A new project on Kickstarter aims to create the most beautiful science fiction magazine ever. Considering the team behind TYCHO, we think they can pull it off.
TYCHO will be “a visually compelling love letter to science fiction” in a bound journal of “wonderful, heavy paper stock” that can live forever on your coffeetable or bookshelf. The creators envision a publication that features short fiction, essays, profiles, interviews, comics, photography, and more—all laid out with scrupulous attention to design details.
TYCHO plans to publish original writing but also work as a pure art magazine, and 32% of its budget is earmarked to pay contributors. So how will the team generate an “un-disposable, indispensable, contemporary science fiction artifact” instead of a throwaway periodical? It’s a tall order, but the people behind TYCHO have the chops:
The EIC is Adam Brent Houghtaling, an author and former EIC of BlackBook Magazine, the Executive Publisher is Cici James, founder of NYC’s SF&F bookstore Singularity & Co. and publisher of its Save-the-Sci-Fi project (disclosure: I used to work at Singularity & Co.), Art Director Esther Wu has a shiny minted degree from SVA, and Contributing Editor Ryan Britt has written for the likes of Tor.com, The New York Times and OMNI, and is the author of the excellently-named Luke Skywalker Can’t Read and Other Geeky Truths. This is a group steeped in science fiction, excited to make a new space to feature all kinds of creative output from the genre universe.
Plus TYCHO’s advisory board is awesome:
- Super-hacker, security expert, and holder of one of the seven keys to internet, Dan Kaminsky
- Actor and science fiction devotee, Paul Giamatti
- Clarkesworld founder and editor, Neil Clarke
- Futurist, Vice Motherboard/Terraform Editor, and Yacht vocalist, Claire L. Evans
- Executive Publisher of Art Forum magazine, Knight Landesman
- Creative Director of Orbit Books and Yen Press, Laura Panepinto
- Director of the Brooklyn Law BLIP Clinic, Jonathan Askin
A $25 pledge will score you the first issue of TYCHO, and there are a bunch of cool perks at higher levels, like funky tote bags and this hoodie featuring magazine namesake Tycho Brahe, “the Kanye West of 16th century astronomy,” that I really wish I was wearing right now.
