February 2026 brings a new standalone novel from the Queen of Speculative Fiction: Arthur C. Clarke award-nominated Aliya Whiteley! Here's what @oliverklangmead.bsky.social @manuscriptgal.bsky.social @timjmajor.bsky.social & @catamaroon.bsky.social thought of it! Preorder geni.us/misheardw

Christmas is coming and I'm officially on leave! Taking a break from socials to enjoy the season. But one last book post before I go: if you're looking for some dark fantasy reading over the holidays, try a story with teeth!

Just finished "When There Are Wolves Again" by E. J. Swift and I'm still thinking about it. Fierce, gorgeous climate fiction that somehow manages to be genuinely hopeful—not in a naive way, but in a way that feels earned and necessary. This is the kind of story we need right now.

World Fantasy Con 2015, Saratoga Springs, Kelly Link, me, and Helen Marshall. @manuscriptgal.bsky.social reposted this today and it is a gleeful thing. @kellylink.bsky.social A DECADE AGO.

Davey: “What’s that rattling sound in my ear? Is it my adult teeth?”

I was looking up some old horror business and stumbled across this fun interview I did with @manuscriptgal.bsky.social a decade ago! youtu.be/WMdYdLF5w8E?...

📢 Call for Papers: Creative Futures We want to reimagine futures thinking with creative methodologies as rigorous frameworks for anticipating change! Papers due September 2026! onlinelibrary.wiley.com/page/journal... #FuturesStudies #Foresight

In honour of getting the chance to attend World Fantasy in Brighton, I’ve been reading up on my fellow authors. There are some brilliant resonances between the work of Amal El-Mohtar and my own. #StoriesAboutStories #LyricalProse

Just received Monsters in the Archives: My Year of Fear with Stephen King by Caroline Bicks in the mail! Really looking forward to diving into this one. I had my own experience researching King's archive, which I wrote about here: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

Spotted at the Brisbane Writers Festival! #bwf #nounderstanding

Like Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita? The Lady, The Tiger, and the Girl Who Loved Death weaves together magic, political spectacle, and the power of storytelling in a world where reality and illusion blur dangerously together. Out from @titanbooks.bsky.social now! #DarkFantasy #CircusBooks

Catch me Thursday at the Brisbane Writers Festival for “Dark Imaginings”! Fairytales and historical myths are often readers’ first encounter with the darkness of human nature. In these stunning novels, fable and archetype are reworked in dazzling ways. brisbanepowerhouse.org/events/dark-... #BWF

ICYMI: We're hiring a Lecturer/Senior Lecturer in #CreativeWriting at UQ! -looking for literary fiction, poetry, graphic novels, comics, digital storytelling, new media, or games! -international applications welcome Apply: uq.wd3.myworkdayjobs.com/uqcareers/jo... #HigherEd #AcademicJobs

Fire as cleansing, fire as transformation. The Bulgarian fire festivals—where dancers walk barefoot across burning coals—shaped how I imagined ritual and renewal in THE LADY, THE TIGER, AND THE GIRL WHO LOVED DEATH. #Fantasy #Folklore #Inspiration #AmWriting

Life is just one tiny fright after another, isn't it?

"Why can't AI just do my research?" Because creative research isn't information retrieval. I'm working on a new academic article showing how research methods produce the distinctive textures of literary prose, looking at Octavia Butler, William Gibson, Kim Stanley Robinson and Andy Weir.

Thinking about Octavia Butler's #writingadvice in Furor Scribendi today: "Forget talent. If you have it, fine. Use it. If you don't have it, it doesn't matter. As habit is more dependable than inspiration, continued learning is more dependable than talent."

While writing The Lady, the Tiger and the Girl Who Loved Death, I found myself captivated by haunting photographs of abandoned circuses across Eastern Europe. #WritingInspiration #DarkFantasy #EasternEurope #Circus #AuthorLife #FantasyFiction #WritingProcess

ICYMI: We're hiring a Lecturer/Senior Lecturer in #CreativeWriting at UQ! -looking for literary fiction, poetry, graphic novels, comics, digital storytelling, new media, or games! -international applications welcome Apply: uq.wd3.myworkdayjobs.com/uqcareers/jo... #HigherEd #AcademicJobs

HUGE news! We're hiring in Creative Writing at UQ! Looking for an amazing writer working in literary fiction, poetry, graphic novels, comics, digital storytelling, new media, or games! International applications welcome. This is going to be AWESOME uq.wd3.myworkdayjobs.com/uqcareers/jo...

“Toward the end of a book, the state of composition feels like a complex, chemically altered state that will go away if I don’t give it what it needs. And what it needs is to write all the time.” I feel that, William Gibson — is this universal among writers?

Alexievich's The Unwomanly Face of War inspired my writing by revealing the erased stories of women in conflict. A masterpiece. #TheUnwomanlyFaceOfWar #Alexievich #WritingInspiration #UntoldStories (The Lady, The Tiger and the Girl Who Loved Death is out now from @titanbooks.bsky.social !)

A beautifully written Slavic fantasy featuring the circus and a tiger from @titanbooks.bsky.social. The Lady, the Tiger and the Girl Who Loved Death by Helen Marshall #BFSReview britishfantasysociety.org/review/the-l...

Romanian bear dancers inspired the haunting folklore in my novel THE LADY, THE TIGER AND THE GIRL WHO LOVED DEATH--ancient rituals of rebirth and demons bleeding from bear skins. Now out from @titanbooks.bsky.social (edited by the brilliant @cathtrechman.bsky.social) #DarkFantasy #FolkHorror

Brilliant Guardian piece on how Big Tech is systematically stealing books, music & films to train AI without consent or payment. This isn't innovation. It's digital colonialism threatening our entire creative ecosystem. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

These are some of my favorite films and if you love them too, my novel is absolutely made for you! THE LADY, THE TIGER AND THE GIRL WHO LOVED DEATH has all the magic, drama, and political edge you crave🔥 Out from @titanbooks.bsky.social (and thanks to @cathtrechman.bsky.social for the fab edits!)

ICYMI! Amazing review from Locus: “I rate Marshall...as one of the best fantasists working in the field....At its core, THE LADY, THE TIGER AND THE GIRL WHO LOVED DEATH is a story about stories.” @mondyboy74.bsky.social reviews @titanbooks.bsky.social locusmag.com/2025/08/the-...

Thinking about wildness today and why it matters to us. 🐅 94-year-old Peggie remembers the last thylacine's cries at Hobart Zoo—a loneliness that still haunts her decades later. "We didn't realise it was the last one until it was too late." www.abc.net.au/news/2025-09...

Best birthday ever! 🎂 Friends, Blood on the Clocktower, and live sketching by the talented @tanaudel.bsky.social . Special shoutout to the masterpiece of Leah reading her character notes while tiny Spiderman creeps around. We all survived the night! #BirthdayGames #BloodOnTheClockTower

Samuel Hume's graph: words that indicate a document is more likely to be written by AI .

Putin & Xi caught on hot mic discussing immortality & living to 150. Writing my 2067 novel about AI & eternal life and thinking about when power seeks permanence how high the cost can be www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/9/...

A reader told me they want more book clubs discussing The Lady, The Tiger and the Girl Who Loved Death and debating whether Irenda is a good person in a bad system or should be first against the wall when the revolution comes. This is exactly the kind of moral chaos I live for.

“At its core, THE LADY, THE TIGER AND THE GIRL WHO LOVED DEATH is a story about stories.” @mondyboy74.bsky.social reviews @manuscriptgal.bsky.social

Life imitating art: Reading about Moscow’s surreal detachment from war while people live in carefully constructed unrealities reminds me why I wrote The Lady, The Tiger and the Girl Who Loved Death—a story about power, illusion, and the lies we tell ourselves www.nytimes.com/2025/08/30/w...

🐅 Join me July 24 at Avid Reader (6:30pm) as Angela Slatter & I dive into The Lady, The Tiger and the Girl Who Loved Death - a dark tale of grief, revenge & the dangerous allure of the circus. Can't wait to share this story! avidreader.com.au/pages/11648-... ✨

After today's technical difficulties, this lovely review from Corey Redekop is exactly what I needed to see. Thank you, Corey! 🙏

Apologies to everyone who was expecting my r/Fantasy AMA today! Technical difficulties and timing mix-ups derailed things. We're going to reschedule for next week when we can do it properly. Will post the new date soon--thanks for your patience!

We're LIVE! AMA happening now on r/Fantasy! Ask me about Putin's theater director, revenge-plotting tigers, twenty drafts, circus magic, or anything else about The Lady, The Tiger, and the Girl Who Loved Death! www.reddit.com/r/Fantasy/co... #RedditAMA

📚 Join my Reddit AMA on July 11 at 5pm EST / 8am AEST! Happy to chat about The Lady, The Tiger and the Girl Who Loved Death, the writing process, or anything else on r/Fantasy. Looking forward to your questions! 🎭

🐅 Doing a Reddit AMA about my fantasy novel "The Lady, The Tiger and the Girl Who Loved Death" 📅 July 11th, 5 PM EST 🌍 (July 12th, 8 AM Brisbane time) r/Fantasy Come ask me anything about world-building, writing process-indeed, anything! #FantasyBooks #AMA #WritingCommunity

A few weeks ago, we interviewed the wonderful @manuscriptgal.bsky.social on her newest novel, The Lady, the Tiger and the Girl Who Loved Death. If you do nothing else, buy the book. But also: listen to the interview! It's delightful. Audio and video version right here: skiffyandfanty.com/p...

After years of writing this story close to my heart, The Lady, The Tiger and the Girl Who Loved Death launches Thursday! Join Angela Slatter & me at Avid Reader 6.00pm for circus magic, dark fantasy & hopefully some great conversation. See you there! avidreader.com.au/pages/11648-...

Anytime I hear from a reader that a copy of my book has arrived, a fairy gets their wings.

Had a great chat with The Nerd Daily about The Lady, The Tiger & The Girl Who Loved Death - from my family's history to Putin's theatrical politics to how it took 20 drafts to untangle that narrative puzzle box of frame stories & multiple timelines! thenerddaily.com/helen-marsha...

The Sydney Morning Herald calls The Lady, The Tiger and the Girl Who Loved death 'grand in ambition,' and 'a song of brutality and mystery' while noting it's 'tough going'. I'll take that as high praise for pushing boundaries. www.smh.com.au/culture/book...

Want to know what I’m reading now? In this post I talk about everything from Francis Spufford and @nickharkaway.com to Kathleen Jennings @tanaudel.bsky.social and @tashanmehta.bsky.social #GreatReads #OnMyShelf www.nerds-feather.com/2025/06/6-bo... @titanbooks.bsky.social @princejvstin.com

“Mummy, if you don’t listen, you can’t play.” “That’s a thing mummies say.” “That’s what big boys say to their mummies when they aren’t listening.”

Ian Mond reviews THE LADY, THE TIGER, AND THE GIRL WHO LOVED DEATH in the July Locus! "One of the best fantasists working in the field… Fiercely imaginative and tricksy… underscores the power of stories to manipulate and control" Grateful when a story finds its ideal reader! @titanbooks.bsky.social

I'm on @skiffyandfanty.com Show talking about "The Lady, the Tiger and the Girl Who Loved Death" - we dive into form, history, and borderlands. Had such a great conversation! Listen: skiffyandfanty.com/category/pod... #SFF #podcast #fantasy #CrossingOver

We're just 2 hours from stream time. Tonight's show features our interview / @manuscriptgal.bsky.social, author of The Lady, the Tiger and the Girl Who Loved Death from @titanbooks.bsky.social. We'll be live at 7 PM Central to share this beauty with you! Bring friends! twitch.tv/alphabetst...