Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Wachana is an independent, not-for-profit publishing brand which caters multilingual alternative literature

Independent means we are not a subsidiary of any big Sri Lankan publisher. Not-for-profit means we sell our work (hard copies) only to earn money for print-reruns and marketing. All our digital downloads are free. Multilingual means we publish in all three languages. (English, Sinhala and Tamil). Alternative literature means we give priority to topics and mediums which are not catered by big publishers such as zines, off beat bilingual poetry, pulp romance, erotic literature, illustrations etc

The brand initially started as an avenue to showcase our own creativity. Now what happened is that we have opened the platform to others as well. If you have writing material and if you would like to publish with us, we would like to invest small amount on printing and marketing and our time on design. If we make excess amount from your work, then we distribute it among the writers. But if not, what we make we reinvest on printing new copies and other marketing and promo activities. This is more of a passion for us rather than the business.

Currently no. Because of our business model and we are at very beginning of our venture. Our business is still small scale and our only modes of sales are this platform and pop-ups. We are more interested in giving opportunity to amateur creative people or people who has content that will be not easily monetized. If you want to sell 2000+ copies and wanted to make your work available around the country and outside, we will not be the right fit for you. If you want to see your 10 poems designed and digitally printed and want to share with close friends and you want to meet other budding creatives like you who do their thing, we are the right fit for you.

We like everything from poetry, to prose to illustrations to mobile photography. If it’s unusual and not done before, perfect. Just go to the links http://wachana.com/submissions , fill the form and submit with your work samples. If not, write us on our email wachanabooks@gmail.com or direct message us on Instagram or facebook. Give us couple of days and we’ll get back to you.

We love zines, we published seven zines, two in Sinhalese and rest in English. Themes ranging from politics to heartbreak. We have one poetry/prose collection which is our biggest project up to date. We have a merch range called “one liner cards”, bilingual cards with witty one liners and accompanying illustrations. Go to http://wachana.com/shop to see all our work.

All the products listed here in our website come with digital soft copies (pdfs). You can download them absolutely FREE OF CHARGE by clicking the button on each product page. If you want hard copies, click the buy button on each product, go to the order information form, fill it and we will deliver the product on your doorstep. All the hard copies are cash on delivery. So, you can pay when you get the product. International customers can directly deposit the money to our mentioned bank account. For local orders, give us 5 to 10 days to deliver the product. For international orders, give us 15 to 30 days.