“The raven gave a short, comfortable, confidential kind of croak;—a most expressive croak, which seemed to say, ‘You needn’t let these fellows into our secrets. We understand each other. It’s all right.’” (Charles Dickens “Barnaby Rudge”) 🎨 Nellie Joshua (c 1905) #bookwormsat

how tired, i think, the moon must be in her #work - yet, still, she rises #haikufeels #haiku #poem #poetry #moon #photography

When everything feels uncertain, I look to the rhythms of the land. They teach me to trust what I can’t yet see. Pause for a moment today. Notice what’s quietly growing around you, and within you. #hopeinthewaiting #payattention #gentlerhythms

Hey BSky, I'm looking for your BOOK RECS on true crime fiction: novels or novellas that read like a true crime non-fiction or a podcast. Think Six Stories by @mattjwesolowski.bsky.social, True Crime Story by Joseph Knox, or Penance by Eliza Clark.

A powerful and enriching session on Vision Boarding this evening from @akischilz.bsky.social at @thelitconsultancy.bsky.social. Completely new to me and a technique I didn't know I needed... until now! Bring it on, 2026 💪✨️

I’ve just realised that the darkest ten weeks of the winter are behind us & just now we’re gaining 2 minutes of daylight each day here in the UK. A hopeful thought 🌿

GNoH NEEDS YOU. Last year, certainly the first half was a washout for me, but after getting proper psychiatric help, I am back with a reviewing vengeance. And GNoH needs more reviewers. If you'd like to volunteer your services, please drop me an email (jimmcleod(at)gnofhorror.com)

Time to take a short break from the final (??!!) edits of Novel 1 to plot Novel 2 with @writershq.bsky.social. Will Shiny New Idea Syndrome make me abandon my firstborn? The imagination is flowing and it's all feeling v exciting! #writersky #amwriting #writers

Current status: just arrived in Narnia

This has long been one of my biggest concerns about AI--that it would be incorporated into otherwise useful tools in ways that I cannot disable. AI cannot make the art I make (in any medium), but having it shoved into everything *can* make it harder for ME to make the art I make.

I mean I'm late to the party but my WORD this album is good Listening on repeat! #florenceandthemachine #everybodyscream #horror

I don’t want to worry anyone but Digging for Britain has just said that the largest UK archaeological dig is currently taking place a stone’s throw from where MR James set A Warning to the Curious.

“‘If only I could touch him,’ she gasped. Two thousand years earlier, a woman said of Jesus: ‘If I only touch his cloak, I will be made well.’” How David Bowie both reinvented and killed the concept of a rock god.

Finding your color season is so important. What if you thought your whole life that you’re a true summer or a bright winter and in reality you are a chthonic autumn? A soft rot? A light hag? A corvid neutral? So many options to hex the world, I mean, choose your makeup from.

Keep the lights on, I say. Things are dark enough as it is. #winterlights

May I shout about this? Matt's courses are truly original & will give your writing that extra spark you always knew was in there! Insights from music & linguistics, peer & tutor feedback, supportive atmosphere. I've done 4 and loved them all! #writersky www.mattkendrick.co.uk/wbtl-go-with...

This poem is dedicated to anyone heading back into work and having to endure dull conversation about what they got up to during the Christmas holidays.

Somehow I've managed to get this far in life without reading Frankenstein and now I realise this was a huge mistake! Del Toro's take is mesmerising - moving, beautiful and horrifying in equal measure. I'm going to the book next, I want to see how it was done! #horror #frankenstein #writersky

Oh Jesus Christ…oh no…Paddington?

Hello #HorrorWritersChat The funeral of our community originator, Matt Mason @chaoticauthor.online, is on Friday. As not everyone can make the funeral, we're inviting people to share their memories of Matt or a review of his books here on Bluesky between Friday and Sunday using #MGMasonRocked 🤍🕯️

I don't usually participate in #Caturday, not owning a cat and all, but my sister's cat is dying to meet you all. Here she is showing the true purpose of the Christmas treats hamper box I sent. Food optional. #catsofbluesky #Christmas #amnotwriting

Botanical rainbow in December. Pause for a ping of dopamine 🌿

The witch is a threshold creature. Wood's tangled border, shore's salt-line blur. For at the feral edges of the land her magic is mighty. The fluid boundary of the marsh offers reflected nephomantic glimpses, a rush of whispered wisdom. – #EmilyCBanting, 1982 #WitchSky

This is as close as I'll get to forest bathing and I'll take it 💚🌲 #trees #forestbathing #christmas

There's a Hookland dialect word - greenhole – used to describe the powerful attraction of a dark way into the woods. 'Going down the greenhole' is usually reserved for that moment when the path ahead intensifies into a tunnel-like pitch and yet you know won't turn back. – #MattAdams, 1982 #WOTD

YES THIS also FOMO goes right out the window, as in, sure, I could go out to all the hot spots OR I could lie here in bed with my iPad watching @dropout.tv with at least one cat dozing alongside, hmmmm, I guess the cool kids will just have to have fun without me

Never forget: Art matters.

At the moment, I’m regrettably not reading Edgar Allan Poe whilst having cappuccinos and croissants in a dimly-lit quaint café on a cobblestone street in Prague during a snowstorm, so no, I’m afraid your email did not “find me well.”

Who will wear the 👑?

A huge bookstore with a tiny/nonexistent horror section is a shitty, incomplete bookstore. I said what I said.

If you like an author's work, the best thing you can do is buy it. The second best thing you can do is ask your local library to buy it. Or, do both!

You can buy my out-of-print portal fantasy, Pseudotooth, directly from me, all signed and doodled in. This book made at least two readers miss their stops on the train. ko-fi.com/s/7292dd0671

Winter conducts its slow seduction. It has disrobed the trees, its cold kisses make them shiver. Revelation of their wooden bones offers us a new, intimate language. They speak of swelling dark and coming ice. They speak their lover's secret names. – #EmilyCBanting, 1981 #Winter

So can anyone recommend the right lit mag for a satirical dystopian fairy tale told in the form of legislation? No? Oh. Well, it seems I wrote it anyway 🙄 #WritingCommunity #writersky #litmags @chillsubs.bsky.social

She is still here.

Stop what you're doing and watch these sleepy chaps.

November’s early darkness enfolds us. The smell of applewood fires and rot is a constant companion at twilight. We hurry between home and evensong, home and pub. Ghosts crowd the lanes, our folklore becomes filled with tales of cold teeth. Winter begins to growl. - #CLNolan

Our forthcoming #BeyondandWithinWitchcraft hits Forbidden Planet for pre-order. Link below 🧙 forbiddenplanet.com/476966-beyon...

Here’s some (more, I shared her work back in May) Dead Seagull art to make your Saturday a little better.

My staff picks are up on the website!! The northern weird Project by @wildhuntbooks.bsky.social includes books by @talkscaredpod.bsky.social and @jodierobins.bsky.social was my favorite thing in publishing this year, and @rachelharrison.bsky.social Play Nice is in my top five of the year!

While being ill this past year, I listened to Florence's entire back catalogue, two songs at a time, which frankly was the best possible use of my very limited energy #florenceandthemachine #fatm #pwme #everybodyscream

The blackbird sings to him, 'Brother, brother, If this be the last song you shall sing, Sing well, for you may not sing another; Brother, sing.' -Julian Grenfell @signemaene.com welcomes you to #BookWormSat.

'A Bram Stoker Award winning novel, The Fisherman is a masterpiece of cosmic horror that contains elements of Lovecraft, Moby Dick and the ghost stories of M.R. James.' #JohnLangan's The Fisherman is No 16 in The Quietus 25 best pieces of #Horror Fiction of the 21st Century so far buff.ly/C4B49ZM

There's still time to participate in this month's #WriteCBC 🙂

Hmmm... which book to read next? #booksky #horror #gothic #writers

For the witch, there are times when the river becomes a fluid scrying, a constant flow of omens. It's tutelary spirit whispers wisdom in her ears, its magics ripple across her psychic skin. She becomes one with its shaping song. – #EmilyCBanting, 1982 #WitchSky

I'm Shona Ray, and I write weird stories inspired by anthropology. My Terrible Truth? Great horror doesn't always need the supernatural. Humanity has plenty of its own. #horrorwriterschat #horror #booksky

Currently DEVOURING The Lamb @lucyrosecreates.bsky.social! Delicious 😋