Odessa Mykytowycz On Melbourne’s Fiend
photography by josh Sabini.
Fiend is an online and pop up bookshop based out of Melbourne owned by Odessa Mykytowycz.
Fiend’s selection of books is thought out, informed and well curated by Odessa. With a focus on zines, small press and independent publications; both local and international, Fiend sells publications that are near impossible to get elsewhere on our deserted island of a nation. Beyond the bookshop, Fiend is a vessel for community events holding readings and book launches that showcase the local literary scene. I love Fiend and what Odessa is doing with the shop, so I popped past her house for a chat about everything Fiend.
If you’re looking to shop at Fiend you can visit their website or if you’d rather look at books in person keep an eye out for Fiend at a book fair or their next . You can find Fiend curations at Ramp Tramp Tramp Stamp in Sydney, Error404 in Melbourne, and Array in Brisbane.
When did you start Fiend?
I started it in 2021, on a whim during lockdown when I needed something to kill my time. I had made a zine that featured a collection of ghost stories I had gathered from friends, followed by an exploration in the last half about why such experiences might come to be. I published it, and then it was in a few bookshops, and that drew my attention to the way those small press publications are handled or at least featured. At the time a few of my friends were also making little books, zines and publications and I thought it would be cool if there was a space for all these publications. Then I realised that I could just be the space [laughs]. That’s how Fiend started, there wasn’t much planning, I was just on distributors' websites buying things that I liked, getting my friend books, selling things on consignment and I’ve grown with it.
I feel like around that time there was a rise in people doing online independent bookshops.
Yeah, totally. We were all forced to be online during that lockdown period and I think that assisted in businesses like Fiend that are mostly online and have grown through Instagram. People also had time to spend time with books and work on creative projects.
Where did the name Fiend come from, is it from being a fiend for buying books?
My ex came up with it, I didn’t even come up with it myself [laughs]. I was wracking my brain for a name; I couldn’t come up with anything and he was like, what about Fiend. So, it became Fiend. I needed a logo and one night I was lying in bed thinking about what the logo should be and came up with the devil reading a book, got out of bed and just drew it.
Woah, did you draw the logo that you’re still using?
Yeah, but it is inspired by Hot Stuff the Devil. I thought about a devil reading a book, with ‘Fiend’ in the wings so I googled ‘Cartoon devil’ and I took heavy inspiration from that.
I had no idea you drew that, that’s awesome. Was the original idea to just sell zines that you and your friends were publishing?
Pretty much, it was a half-baked idea. It still is a passion project but especially then I just wanted something to fill my time. I was telling my housemates about it, and they were like you should launch it, so I did a half-baked launch. I don’t mean to sound like I’m lazy about Fiend at all [laughs] but especially at that time I was quite impatient about it just in terms of how little time and planning went into it in the scheme of launching a business because of how unstimulating lockdown otherwise was.
How long was it from the conception to the launch?
About three months. The idea evolved into being several small presses locally and publications I loved like Worms. Through Worms I found out about some international distributors, which opened the door up to a lot of the more international independent and small press publications that are such a big part of Fiend now.
Was that a big thing when you realised that you wanted to focus on small press and international publications that you can’t really get in Australia?
Yeah, definitely. Part of the idea behind it was to support small publishers and local makers. I wanted to have books that would either be overlooked in a conventional bookshop or that would be hard to find. The books I stock are also driven a lot by personal taste which is an interesting one to navigate, there is a constant mediation between what I like and being aware of if I am leaning more into one kind of publication or kind of voice. It’s about being aware of the places I am not looking at and the voices I’m not looking at as much as the voices that I am.
How do you source your books? Are people coming to you or are you reaching out to distributors and publishers?
A lot of it now is reaching out to distributors and publishers. I am in a really good spot where I know the distributors and publishers who stock titles that would suit Fiend. Quite a bit is on consignment too where if someone has a publication they want to stock they’ll reach out to me.
What made you want to start doing popups, markets and bookfairs alongside the online store?
Online can’t replace browsing books and with the smaller press publications that I stock that you won’t hear about as much as a Penguin classic, it is really important to have that browsing space. I’ve always wanted to have a physical space, but it was just when the opportunity would present itself that it could happen. I started stocking books in Error404 and then the first pop up was a year into doing Fiend. To celebrate the first birthday, I had a weekend celebration with a pop up on the Saturday and on the Sunday I had a bunch of people doing readings.
How has it been being able to use Fiend as a vessel to hold community events?
It is really cool. I didn’t expect it to become what it has, I love it and am so glad it has though. It nourishes a whole side of me that isn’t in other areas of my life in terms of it being intellectually engaging but also the involvement in the community. When I stop and think about all the things Fiend has brought me it is crazy. I have so many friends through Fiend, like I know you because of it. I have so many friends I have made through doing it and bookfairs, I also met my boyfriend Riwaz through a bookfair which has brought me this whole circle of people which is crazy. I love having physical events, it is so important to have the browsing space and engaging with the community is so nice. When I’m just working online and mailing off orders it is so hard to feel the support and engagement beyond an order coming through. It is so nice to do that with pop ups and that is something I want to do more of but while I am studying it has been so hard. It is a good thing that Fiend can ebb and flow when I need it to based on the workload I have.
How did the shop curations come up?
It started with Error404; they started stocking some books that I was selling. It wasn’t anything that was necessarily particular to them, it was just a handful of books that I felt would look good in their particular shop environment. As that went on, I had a six-month pop-up above the shop and when that wrapped up, we had a chat about what books could look like in that store and the idea of a curation came from that naturally. It is something that I really enjoy doing because I get to explore a whole other side of books and fashion books that I may not necessarily feel are at the core of what Fiend does when I am on a budget. So, it is really nice to have the space to do that and to curate a vibe with the books, having them be a reflection and extension of the brand's ethos.
My next idea is that I want to work with a cool local café or bakery and do a curation of food publications. There are so many cool, small food publications. Or do an event where I have a bunch of food publications in cooperation with a local café and serve really yummy food. I think it would be really fun.
It’s been three years of Fiend now, where do you want to take it from here?
A big goal will be to have a permanent physical space, that would be so amazing but without having a donor or some kind of financial backing it isn’t really feasible. You need to sell so many books to fund a storefront. I just want to keep doing events with the community and thinking about fun ways to bring people books in person.