Welcome to The City
This city whose name is lost to memory is as big as any dream and as oppressive as any nightmare. These are the stories from The City and the outskirts that attempt to keep it at bay. Explore the streets, ride the buses, climb the highest towers and listen to the inhabitants as they wrestle for the truth within their Various Sorrows & Joys.
A City of Prose, an Archive of Emotion
Various Sorrows & Joys is a collaborative world-building imprint that moves beyond the printed page, into a City of shared experience and emotion. We are producing, printing and distributing an ever-expanding series of short stories that all take place within the same unnamed city.
These stories are presented in beautifully designed pocket-sized chapbooks in an ongoing, numbered and highly collectable series.
We're launching a Kickstarter in February 2027 to bring the first five Various Sorrows & Joys titles to life. Register to receive pre-campaign updates, articles and sneak peaks at what's to come.
The Manifesto
Written by Hands that Build Cities
Every title published within Various Sorrows & Joys is shaped by a strict 12 rule manifesto that allows writers to create interconnected fragments of one ever-expanding urban mythology.
The Laws of The City
- The Name: The City is known only as The City. It is never named.
- The Geography: Recognisable landmarks or districts must be renamed to align with a vague, universal identity.
- The Half-Life of Culture: No direct naming of famous people or specific pop culture references. Treat our world as ‘half-remembered.’ (e.g., “the song about being sixty-four”).
- Historical Anchors: General human history (e.g., The Blitz) is permitted as shared memory.
- The Era: Events must take place within +/- 100years of 2000CE.
- The Natural Law: No monsters or mythical creatures. This is our plane of reality.
- The Days are Strange: Magical and baffling occurrences are permitted but must be accepted as part of the fabric of daily life.
- The Spirit: Belief systems and theology align with our own world.
- The Shared Key: An author's characters maybe used by another writer. Reusing an inhabitant requires permission and credit to the original author and must be used authentically and respectfully.
- 10.The Visuals: Black and white illustrations only.
- The Scale: Submissions must be between 2,000 and 8,000 words.
- The Hand: Strictly No AI. All work must be the product of the author’s hand and mind.
These 12 immutable laws govern our City, and will be the first port of call for writers wishing to submit their story to this imprint. Adherence will enable us to stories our stories of The City and share our Various Sorrows & Joys.
After The Page
The City does not end at the closing of the book. The experience continues, with readers encouraged to contribute to it's ever-expanding reach. At the end of every book, a prompt page invites you to write down a personal sorrow and joy.
An Archive of Emotion
Using a QR code, you will be guided through an upload and release form so that your reflections can be added to our curated Various Sorrows & Joys Instagram account, creating a collaborative social gallery built from real human experiences.
Our Full Creative Ecosystem
We're bringing all our tools, imprints and creative instincts to the this imprint, so we can inform and inspire audiences to submit their work and become part of The City.
With feature articles and author interviews on TheNeverZine to our bespoke podcast, live readings and open submissions, were building routes to transport you into this world, so you can stay, explore and start to build new avenues, buildings and towers.
The Architects Guild
At TheNeverPress we believe in the odyssey of dream to reality, and we believe in the development of our voices and the power of exploration and collaboration. So, for writers successful in publishing through the Various Sorrows & Joys imprint, they will be invited into the Architects’ Guild. This is an exclusive inner circle of creators shaping the permanent canon of The City.
Membership Benefits Include:
- Profile on TheNeverPress site.
- Article on TheNeverZine.
- Various Sorrows & Joys Podcast Episode.
- Community access to other Various Sorrows & Joys authors.
- Invitations to workshops, live readings and get togethers
- Updates on the expanding city via an exclusive newsletter.
- Development time with TheNeverPress on other projects.
- Fast track to submit new stories
Bringing The City to Life
We are deep in production on this imprint, and we're incredibly excited to be working with some amazing writers, who are not only bringing us their stories, but also taking part in shaping The City itself. We have created a little cadre of architects and we're gearing up for launch, but we do have a way to go. It would be fantastic if you would join us in this project, become a founding member and lay the foundations for an imprint that can transform independent publishing, bring new voices to the world, and deepen our connection to each other with the stories we share.
If you'd love to see Various Sorrows & Joys come to life, then all you have to do is register your interest in our Kickstarter by tapping the button below. If you would like to do more, then contact us at the bottom of this page and let's talk.
We're launching a Kickstarter in February 2027 to bring the first five Various Sorrows & Joys titles to life. Register to receive pre-campaign updates, articles and sneak peaks at what's to come.
