Sandra and Brett run the best damn horror publishing house I know: “If we haven’t made you unwell, we haven’t done our job”

Sandra Kasturi and Brett Savory of ChiZine

I meet some of the most interesting people via Cory Doctorow, and Sandra Kasturi and Brett Savory are no exception. I met them back in the late ’90s, played accordion at their wedding (the traditional Wedding March and Billy Idol’s White Wedding at the conclusion), attended some wonderful gatherings at their house, including New Year’s 2011, caught Brett’s old band The Diablo Red in concert, and made two appearances on YTV (the Canadian answer to Nickelodeon) on “Meet a Musician Week” thanks to Sandra. They are absolutely wonderful, warm, funny people, which is why they’re the perfect couple to run a “dark genre fiction” publishing house, ChiZine Publications.

A lot of the work they publish is pants-poopingly scary, and while ChiZine’s official motto is “Embrace the Odd”, I like Sandra’s unofficial motto: “If we haven’t made you unwell, we haven’t done our job.” They publish a lot of stuff that sends other, lesser, publishing houses of weaker minds and bodies run screaming back to Mommy. For this, I’m glad they’re around, because sometimes I need to look into the abyss — and when that happens, I can always crack open a ChiZine book.

They’ve just been covered in the National Post, and it’s worth your while to read their story. Nicely done, Sandra and Brett!