I feel this in my soul. Cause let me tell you there is a SET LIMIT amount of times I'm willing to put up with "oh look she speaks! lol" before I stopped even trying to talk to someone at all.

ask and ye shall receive weird looks for asking

“I want to start with an important re-framing: it’s not your asexuality that’s caused your struggles. It’s allonormativity. […] It’s an important distinction, because you aren’t the cause of your own marginalization. You are fine. It’s the world that isn’t.” 🖤🩶🤍💜

As the MAGA-idolatry ramps up to fever pitch I can’t help but mull this over. We did this. We set up the evangelical Christians in our care to be vulnerable to this kind of populist movement. And the way we talked all about the Bible without wrestling with the text itself is part of that.

The local bookstore covers an entire city block. How can I even begin to choose reading material, faced with such a crushing array of options? I left the establishment with empty hands and a heavy heart.

“I recalled enough of the prayer to whisper it to the newts the next day, holding my hands over the plastic dollhouse like some kind of enormous god.” 🦎💛🙏🏼 Such a banger opening to @whaleroadreview.bsky.social’s Fall Issue.

“This Castle is a Creature,” aka one of my favorite poems we’ve published in @whaleroadreview.bsky.social! “Will I ever stop being so childish. Sometimes I sharpen / my lead and sometimes I watch as much television as I / want and it’s glorious, shrimp’s eye of color.” 🏰 🌈 🦐 📺

read the rest of “My Disposal” by Hannah Madden in issue no. 01 of (s)crawl on 10.26.25 #scrawlmagazine #litmag #horrorlit #horrorwriters

We have a very belated announcement: while working on this year's award nominations, we discovered that we'd neglected to announce last year's nominees for The Nina Riggs Poetry Award! www.whaleroadreview.com/nominations/

"Time to relax and chill this weekend... wait... am I chilling correctly? I should be more productive and watch something new instead of rewatching stuff. I should play a game I haven't, instead of an old favourite... DO I EVEN DESERVE TO CHILL???"

i hope you’re doing well. despite literally everything

My Amphibian Man is done! Just gotta wait a little longer for him to dry completely before I put him back in the hoop. My favorite part is the soak. Somehow, embroidery looks so good in cloudy water #theshapeofwater @realgdt.bsky.social

Lmao my 4yo is calling it “Cake Pop Demon Hunters”

oh this is the kind of story i'm obsessed with. concise and sharp and heartbreaking, unwilling to step off the emotional gas pedal, so thoroughly engrossed in the voice of this dedicated devoted despairing limerence. ouagh

This is just so incredibly good. Entrancing, emotional, bittersweet and beautiful with prose that cuts like a knife. Amazing.

Same. Taking this opportunity right now to say: hello if you’re new! ✨💖🖤 I tend to confuse people bc I’m unapologetically queer, asexual, horror fan/horror writer, whimsical, deconstructing, leftist—AND religious. I’m still christian myself, and I also see beauty in other spiritualities ppl forget.

*sigh* Locking down comments because it escaped containment and all the evangelical anti-theists showed up. Look, if you left evangelicalism and faith behind, that’s great for you, but you should probably leave behind the urge to proselytize alongside it. bsky.app/profile/josi...

Came across this! Some animation students in Spain are working on a short film and asking for asexuals and aromantics to share their experiences! 💜🖤🤍💚 Survey below! docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

I wish that Bluesky could come up with a simple tag I could add to certain posts that means “Hi! I am critiquing certain Christian traditions, but I’m still a Christian myself, so please don’t flood the comment section with statements about how all religion is bullshit. Thanks, much appreciated.”

This sounds wonderful. ❤️

This is so interesting bc I *am* a younger gen who missed out on that theatrical experience, but will also forever remember my first time. I saw it Halloween night crowded in a dorm room with friends on a christian campus. It was, uh, how I found out I was ace. 😂 It’s still inspiring queers today!

This haunted house has my heart the most as it tries so hard to resist becoming evil. 🥺 (and what a coincidence that I read this after I’ve saged my house!) This is genuinely such a sweet & tender story about loving wholeheartedly and indirectly without needing to be known, just needing to be home.

“And Charli is your friend? You try not to laugh. Charli is my sight. Charli is my owner. Charli is my gallant, my secret-keeper, my gravemate. Charli is the only one who would see me at the grocery store and know that it’s a lie, everything, all of it.” MY HEART???😭🩵 THIS FRIENDSHIP. THIS KINSHIP.

“Your citadel of normalcy Is destined for decay.” (Also, I need “in drag, in dance, in defiance” engraved somewhere 🌈 💃🏻 ⚔️ 🔥 )

Aromantic, asexual, and aspec people redefine intimacy by centering personal boundaries over normative expectations. In discovering what closeness means for us, we create space for fulfillment without compromise, rooted in self understanding and care for our identities

“a chorus of crickets chirping under the cover of a dark forest a mournful confession how she caught one as a child held it captive in a mason jar coveting its song” 🦗 🎶 🌳 🛌 🫙

“How to quit wishing on stars and wrench them out of the sky instead. Nests of white fire, cold as an icebox, tips digging into my palms, I cover them with earth. Dream of my daughters with stars in their mouths, running their hands through the roots of the world.” 🌟 💫 🌱💀

A transcript of my conversation with my 6 year old nephew: ME: what’s your favorite color? HIM: death ME: what? HIM: what’s your favorite death? ME: orange HIM: that’s weird

[at my second rodeo] listen up you ignorant sack of shit

Every time I have to take Tylenol now I keep muttering out loud, "well the damage is done, might as well"

It's Friday Night. Read those pages from the Necronomicon out loud. You've earned it.

We're reading the stories that have already been submitted. We've got stories that make us laugh, gasp, think hard and occasionally be very puzzled (please read the guidelines!), and we're open for more. Submit your speculative fiction under 5000 words!

normal writer writing normal short stories in a normal way using adverbs normally

we do need this one on T-shirts actually

A REAL ONE. He ACTUALLY saved the world! 🤯

happy birthday bell hooks. I’m learning so much so intelligently from your work about what love is. thank you.

Bell Hooks would have turned 73 today.

Got this book by bell hooks recently at the San Diego Book Crawl and excited to engage with it.

bell hooks may be best known for her writings and activism around feminism, race, and class, but she was also of Appalachia and wrote from the heart about Appalachian experience often. We honor her work on her birthday, work that so many have found kinship with over the years. We miss you, bell.

Happy Stanislav Petrov Day to everybody who is alive thanks to him. If you don't know him, today is a great day to read his story.

I have a joke about incubi and succubi but everyone always sees them coming.

I have a joke about the Sirens. Wouldn’t you’d like to know.

I have a joke about Artemis but it’s wild.

I want to make a joke about the Mummy but I’m always told to just wrap it up.

This academic paper has me in awe and contemplation today. I think every queer christian or C.S. Lewis scholar/reader in academia should read this. What a fascinating perspective to see the growth and exploration of. (Do note the context of this conversation in the beginning and who this is for.)

Love this! And wow I resonate deeply with that last takeaway about punishing self for crushes even if they’re queerplatonic, about wanting closeness with friends in a world that reduces and restricts what affection is allowed. Thanks for sharing! Keeping an eye out for when this book comes out!

I have a lot of US friends. I thought I knew all the major differences between us. And then today I found out that flapjacks are very much NOT the same thing to US and UK people 🤯 (US - pancakes / UK oat based treat)

Ah, Halloween. With its Black Flame Candles, Coraline dolls, and Victor x Emily, Chucky x Tiffany, Frankenstein x Bride “made for each other” couples merch. The “we learned absolutely nothing from the movie” merch.

There’s not one but TWO competing Halloween stores in walkable distance from me. Good news for my body’s morning walks, bad news for my body’s mourning wallet.