Riding the wave: Emma Hopkin on launching Post Wave’s UK arm

“A bit of a rollercoaster” is how Emma Hopkin, former MD of consumer publishing at Bloomsbury, describes her new venture heading up Post Wave UK, a subsidiary of Post Wave Publishing China.

Contextualising the business’ reasons for expanding into the UK market, she says: “[Founder Wu Xingyuan] has an incredibly international outlook – probably 80% of everything they publish from around the world is in translation. So, he has very good relationships with a lot of international publishing houses, and he has the desire for Post Wave to be an international business.” While plans to launch an English-language business were delayed by Covid, Hopkin saw a job advert for her MD role in the summer of 2023 and had joined by October.

When I ask why the move appealed, she explains: “It was a blank sheet of paper, and I thought that sounded extremely interesting. I was MD of Macmillan Children’s Books, Bloomsbury Children’s Books and then Bloomsbury Consumer, and I just thought that starting something from scratch sounded quite interesting – and it is.” Currently, Post Wave UK is focusing on illustrated children’s publishing, covering board books, picture books and non-fiction for readers aged from pre-school to 12-years-old (though “the plan is at some point to look at the adult market”).

As such, Hopkin quickly surrounded herself with children’s book specialists: Emma Blackburn joined as publisher from Hachette, where she was group publisher for Preschool and Picture Books; Big Picture Press’ head of publishing Joanna McInerney came on board as editorial director; and Avni Patel, previously art director of the children’s list at Thames & Hudson, was hired as design director. The editorial team is supported by junior editors Lily Hawkes and Phoebe Geary. Hachette Children’s group sales director Nicola Goode joined last September as global sales director, while Valentine Lechevallier has just been appointed rights director from Hasbro. “It’s a really strong team,” Hopkin tells me.

Last summer, the publisher branched out into the US market. Krestyna Lypen, former senior editor at Hachette Book Group’s Algonquin Young Readers imprint, was appointed editorial director of Post Wave Children’s Books and a sales and distribution partnership with Chronicle Books in North America was struck. At the time of our conversation, the press is recruiting for another editorial director in America to increase acquisitions.

More recently, it announced Post Wave Berlin Studio, a small children’s books creative studio run by chief editor Harriet Birkinshaw, previously publisher at Flying Eye Books, and art director Marc Majewski, a children’s book illustrator, which will launch its first list of books at Bologna Children’s Book Fair (BCBF) 2025. Both the US and Berlin arms report to Hopkin, who is anticipating “an exciting spring”, with Post Wave Children’s Books also releasing its first books in the US in March and Australia in April. Australian sales and distribution are handled by Hardie Grant, while Bounce Sales & Marketing looks after the UK market.

It’s been a learning curve for all of us. Everybody has stepped outside of their work role to pick up another piece of the business

When the initial Post Wave UK team was announced, Hopkin revealed plans to “grow quickly and cleverly”. She expands: “We’re in an investment phase where we are acquiring a lot. We started off with eight titles in 2024, we’ll have 25 this year, moving up to 50 in 2026 and 80 in 2027. We are attracting some great authors and some great illustrators to the list.” She credits this to the profile of the press’ creative team. “They’re very well-known and well-respected in the children’s book world, so we’re bringing some really excellent talent to our list.”

In terms of what she is looking to publish, Hopkin states: “We say that our list ‘visually delights’, so we’re looking for really accomplished illustration. We’re very proud of the look of our books.” When I ask how it feels to be concentrating solely on children’s publishing again, she smiles. “It’s brilliant. This is where my heart lies, definitely. I think the children’s book world is just a very nice place to be. It’s filled with very generous and kind people who are incredibly motivated to get children reading, which is why we all do it. And it’s also a very creative business, which is something I’ve always really enjoyed.”

Post Wave UK released its first books in the UK last August and “the signs are good” in terms of their reception so far. Its first original title, Our Love by Fátima Ordinola, came out in January with support from Waterstones and a review in the Guardian.

The press’ output is a combination of original publishing and translated books, with Hopkin estimating this year’s list is made up of roughly 70% translated and 30% original titles. “Next year, we’ll be at 50/50, and from then on we’ll have even more original publishing and fewer translations.” It has picked up a few books from Post Wave China, including Tiger, It’s Snowing! by the “incredibly talented” Daishu Ma last Christmas, and follow-up Tiger, Don’t Worry!, coming this year.   

The Post Wave UK team works closely with the team in China, particularly the copyright and production teams. All of its books are produced in China, but Rachel Ng was recently recruited from DK to the London office to help manage the production process. There is also an editor based in Shanghai. “They’re a great, talented bunch of people,” Hopkin says of her Chinese colleagues, though she admits that the language barrier has been a challenge. “That’s difficult, but we’re getting there. We have two Mandarin speakers in the UK office now, which is fantastic.”

Hopkin has focused on putting “really strong systems in place” as Post Wave UK establishes itself. “Because we want to grow quickly, we know how important it is to have work-flow efficiencies, so we’ve been trying very hard to do that, but we do sometimes feel like we’re in the wild west.” She gives a shout out to the Publishers Association and the Independent Publishers Guild for their “excellent help for people starting up”.

Having always worked at large publishing houses, Hopkin characterises building Post Wave UK from the ground up as “really exciting and absolutely terrifying”: “It’s been a learning curve for all of us. Everybody has stepped outside of their work role to pick up another piece of the business, which we’re all really enjoying, actually.” She is proud of the press’ relationships with its authors and illustrators – “it’s something that we’re really working on”. She expects the team to expand to around 25 people over the next couple of years and predicts that business in America will particularly flourish.

In the shorter term, Post Wave Children’s Books is heading to BCBF, where it has a stand displaying its original publishing. Several of Hopkin’s Chinese colleagues will be attending too. She is looking forward to meeting foreign publishers while there: “I hope that we can formulate some really strong partnerships with international houses across Europe and the rest of Asia and beyond.” She is also hopeful that the press will start to see critical and commercial success for its books, explaining: “It’s a hard place to be without a backlist, so you’re very reliant on your frontlist.”

She adds: “Every day brings a new challenge. The market is tough, but it’s a very energising thing to do, setting something up, so we’re all incredibly motivated. It’s been such a pleasure and such a great opportunity to do something like this. I feel very lucky.”