The Slab is a brand new publishing press, specialising in quirkier sorts of books. Established in 2023 by Donna Scott.
The Slab Press’s story begins in 2015, when I attended an event called Under the Austerity at Northampton University. This was an event to discuss counter-culture and featured talks from Alan Moore, John Higgs, Robin Ince, Scroobius Pip, Francesca Martinez, and Josie Long, and included music by Grace Petrie.
During the event the subject of Arts Labs came up, which had been a phenomenon in the Sixties in Northampton, and someone suggested we start one up again. My husband Neil and I signed up after the talks had finished to hear more. We started going to meetings, initially at NN Cafe, then The Lab. All sorts of cultural activity was produced by the newly reformed Northampton Arts Labs. We produced artwork, plays, magazines, and events, and even arranged trips to other Arts Lab events.
Prior to joining the Northampton Arts Lab, my cultural interests included science-fiction, poetry and comedy. As a poet I’d been the first official Bard of Northampton and won a couple of slams too. As a comedian I’ve been part of the multi-award-winning children’s comedy group The Extraordinary Time-Travelling Adventures of Baron Munchausen, as well as reaching the finals of Old Comedian of the Year, the quarter finals of Sketch-Off (with Prison Biscuit), and more recently the finals of Some Antics Comedy Competition in 2023. I also reached the final 10 of BBC New Voices back in 2019.
However, my grand passion has always been for literature, especially science fiction and fantasy. I’m a Director (and former Chair) of the British Science Fiction Association, and I have numerous published short stories in this genre under my belt. As an editor I’ve worked for the likes of Gollancz, Games Workshop Black Library, Solaris, Rebellion, Angry Robot, and Immanion Press. I am also the editor of Newcon Press’s Best of British Science Fiction anthology series, now in its 8th year. I also worked directly with Alan Moore on his novel Jerusalem. It was Alan who suggested that the Arts Lab should produce an anthology of science fiction, and so I reached out to the Northampton Arts Lab community, and others from around the UK, and I started acquiring stories and artwork.
I took inspiration from the project and as I worked on this initial book, I began to incubate an idea about how I could one day run a publishing company of my own. The Arts Lab book – Dark Horses: A Science Fiction Anthology – would be the first. The name The Slab takes a little Arts Lab inspiration, and a little more from Mary Shelley. What is on The Slab? Well, let’s see…
This is my not so hideous progeny, to almost paraphrase Frankenstein.
Welcome to The Slab. This is where I am stitching together all the skills I have learned over the years from all over my cultural life to bring you books that are a little different from the norm. I hope you find them quirky, interesting, and beautiful.
Donna Scott, November 2023.
The Slab Press 