🚨 Ends Midnight Tonight! 🚨 Follow the link below to explore our flash sale 📚 Use code 2026 at checkout! www.uwp.co.uk/sel-sale/

This event at Wolverhampton sounds cool. Shame it's in-person only. 😔 www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/computatio...

SATURDAY is the best day of the week for staking #VAMPIRES in European lore. #Saturday is the time that vampires must sleep in their graves or tombs and thus they can be found and dispatched; persons born on a Saturday are said to possess powers against the undead.

STAGING FAIRYLAND British popular theatre from mid C19th onwards was inspired by fairyland. #Fairies became fixtures of pantomime, burlesque, musical extravaganza & Romantic ballet. Favourite stage fairies down the years: Vivien Leigh & Anna Pavlova🖤

Fab gift for Sam! So excited and to have received this special message of thanks via the Buffyverse, engineered by my PhD student Daisy who will graduate in February. A moving tribute but also something all vampire fans and students of the #gothic can enjoy! #Buffy www.cameo.com/recipient/69...

Happy First Day of #BlackHistoryMonth !Today is a great day to learn about Vivian Stephens, the #Blackwoman publishing editor who turned the Romance genre into a juggernaut. This @bookriot.bsky.social piece gives a great overview of her career. #BHM #romancelandia #blackbooksky #booksky #blacksky

Great article about Vivian Stephens linked in quote below! ⬇️ I did a 2-part deep dive on Candlelight Ecstasy a bit ago, which covers some of the history but also more detail on the texts Stephens acquired and how they stand up today. shelflovepodcast.substack.com/p/the-agony-...

The US Dept. of Education’s Office of Civil Rights has dismissed 11 complaints and six allegations related to book bans, saying it was ending "Biden’s book ban hoax." PEN America counted over 10,000 instances of school book bans in the 2023-24 school year, nearly 3X the number in the previous year.

With new threats to libraries & library workers already materializing, we need all library advocates to show up together. United in our advocacy for libraries and everyone we serve, we WILL make a difference. Join us and Show Up #ForOurLibraries. Learn more: www.ala.org/news/2025/01...

The SAVE act would mean that, if you are a married woman who took your husband's name once married, you would no longer be able to vote. This is HR 8281 if you want to read it for yourself and it's already passed the house. #saveact t.ly/m_rc1

@drfrancisyoung.bsky.social's "This is my book" suggests a good consequence for this wholesale biblioclasm. Worth a read! #bookhistory

Project 2026 Declares Open War on Women’s Rights msmagazine.com/2025/12/13/p...

The new paperback for Graveyard Gothic is 40% off at @ManchesterUP until 31 January. #gothic #gothicstudies #newbook manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/gothic-studi...

The plenary speakers have just been announced! And a reminder that the CfP for the 18th biennial conference of the International #Gothic Association closes on the 31st of January. hullgothic.wordpress.com @igagoths.bsky.social @gothicstudies.bsky.social

The Government is planning to send King Charles to the US to celebrate with Trump. Giving him a royal visit right now sends a terrible message that his behaviour is acceptable. We can stop this if enough of us speak up. Will you add your name to the petition? you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/ca...

We--educators & anyone to whom educators talk (it's Xmas, tell your families!)--need to convey that the framing that a new revolution in education is at hand, & we need to come up with new & inventive ways to police our students' honesty AND still carry out the educational mission is STUPID FRAMING.

No one says to legit business owners, "hey I see there's an underground market selling toxic knock-offs of your product: how will you incorporate the toxic product AND protect your customers against its harms?" But apparently it's fine to make this suggestion to educators with respect to AI.

It is EXHAUSTING not only being made responsible for coming up with new kinds of assignments for our students; it's also tedious reading op-eds that suggest the core problem is a crisis in teaching. But, as Chris and I lay out here, this isn't a crisis in teaching; it's an attack on learning.

QRP to reintroduce itself! I’m an award winning writer and editor who is inspired by Palestinian folklore. I’m still struggling to find my place as an artist. These are my favourite pieces from 2025. Also looking for freelance work.

Texas universities deploy AI tools to review and rewrite how some courses discuss race and gender www.texastribune.org/2025/12/15/t...

This winter, #NHS staff across the country will be battling horrific conditions whilst trying to save lives & provide care for patients. I just signed Just Treatment's digital Christmas card to show my support and gratitude. Add your name here ⬇️ actionnetwork.org/forms/sign-t...

There is a Yuletide tradition in France telling of the witch La Guillaneu riding her headless fairy steed through French winter nights. But follow us to Brittany today for our 2nd #Yulefolklore tale, where La Guillaneu takes on a quite different guise! Link in the comments 🎨 Ari-Matti Toivonen

Please review my collection on Amazon or Goodreads if you have been lovely enough to buy it. It really helps. www.goodreads.com/book/show/21... In the Shadow of Gods amzn.eu/d/gRaCt0j

This weekend's Romancing the Gothic 'blast from the past' is this video from last year by yours truly! 'Interminable Realms of Space': Cosmic Voyages and Demonic Theo-Aesthetics in Byron's 'Cain' youtu.be/f8GJzKqVNsg

Two weeks remaining to get your proposals in for our 2026 conference 'Folklore on the Move'! Proposal deadline: Sunday 14 December 2025

Wait. Why would Marjorie Taylor Greene calling to release the Epstein files be a betrayal to Donald Trump and the entire Republican Party?

This cause is close to my heart - please sign: you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/co...

They’re all just looting the treasury now

OGOM HALLOWEEN NEWSLETTER www.opengravesopenminds.com/newsletter/o...

SPOOKY READING Don't forget to browse the MUP Spooky reading List for #31daysofHalloween and access the intros to all three of our @OGOMProject books for FREE

#HALLOWEEN As the veil grows thinner between our world & the spirit world & the witching hour approaches I'd like share my photos of the most uncanny landscape I know. This spookiness is entirely real. Cross Stone Graveyard in Yorkshire is unsettling & sublime #31daysofHalloween

Sam George, Older than Dracula: in search of the English vampire theconversation.com/older-than-d...

BLOG: Will Monkeys Become Britain's New Big Cats? A rational look at the looming risk of loose primates in post-licensing Britain as 2026 brings changes to the law... #Cryptozoology #BritishLaw #Cryptids www.theghostgeek.com/p/will-monke...

If you enjoy my writing, please be sure to subscribe on my relaunched blog here: theghostgeek.substack.com

Announcing #PictCon2 17th October 2026, Perth, Scotland. Guest of Honour, Neil Williamson neilwilliamson.blog/about/ Ticketing is open at Eventbrite. www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/1794793438...

Neil Williamson always has something interesting and perceptive to say, this alone would be reason enough to go to PictCon2.

We are a mere 8 members away from our target of 50 by Monday (when I pay the deposit). PictCon2: A Scottish sf & fantasy convention about sf and fantasy in Scotland. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 17th October 2026, Perth, with Guest of honour, editor & writer, Neil Williamson. Tickets at: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/pictcon2-t...

Real ghouls match their bookmarks to their books. Did you check out our spooky season reading recommendations? We had weird and witchy reads (including CJ Cooke’s The Ghost Woods, pictured) as well as some culty and corrupt options. Listen: shorturl.at/f5yA9 (other podcast platforms available!)

Chuffed to find this today. Jacques Brunius is a fascinating figure in British Surrealism.

The latest book from @stockholm-uni.bsky.social’s LAMP project (who invited me to lecture on Baltic religion last month) is out in open access: Indo-European Afterlives: blog.stockholmuniversitypress.se/2025/11/11/h...

the emails from epstein say things like "thank god donald trump isnt exposing us. he knows more than anyone" and the headlines are like "it would seem, to some, that donald trump's name is mentioned in passing"

If we don’t act now, many child refugees will be left in war zones or unsafe camps, away from their mums and dads. Email the Home Secretary now to stop the suspension of refugee family reunion – it just takes a minute >> act.safepassage.org.uk/email-home-s...

THE SPOOKY SEASON IS HERE at last! I will be taking part in #31daysofhalloween again from 1st October. Some vintage #Halloween #cats to celebrate! Black cats are lucky not unlucky of course! Can't wait to see all the #Halloween posts!

AN ANCIENTE MAPPE of FAIRYLAND newly discovered and set forth. London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1918. I have a copy of this map of fairyland by Bernard Sleigh in my study to ponder other worlds. It's filled with awe and wonder.

JACK-O-LANTERNS Before the grinning pumpkins of #Halloween the folkloric versions or Jack-o-Lanterns, named after the Irish myth, were terrifying; carved from turnips or beets they had the appearance of shrunken heads, warding off uninvited guests

FEAR IN THE FENS FESTIVAL Woo hoo I will speaking on ‘Becoming Wolf: The English Eerie and History of the UK Werewolf’ Sat 25th October, 3.00 at fearinthefens.com in Kings Lynn. There will be a showing of An American Werewolf in London #31DaysOfHalloween

If you look closely you will see my article on the vampire's lost reflection. Thank you to @helleborezine.bsky.social for the wonderful Mirror issue. Readers of these articles on fetches, changelings, doppelgangers and vampires will never look in the mirror in the same way again! #31daysofhalloween

OGOM HALLOWEEN EVENTS You are cordially invited to our Halloween activities and events. Full listings over on the OGOM blog #31DaysofHalloween www.opengravesopenminds.com/events/ogom-...

Open Graves, Open Minds: Halloween Newsletter 2025 Welcome to the Open Graves Open Minds Newsletter for October. We’re delighted to bring you our news and activities for the 2025 spooky season. We are trying out a new way of publishing the newsletter, directly from the website (other options are…