Behold, a story of an IT guy trying to fix an elevator that wanted a divorce.

Live horror.

Evergreen post

PSA: If you're an author & you get a chatty email from a marketer, or book club that praises your book & bashes Amazon's algo before offering to 'help', usually with 500 to 10,000 reviewers, it's just a ChatGPT automated marketing scam. It's the new Nigerian prince email, brought to you by 'AI' 🙄.

What might not occur to you upon reading this headline is that, in other words, ICE is targeting gay men of color Every queer press org should be picking up this story

Instant purchase.

Canadians, did you know CBC has an app to help you learn French or English? mauril.ca/en/

I AM ALSO EXCITED. Join us, Halifax!

Today's newsletter is about the view from the author's side of the process of getting a book into the hands of readers.

Noticing a lot of user-first platforms popping up in response to this kind of BS. There’s the Nebula video platform, the music one I can’t remember the name of, & Gander, a social media platform, founded by a non-billionaire dude, just for Canadians, and MODERATED ACCORDING TO OUR CHARTER OF RIGHTS

Halifax! Next weekend! Me and @peterbcounter.com and @elliottgish.bsky.social at various times and places! Check local listings!

When the Oedipals hit

What great company--thank you Dorian! 🖤

Can standard dichotomies like ‘left and right’, ‘nationalist and federalist’, or ‘populist and technocratic’ help us understand politics in the province? #nlpoli Read Part 1 of Drew Brown's new 2-part analysis of Newfoundland and Labrador's political system. theindependent.ca/commentary/a...

This is one of the reasons why I never get attacked by the GC leadership. They don't want to remind people that an out trans dyke has been pretty visible in political and cultural life for the better part of 50 years and was never segregated or harassed.

CHOTINER: ME: CHOTINER: ME: In 2014, you appeared on The Steve Malzberg Show on Newsmax to discuss the topic of slavery reparations, which you had written about in The New Republic. At what point did you realize your appearance on this show served to legitimize it and its positions? CHOTINER: Um

These very true words from Steve Hely have given me tremendous comfort over the years.

@danielkraus.com coded

sick of these purity tests (drawing a clock correctly)

My unpopular take is that it's weird to not realize that the movement in youth to get rid of sex scenes is also a fascist movement to stigmatize sexuality and kinks outside of the realm of heteronormativity.

My unpopular opinion is that youth think everything is for them and should be for them just because they have access to it. It’s not for you. Watch something else. Veggie Tales. Paw Patrol. I don’t care. Come back when you can handle the existence of a penis.

Among a litany of other reasons why these crackdowns are wrong, one of the main ones is that undercover police can arrest anyone and claim they were cruising. I fear the mere act of whipping it out at the urinal to pee is gonna be called cruising just so police can throw someone in jail.

TriCon: The Trident Conference for Speculative Fiction May 15-17, 2026 Kjipuktuk | Halifax, Nova Scotia Registration now open! More details: tricon-halifax.com. GOHs: @amalelmohtar.com @englelaird.bsky.social @kurestinarmada.bsky.social #amwriting #speculativefiction @tricon-hfx.bsky.social

“When he looked in the mirror all he could see was the vague whiteness of her body beside him, her pale skin glowing a little in the dark.” –@elliottgish.bsky.social, from "In Glass" ex-puritan.ca/in-glass

THIS FRIDAY, our second feature film SAINT DROGO is finally coming to Blu-ray! With hours of special features including directors commentary, see the film @horrorpress.com calls “a signature blend of quiet rage and grotesque practical effects that would make any gore hound flinch.”

This may be the finest scene in all of cinema.

This is *stunningly* disingenuous, and the fact that Singal continues to enjoy a career writing at the highest levels about a topic that he either unwilling or incapable of discussing honestly is such an indictment of the Anglo-American prestige media.

Friends, I do not know how this works, but if you're a HWA member who enjoyed stories from Weird Horror 10 and / or 11, or @thomasha.bsky.social's collection UNCERTAIN SONS, please consider recommending them.

A propos of nothing in particular, my eligibility list for this year is posted here: www.daviddemchuk.com/eligible-2025

Overjoyed that this is now out in the world! 👻

Join us October 17th to 19th for Can*Con @canconsffh.bsky.social Ottawa’s Sci-Fi, Fantasy, and Horror Literature Convention! Check out my schedule below and drop by to say hello! I'll be signing copies of The Butcher's Daughter. Full details: www.can-con.org

The Blackbird is a simple, masterful gem of stop motion. Only Norman McLaren could've made it. But the film took him a decade to figure out. We explore the story, and the personal struggles, behind the work: animationobsessive.substack.com/p/a-little-p...

📚 Some bookish kickstarters are really struggling right now, here is a list of some that look promising to me 📚

Shanah Tovah, New York City. Here's to a sweet and hopeful New Year.

Holy shit, SPREAD ME gets an absolute stunner of a review from FanFiAddict!! "As Johnny Cash once sang, love is a burning thing, but in Spread Me, nothing’s hotter than the desert…or what lies beneath."

sometimes a teeny tiny micro hits me jussssst right, and today's from Tania Ravaei is exactly that. hope it hits a bunch of you just right too. https://www.havehashad.com/994qo

"It is a dark lens through which we see our world, our lives, and we tremble at the sight." -- David Demchuk Darkly, strangely, horror has such sights to show us. #whyilovehorror Edited by @raforall.bsky.social Published by @sagapressbooks.bsky.social Why I Love Horror. Out tomorrow!

"You're irrelevant on Bluesky!" m8 I was irrelevant on Twitter where I had 110k followers and frequently got over a million views on my videos. It was still just shitposting on a social media site. Deciding that posting is activism has rotted a lot of brains on all sides.

Better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick—I've just posted another edition of Sunday Scaries! buttondown.com/daviddemchuk...

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. This movie understood America so fucking well it’s insane

Restricting the expression of sexuality through fiction and art made by adults, for adults – including those you find personally disturbing or offputting – is conservative censorship, full stop. When that censorship disproportionately affects subgroups, that's also discrimination. For shame.

Better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick—I've just posted another edition of Sunday Scaries! buttondown.com/daviddemchuk...

Romancelandia: even if you don't read dark romance, the new Bsky guidelines should concern you. Disallowed: "Illustrated or animated" depictions of nonconsensual adult content. Why ban fictional depictions of anything? And how will consent be determined from an illustration?

Public service announcement: ONTARIO SFF WRITERS PLEASE REMEMBER TO APPLY FOR THE OAC RECOMMENDER GRANT AUGUR IS A RECOMMENDER WE WANT TO RECOMMEND SFF WRITERS GET GRANTS /end

🎶It’s the most Rubinstein time of the year! 🎵

Nobody lets their body move to the music hey hey hey anymore and that’s sad

@canconsffh.bsky.social is just around the corner! 🦇 Here’s where you will find me. Come up and say hi, and bring a book to sign 📚 The full schedule and list of panels and other sessions is on the Can*Con website!

oh, the mysterious knocking on the walls at night? yeah, the guy who was murdered in this house loved knocking. he loved it so much

A message to Vince Gasparro, who has banned us from Canada, and our many fans there. 👇