VS. Books was founded by artist Vivek Shraya in 2017 to create more intergenerational dialogue and support for artists of colour. Vivek offers a mentorship opportunity for emerging BIPOC writers, as well as a publishing contract with Arsenal Pulp Press under the VS. Books imprint.
VS. Books has published two books to date: Cicely Belle Blain’s debut poetry collection Burning Sugar, and Téa Mutonji’s Shut Up You’re Pretty, winner of the Trillium Book Award and a 2024 Canada Reads finalist.
Vivek Shraya is an artist whose body of work crosses the boundaries of music, literature, visual art, theatre, TV, film, and fashion. A Publishing Triangle Award winner, her books include even this page is white, The Boy & The Bindi, and I’m Afraid of Men, which was heralded by Vanity Fair as “cultural rocket fuel.”
Arsenal Pulp Press is a book publisher in Vancouver, Canada with over 400 titles currently in print, which include literary fiction, nonfiction and poetry; books on social issues; gender studies; LGBTQ2S+ and BIPOC literature; graphic novels and non-fiction; children’s and young adult literature; regional history; cookbooks; alternative crafts; and books in translation. We are interested in literature that engages and challenges readers, and which asks probing questions about the world around us.
