Meet the Fall Kickoff Speaker

Dominique Raccah founded Sourcebooks, one of the nation's leading independent book publishers, in the spare bedroom of her house in 1987. Born in Paris, France before moving to the U.S. when she was 9, she attended the University of Illinois where she acquired a bachelor's degree in psychology and a master's in quantitative psychology. Dominique was in the midst of a flourishing career in advertising with the Leo Burnett Agency in Chicago when her lifetime love of books proved too strong a calling and she left to pursue publishing.

Dominique began Sourcebooks, then a specialty house serving the financial services industry, with money borrowed against her own retirement fund (all of $17,000 to be precise). Her vision for the company changed over the years as she began to see what innovative and provocative publishing could accomplish, as well as what advantages an independent, entrepreneurial vision could bestow in the rapidly consolidating industry. Her endless drive and unique vision helped to lead Sourcebooks to the New York Times bestseller list nine different times (so far), with spectacular successes across the non-fiction spectrum, as well as bestsellers in fiction and a line of groundbreaking multimedia titles (Sourcebooks MediaFusion). Dominique has never given up her desire to create, as she continues to act as the series editor for poetry projects (including Poetry Speaks and Poetry Speaks to Children) and the Sourcebooks Shakespeare series.

Now, twenty years later, Dominique and all of Sourcebooks celebrate their success with number one titles in parenting and college guides, an important group of novelists (published by Sourcebooks Landmark), a new children's imprint (Sourcebooks Jabberwocky), and an ever-expanding roster of business relationships (including U.S. News and World Report, Forbes, The History Channel and Playskool). She is proud to not only be a leading publisher of poetry, a personal passion, but also the largest woman-owned trade book publisher in the country. In the past few years, Dominique has received The Blue Chip Enterprise Award, was inducted into the University of Illinois Entrepreneurship Hall of Fame and won the Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year award. She has served on the board of directors of the Committee of 200 and now serves as co-chair of the Book Industry Study Group, the U.S. book industry's leading trade association for research and supply chain standards and policies.

Today, Sourcebooks has 75 employees, publishes over 300 new titles each year and is still based in Naperville, Illinois, where Dominique lives with her husband, Ray, in the same house where Sourcebooks was born.