Summary
A quick look at local, Oakland publisher specCt!
Physically located in Oakland, CA, speCt! (titles on Asterism) has been treating a reading public to beautiful poetry and visual art since 2012.[1] Founded by Gillian Hamel, Peter Burghardt, and Robert Andrew Perez, the group started printing on a C&P is a small letterpress.[2] The community publisher started with and continues to focus heavily on chapbooks, which they publish with beautiful covers and excellent printing. They also print the occasional full-length text with titles like Wildfires. Their authors, including Ching-In Chen, have won awards for their beautiful work, including the 2022 Markowitz Award.[3]
One can find information about their publications on Asterism and about their community activities, including readings, on their Instagram page.
Gorgeous example titles
To find out more about UC Berkeley’s collection of speCt!’s book, take a look at our UC Library Search.
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EndNotes
[1] “speCt!,” Asterism Books, accessed July 10, 2025, https://asterismbooks.com/publisher/spect.
[2] “speCt: A Retrospect!ve,” Small Press Traffic, 2022, https://www.smallpresstraffic.org/traffic-report/spect.
[3] Mai Tran, “Ching-In Chen and Morgan H Thomas Win 2022 Markowitz Award for Exceptional New LGBTQ Writers,” Lambda Literary, June 7, 2022, https://lambdaliterary.org/2022/06/ching-in-chen-and-morgan-h-thomas-win-2022-markowitz-award-for-exceptional-new-lgbtq-writers/.