We’re going to open a bookshop, both online and and [sic] in real life, in Brooklyn, NY where we live and work. It doesn’t have to make much money…. But what it will do is let us choose one great out of print work of classic and/or obscure sci-fi a month, track down the people that hold the copyright (if they are still around), and publish that work online and on all the major digital book platforms for little or no cost. Every month on this website visitors will get to vote on the next great but not so well remembered work we will rescue from the obscurity of the past.
This is the mission statement of Brooklyn hybrid bookstore/publisher Singularity & Co., which officially opens tomorrow. The shop on 18 Bridge Street is owned/staffed by Cici James, Jamil V. Moen, Kaila Haile-Stern, and Ash Kalb, all of whom are newcomers to the world of publishing and bookselling (a trait generally evidenced by the relative progressiveness of one’s concepts), unabashed sci-fi lovers, and proponents of “Big Idea” style book business.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of their endeavor is the owners’ efforts to revive out of print works of science fiction (speculative fiction if you’re going to get all prickly about it) on a monthly basis, and making these decisions democratically based on the results of a vote from Singularity& Co. “members.”
Membership is based on the purchase of a subscription, ranging from $29.99 to $199.99 per year, and allows you to help revitalize books that are all totally worth saving based solely on their fantastic covers. For instance:
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Singularity will primarily carry vintage “sci-fi, fantasy, and pulp books, as well as things that fans of those books would like (curiosities, t-shirts, greeting cards, robots, awesome things beyond description),” but they have plans to eventually stock new books as well. Until then, you’ll just have to make due with “awesome things beyond description.” Sigh.
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