Ryland Peters & Small (RPS) and CICO Books is an independent, illustrated publisher that publishes books focused on interior design, food and drink, craft, mindfulness and spirituality, health, humour and pop culture. They also publish children’s books. It’s easy to get a feel for what they publish here.
RPS was started in 1995 by David Peters, Anne Ryland and Jacqui Small, in 2006 they acquired CICO books. They are based in London and publish about 100 books a year. They have good distribution in the US and the UK.
They do not consider proposals outside of the genre of illustrated non-fiction. However based on the proposal information they ask for, and their general submission guidelines, they are not asking authors to find or contribute illustrations themselves.
They ask for the following:
- covering letter and synopsis
- a list of contents
- a bit about yourself as the author(s)
- if possible, please provide a sample chapter/project (no complete manuscripts please) so that we can get an idea of your writing style and what content/range of recipes/projects your book will include
They cannot accept files over 1 MB and they will not return any materials sent in the mail. If they are interested, they will reach out within 6 weeks time. If you have not heard from them at this point, they are not interested.
To learn more or submit, go here.
Emily Harstone is the author of many popular books, including The Authors Publish Guide to Manuscript Submissions, Submit, Publish, Repeat, and The 2024 Guide to Manuscript Publishers. She regularly teaches three acclaimed courses on writing and publishing at The Writer’s Workshop at Authors Publish. You can follow her on Facebook here.
