About Us
We are a small independent press, focused on issues related to movement and our human connection to the world.
History
Uphill Books is a small, mission-driven, independent publisher based on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington State. Under the original banner of Propriometrics Press, we published our first title, biomechanist Katy Bowman’s Alignment Matters, in 2013. Since then, books we have published include Bowman’s award-winning Move Your DNA and Dynamic Aging, Doniga Markegard’s Wolf Girl and Dawn Again, and the award-winning Eat Well, Move Well, Live Well, by Roland and Galina Denzel. Our titles have sold more than 300,000 copies in English and have been translated into 16 languages (and counting!). In 2023, we changed our name to Uphill Books to better reflect the scope of our mission and because it’s easier to spell.
Mission
Uphill Books publishes innovative non-fiction books about movement: in our bodies, our minds, and our lives. We inspire readers to consider the meaning and importance of movement and to move, think, and live differently. We support authors in articulating ideas that challenge conventions and move our understanding forward.
We believe that movement is a lens through which to observe and understand ourselves and the world around us. It is also a mode for addressing our problems.
Movement is essential to humans
- We are more sedentary than ever before, and there is a significant and growing body of scientific evidence affirming that movement benefits us in myriad ways, physically and mentally.
- Just as our bodies (including our brains!) benefit from a diverse diet of nutrient-dense foods, so do they also benefit from a full spectrum of movement “nutrients.”
- Movement, and the desire to move, is both innate and inclusive. It is our evolutionary heritage, and movement is for every body!
Movement is misunderstood
- Movement is commonly equated with exercise, but our bodies are always moving.
- Not only do we need to move our whole bodies more; we also need to move our individual body parts more.
- The way we move directly influences how our bodies are shaped.
Movement is essential to our interaction with the world around us
- Our movement deficit has cultural and societal analogs, reflections, and implications.
- The less we move, the more we are outsourcing the movement required to keep us alive and thriving—most often to others’ labor or energy-intensive technology.
- Stagnancy is unhealthy—culturally and psychologically as well as physiologically.
- Movement can build community. The movement of our own bodies is an invitation for others to move, and moving together with people of different ages and abilities can foster community and individual health at the same time.
- Movement is one gateway into resisting a culture of convenience, commodification, and commercialization
- Movement can be a reclaiming and celebration of our freedom, autonomy, and physical sovereignty.
Team
Katy Bowman, President
In the fourth grade, Bowman crushed Ms. Franich’s summer reading contest by submitting over 800 pages read (a tiny construction paper book was given for every 25 pages). She ceremoniously stapled each 25-page book next to her name, creating a line that (obnoxiously, to many) went off of the bulletin board and trailed down toward the floor.
To this day, she needs spellchecker for words like bulletin, but adores books, especially books by people with brilliant, convention-defying ideas that inspire her to evolve.
Penelope is a book editor working in children’s and adult’s fiction and non-fiction. She began working in publishing over two decades ago and has edited both in house and as a freelancer across genres.
Also a parent, gardener, musician, and children’s book author, she spends as much time as possible in the forest and ocean, all within a stone’s throw of her home in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Zsofi Koller is a web and print designer living in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia. She is particularly fond of moving her body, reading, and designing beautiful things – so getting to create the designs for a small press with the mission of Uphill Books is a dream come true. On a given day you can find Zsofi getting schooled by her twin daughters, walking her hyperactive young dog by the ocean, and dancing to Daft Punk at her standing desk.
Christina helps amplify the innovative efforts of authors by reaching out to influential media professionals and like-minded organizations for book reviews, interviews, author profiles, excerpt placements, and other coverage. She specializes in books on health, nutrition, food, gardening, the environment, and sustainable agriculture. When not chasing after her two young kids, Christina can often be found walking along the shores of Lake Champlain (thank you Katy Bowman!), planning her next DIY home furnishing project, or quietly pondering why she ever decided to take her husband’s last name.
Michael got his start in the book business in high school boxing up returns at the Tattered Cover Bookstore, and has been happily ensnared by the industry ever since: 35 years as a bookseller, magazine editor, and publisher. He loves composting, playing the piano, scuba diving, and hiking in barefoot shoes; and lives with his wife and two dogs in Bellingham, WA.
