Profile Books is a British independent book publishing firm founded in 1996. It publishes non-fiction subjects including history, biography, memoir, politics, current affairs, travel and popular science. Profile Books is distributed in the UK by Random House and sold by Faber & Faber, and is part of the Independent Alliance.

History

In 2002 the company acquired the HarperCollins UK business list. The list now includes works by Robert Greene, Ryan Holiday, and Shoshana Zuboff. In 2003 the company published Eats, Shoots & Leaves by Lynne Truss which was the bestselling non-fiction title for 30 weeks and the Book of the Year at the British Book Awards 2004, at which the company also won the Small Publisher of the Year award. In January 2007 Profile Books acquired Serpent's Tail, bringing together two small publishers in London. In 2008 Profile set up an ethical imprint GreenProfile under the direction of Mark Ellingham, the founder of Rough Guides. In 2012, Profile launched a new list with Wellcome Collection, designed to showcase writing about medicine, the body, and the human condition. Authors on the list include Val McDermid, Atul Gawande and Gavin Francis. In October 2012 Profile acquired Birmingham-based independent Tindal Street Press. Since 2014 Profile has published a boutique list of Tuskar Rock, editorially selected by Colm Tóibín and Peter Straus, which includes works by László Krasznahorkai and Chris Kraus (American writer). In 2017 the first books were published in the new Pursuit Books imprint, a list showcasing writing on cycling.

Notable publications

Authors include Anjana Ahuja, Alan Bennett, Susan Hill, Ian Stewart (mathematician), Jonathan Dimbleby, Sandi Toksvig, Simon Garfield, Robert Greene, Richard Mabey, Simon Jenkins, Margaret MacMillan, David Harvey, Federico Varese and Francesca Simon. The company publishes all of The Economist books. Robert Greene Timothy Brook Richard Wrangham Simon Garfield Susan Hill Tracy Kidder Jay Bahadur Patricia and Robert Malcolmson, Nella Last James A Robinson, Daron Acemoğlu Alan Bennett Simon Jenkins Jonathan Dimbleby David Harvey James Ward Atul Gawande Shaun Bythell (of Wigtown bookshop) Eugenia Cheng

Prizes

Profile Books has won the "Independent Publisher of the Year" awards three times. In 2017 The Essex Serpent (published in the Serpent's Tail imprint) was named the Fiction Book of the Year, the Book of the Year, and won Publicity Campaign of the Year Award at the British Book Awards.