For the Finest in Nautical and Historical Fiction and Non-Fiction

Fireship Press is a fast growing publisher dedicated to Nautical and Historical Fiction and Nonfiction publishing a wide range of works from Age of Sail, Medieval and Renaissance histories, Westerns and Civil War fiction.

The Cortero Imprint publishes contemporary, Fantasy, Murder Mysteries, Thrillers,Sports and Instructional Books.

Fireship / Cortero is always interested in publishing new authors and actively seeking writers interested in furthering their writing ambitions. Books are published with print on demand and ebooks working with distributors in the United States, Europe, and Australia.

Combining a love of the sea, history, writing and educating authors about the publishing business, author and publisher Thomas Grundner officially founded Fireship Press in 2008.

After Grundner’s untimely death in 2011 and with the support of the Fireship team, co-founder Mary Lou Monahan moved out of the back room functions and assumed solo responsibility for the operations, continuing his legacy.

Dr. Thomas Grundner received his undergraduate degree in Psychology from Eastern Michigan University; a masters degree in Human Learning from the Institute for Behavioral Research in Silver Spring, Maryland; a second masters in Education from the University of Southern California; and a doctorate in Educational Philosophy and psychology, also from USC.

The majority of his working life was spent as a college professor.  In 1991, however, he bailed out of academia, ran a nonprofit organization for a while, bailed out of that and, given his background and training, made the only career move he thought to be logical—he became a full time custom golf clubmaker.

Grundner’s experience as a clubmaker led him to write a series of best-selling golf equipment books with noted golf club designer, Tom Wishon.  As a result of the success of these books he was able to become one the original investors in Fireship Press.

Grundner served as the “Senior Editor” of Fireship, which also allowed him to indulge in his first love—writing books about the 18th Century Royal Navy. As one of Fireship Press’s bestselling authors he published the Sir Sidney series consisting of The Midshipman Prince, HMS Diamond, The Temple, and Acre.

David Hayes of Historical Naval Fiction has moving obituary for Tom here.

His obituary in the AZ Newspaper.

“Fair winds and following seas.”

Mary Lou co-founded Fireship Press with her husband, Tom in 2007. After 20 years as a college professor and entrepreneur, Tom published a successful golf book in 2003.

With the book proceeds, Tom envisioned combing his love of the sea, history, writing and educating authors about the business of publishing, by launching Fireship Press. Later, to incorporate non-historical, non-nautical books, a subsidiary of Fireship Press, the Cortero imprint was initiated.

After Tom’s untimely death in 2011 and the support of the Fireship team, Mary Lou moved out of the back room functions and assumed solo responsibility for the operations.

Despite having an MBA degree and many years as an operations manager in hospitals and clinics and serving as an Associate Professor at the University of Arizona, Tom’s sudden departure left big shoes to fill.

Our goal is to maintain Tom’s legacy of producing quality historical and nautical stories, continuing the development of the Cortero imprint and encouraging both novice and experienced authors to produce the ‘finest’ stories. With the support of the many past and present members of the Fireship team, we have continued to grow and thanks to our authors’ commitment, we have managed to ‘keep our lights on’ while many independent publishers have closed their doors.