Ark Press is off to an ominous start after its first year of operations, firing one of its senior editors, DJ Butler, two weeks before Christmas, in a move that has fans perplexed.
Earlier this year, Ark Press came into existence in what appeared out of nowhere. Fandom Pulse did a deep dive into the company, learning that it originated from Peter Thiel attempting to buy military science fiction publisher Baen Books and getting declined, and so he used his investment group to fund a subsidiary of his conservative boutique publisher, Passage Press, to operate in the science fiction and fantasy realms.
Along with this announcement came the announcement that Monster Hunter International author Larry Correia would be diversifying away from Baen Books, and giving a new book to Ark Press called American Paladin, which is very similar to his Monster Hunter series, like it had the serial numbers filed off.
According to our inside sources, Baen Books was offered first rights to American Paladin but turned down Correia to give him the green light to go to this new publisher.
Perhaps even more painful for Baen Books was Ark Press poaching its editors, Tony Daniel and DJ Butler, as they moved over to this Thiel-funded startup and shook up their former publishing company.
Fandom Pulse spoke with DJ Butler upon its formation, attempting to try to cover the press as we generally support conservative publishers, but Butler went on an unhinged tirade against our publication in public, shouting and swearing on various livestreams about Peter Thiel in a bizarre reaction to our journalism.
DJ Butler quickly became the face of Ark Press, making YouTube videos, including one calling for a writing contest with a very specific prompt in mind, claiming the winner of it would receive a $10,000 signing bonus.
Over the summer, he hosted regular Twitter Spaces hyping up the press, though to limited success as the X account now only has fewer than 4,000 followers—many of those coming from the main Passage Press account promoting it.
Nevertheless, Ark Press continued undaunted, announcing they would be bringing over libertarian activist Travis Corcoran, better known as Morlock P online, solidifying its bonifides as the modern-day Sad Puppies publisher.
In October, Larry Correia pushed a Kickstarter for his new American Paladin book, which performed very well by many authors’ standards, but was a financial disappointment for someone with Correia's following. The book failed to generate $300,000, with only a handful of over 3,000 backers for a campaign that included not only the novel, but a full graphic novel adaptation and an audiobook from a top-tier audio producer. While the campaign pulled out all the stops for expenses, reaching a low level of profitability must have shaken Ark Press, as they are relying on Correia to fund most of their other projects that are likely not to achieve near this level of backing.
A publishing insider spoke to Fandom Pulse regarding the internal backlash after the Kickstarter, stating that Correia and his longtime podcasting partner, Seve Diamond, have gone on social media blocking sprees and blowups as of late, corroborating the obvious evidence that American Paladin did not perform as expected.
One of the readers of the graphic novel, which is already out on Kindle to the general public, described American Paladin’s graphic novel as, “Imagine a crappier MHI, but with a near parody stereotype version of Owen Pitt.”
Following the release of the graphic novel on Kindle, DJ Butler received the news that he would no longer be working for Ark Press, effective in 2026.
With tepid response and DJ Butler’s involvement as senior editor, one must imagine that this is related to performance, and a master like Peter Thiel’s investment group is cutthroat when it comes to such matters. However, Ark Press’s current employees have not responded to Fandom Pulse’s inquiries on the firing as of this writing.
DJ Butler did make a statement about it on his private Discord to his followers:
It looks like Butler is attempting to get ahead of the damage and yet virtue signal that he’s still supporting the company even though he’s been let go. His friends on X are not so forgiving of Ark Press, however.
Another author followed up:
Ark Press has not made any public announcements about the matter itself and has been fairly quiet for the last couple of weeks. The X account has said little other than a couple of retweets of people posting they bought American Paladin, and no one seems to be doing much with the account that used to be fairly active when Butler was running it.
One might note another issue that around the time of Butler’s firing, fans were complaining on X that the American Paladin graphic novel got out to Amazon purchasers before those who backed on Kickstarter received it. There, they admitted they dropped the ball.
We may not know the reason Butler is out, but this is an ominous start to Ark Press’s launch as a publishing company.
What do you think of this massive publishing news?
For a great alternative to mainstream publishing, with sci-fi spy thriller action, read The Stars Entwined on Amazon!
NEXT: After Massive Backlash, Fans Propose Fixes To Stranger Things To Remove The Gay
Would have thought they'd have had more ducks in a row, but it seems they just weren't ready for prime time. Onwards and upwards, but I still prefer if they succeed because we need more alternatives to the mainstream publishers
Thank you for providing us with these updates.