (Dr. Robert Coram, Dorset, UK [author])
• Working with Siri Scientific Press has allowed me to develop as a professional palaeontologist and to establish a firm foothold in academia, essentially resulting in worldwide scientific recognition from experts in the same field, in addition to new collaborative research opportunities in areas that are often very difficult to break into (Dean Lomax, Doncaster, UK [author])
• An absolutely exemplary editor and publisher ... I've had lots of very positive comments on the appearance of the book, and stark amazement at how quickly you got it out - so, again, very many thanks indeed!! (Prof. Ted Benton, University of Essex, UK [author])
• The combination of high quality binding and illustrations with low cost might shame and inspire other publishers (www.booknews.com [academic book reviewer])
• ...produced to a very high standard, with numerous colour images, all printed on good quality paper. The editing is tight and as far as I can tell, error-free (Newsletter of the British Arachnological Society [academic book review])
• It is a very very beautiful book!! A book I am proud of... Very glad to have worked with you (Prof. Michel Boulard, Paris, France [author])
• This is the book I always wanted to produce and you have made that possible....many thanks (Pete Lawrance, UK [author])
• I'm am extremely impressed with the final product. Thank you very much for all your help with the production of the book (James Lawrence, South Africa [author])
• It is one of the most interesting pieces of writing I have ever seen in any academic book, not just a paleontological one; it’s a little out-there at times, but stick around for the last paragraph — that’s where it all comes together (Priscum, Winter 2015 [academic book reviewer])
• I am most pleased with the book. The layout, photos, cover, etc. look great, and the overall quality of the printing, cover, paper etc. are excellent (David Hartnett, Kansas, USA [author])
• The book looks fantastic! The print quality is excellent and the layout looks really good. Congratulations all round to everyone involved in this project, as the finished result is top notch in my opinion (Sinclair Stammers, UK [author])

Our logo:

Our logo, which appears on titles from 2012 onwards was kindly designed by Richard Hartley. It consists of the letters SSP, the words Siri Scientific Press and a line drawing of a fossil insect wing belonging to the lacewing species Sympherobius siriae (Neuroptera: Hemerobiidae) in Eocene Baltic amber.

If you are a potential author, we would be happy to hear about your ideas, regardless of the stage of production you are at. Please email Dave Penney at books@siriscientificpress.co.uk

Alternatively, if you would like to discuss your ideas in person we would be happy to meet you in our Rochdale office.

In addition to running Siri Scientific Press, Dave Penney is a researcher and an Honorary Lecturer at the University of Manchester, UK. He is also a Fellow (and regional representative) of the Royal Entomological Society, a Fellow of the Linnean Society, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology, a Chartered Scientist, a member of the British Arachnological Society, the European Arachnological Society and a member of the Systematics Association and a Patron of UKAFH (UK Amateur Fossil Hunters). He is also a competitive powerlifter You can see more information about his research interests and academic publications by clicking here.

Dave Penney (founder and proprietor of Siri Scientific Press) presenting a Keynote Lecture on fossils preserved in amber, at the Joint meeting of the “Palaeontological Society of China“ and the “Paläontologische Gesellschaft", Göttingen, Germany, 2013.

Most of the profits from SSP sales go towards publishing new titles and also towards supporting the scientific research of Dr Penney which is otherwise unfunded.

Just as we support others (e.g. through conference prizes, sponsorship etc.) we are always happy to receive donations in support of our own publishing activities. Thank you

Thank you for visiting. We look forward to welcoming you to our expanding list of international authors in due course.