Welcome to Cosmic Cranium Press

In 2022, John & Catherine Hughes opened a cool bookshop in New Westminster, Canada called Groove Cat Books & Records. The community embraced the idea of a local bookstore, complete with readings by local authors and musical events. But, as successful as that endeavor has become, John & Catherine decided that they needed to contribute more to the literary scene—and so Cosmic Cranium Press leaped from the realm of idle conversation and into the real world. Today, Cosmic Cranium is a place for smart books that defy classification and avoid mainstream approaches. The Press’ mission is to publish titles that offer do-it-yourself solutions to problems most don’t know exist, reveal intelligent ideas that linger on the societal brink, dazzle weirdly or do all three.

Cosmic Cranium looks to a murderers’ row of books like William Burroughs’ Naked Lunch, Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian, Mark Danielewski’s House of Leaves, Greil Marcus’ Lipstick Traces and Thomas Ligotti’s Songs of Dead Dreamer as exemplars. All of these titles explode with creativity from unexpected quarters: sometimes from the gutter, as notes from a rebellion and as nightmares. The unconventional perspectives in these books keep the reader turning pages with head-spinning innovation. As good as they are, it took years before some of these titles gained recognition as superb literature. These writers looked to the future, changing the way people think about books. This is the standard Cosmic Cranium Press will keep.