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Who we are

We are Onça Publishing, a brand new publishing house based in British Columbia.

(Specifically, we are publisher and founder Shed Simas, who has been working in book publishing for over two years doing everything from design and editing to production management—and waiting to launch this company; and marketing consultant Sam Markham, who currently works doing all aspects of marketing for several books at three BC publishing houses.)

We are lovers of speculative fiction—science fiction, fantasy, dystopian, et cetera—but also of literary fiction, and we want to bridge the two genres and end the elitism we see that privileges literary fiction at the expense of other genres.

We feel that speculative fiction has the potential to fulfill the primary goal of literary fiction—to tell a very human story where the focus is the individual—to an even greater extent than realistic fiction can, by placing characters in the types of extreme circumstances that bring out the deepest facets of human nature.

You can read more about Onça’s beliefs and mandate on our website: oncapublishing.com/about

We want to bring you the amazing literary speculative fiction that we all know is out there. But to do that, we first need to establish ourselves and gain financial stability. That’s what this is about.

Onça Classics

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

To complement the new fiction program we are so passionate about, we are going to celebrate the greats of SF&F with our Onça Classics series: special limited editions of classic literary speculative fiction. The first title is The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson.

Every design decision made on this edition was specifically directed at reflecting the nature of the relationship between Dr. Jekyll and his alter-ego Mr Hyde, and we want to bring you this book with the highest possible production standards. We want to use high-quality paper for the text block, real cloth for the case wrap, and do a handful of fancy things like this die-cut illustration on the sleeve:

(Note that this is a mock-up and was digitally produced. It may not reflect the actual look of the book.)

The design is all ready to go; all we need are the funds for printing. To cover the cost of printing 1,000 copies—the only copies that will be made!—plus preparing the sleeves and shipping everything to our warehouse (read: our publisher Shed’s house), we will need $11,000. This is where you come in.

What this means to us

This campaign is not just about printing a special limited edition of a SF&F classic. It is also about getting Onça off the ground. Reaching our fundraising goal means we can not only make Jekyll & Hyde look as good as it deserves to, but we can also move forward with the financial stability that will allow us to pursue our new fiction program.

So if you’re interested in seeing some new literary speculative fiction out there, and in supporting independent publishing, please check out the perks we’re offering and help us spread the word!

The perks

The most important thing here is to get this book in your hands: that’s the perk for $30 or higher contribution. The book will retail for $49.95 so this is a really good deal! Get in early, help us make this happen and you will save too!

For a $50 perk, not only do you get a copy of the book, you will also receive a 40% discount code that will be valid forever on any other book from the Onça Classics series that we produce in the future! The plan is to publish one Onça Classics title a year, or one every two years. We have yet to decide what the next titles will be, but we're considering the work of high-profile writers like Edgar Allan Poe, H.G. Wells and H.P. Lovecraft. We will keep you posted.

If you're looking for an extra-special perk, we have two great artists doing original Jekyll & Hyde–themed art for us. Each piece will be available as a print for several reward levels, but only one lucky person gets to own the original, to be revealed at the book’s launch in March. So make sure to claim that perk fast!

Our current contributing artists are the great comic artist/illustrator Asher J. Klassen, and the wonderful painter Marissa Brown. We are also looking for more artists to support the cause with perks for higher contribution levels, so keep an eye on this section!

Asher J. Klassen

Asher is a comics artist drawn to the story of Jekyll and Hyde because of the idea of duality. "Dichotomies are powerful things in art and literature; they make powerful characters and powerful visuals," says Asher. "It's what draws me to Noir; the visual weight of light and dark and the idea that people who appear one way in the light are doing something much darker in the shadows."

"American Gods," inspired by Neil Gaiman's novel of the same name. This piece was gifted to Gaiman during a signing in 2013.

Asher experiments extensively with form, using the tensions between word and image on the page to build on the poetic strength of the piece, or using space in unusual ways to influence the narrative. "I want to stretch the boundaries of the medium," he says. Asher works primarily in ink, "this liquid that has carried human knowledge for millennia."

Be sure to visit Asher's website ajkomics.ca and follow his blog, Watercolour Horizons.

Marissa Brown