Walker & Company is a bit of an anomaly in American publishing today: an independent, 40-year-old, family-owned publisher in the heart of New York City. When Sam Walker founded Walker & Company in 1959, Sputnik had recently been launched and department stores were America's primary booksellers. We remain proudly independent at a time when independence throughout the book industry has never been more meaningful.

From the start, Walker has been diverse, reflecting Sam's, and soon his wife, Beth's, varied tastes, many of which continue to define our list today. History in its many guises has always been an active part of the list, through authors like Harrison Salisbury, and, today, Dava Sobel, Mark Kurlansky, and Michael Allin. Science, too, is a particular passion. The prolific Isaac Asimov published with Walker early and often, and now we enjoy the talents of science writers like Tom Standage and Kitty Ferguson.

Soon after the company was founded, Beth Walker started our children's division, which has remained a cornerstone of the company ever since. Isaac Asimov was as skilled in writing for young readers as for older ones, and over the years we have published many of the luminaries of children's publishing, among them Barbara Cooney, Tomie de Paola, Joyce Hansen, Michael McCurdy, Pat and Fred McKissack, Anne Rockwell, Anna Myers, and Kevin O'Malley.

Mysteries, too, have always appeared on Walker's lists. Among the first was the initial George Smiley novel by John Le Carré; we published many of John Creasey's crime novels, and now are graced by the storytelling skills of Bill Pronzini, Jeanne Dams, James Sallis and Carol Lea Benjamin, among many others.

Our Large Print division, which focuses on the inspirational marketplace, was founded in 1985 and has made the works of Billy Graham, Max Lucado, C.S. Lewis, Catherine Marshall, and many others available to those who are more comfortable with large type editions.

We are currently developing our new website, WalkerBooks.com, which will feature all of our latest books and will be available soon. We hope the books you will find on the WalkerBooks.com site will intrigue, challenge, surprise, or otherwise engage you. They are available at independent, chain, and specialty bookstores across the United States, as well as in a variety of ways on the Internet.