so weird to do my little dayjob of trying to preserve shared governance at my university (also DGSing, teaching, & writing supposedly) & having to be normal & measured with colleagues all while knowing that this is happening

This story, for all its bleakness, opened up the tight fist of fear that is my heart, held my hand, and made me feel a little less alone.

hey Milwaukee, this Friday I’m part of the Book Drop series with @brookesmoody.bsky.social & Richard Vargas at 7 pm at Amorphic Brewery! I’m reading a flash that involves magic fish & bad deontology. Come on out!

hey Milwaukee, this Friday I’m part of the Book Drop series with @brookesmoody.bsky.social & Richard Vargas at 7 pm at Amorphic Brewery! I’m reading a flash that involves magic fish & bad deontology. Come on out!

surprised to discover that Le Guin's Orsinian Tales are some of her best work, a melancholy exploration of what the 20th century, esp the Cold War, meant to central Europe. Its closest peer is Jan Morris's masterpiece Hav (you know something's good if I compare it to Hav, which has no real rivals)

such a clear statement of intent that the US is only invested in Palestinian death, nothing else, not even death as cover for a land-grab, just death

this video is how I learned that the well-dressed librarian who rides the same bus as me every morning, but who has not been there for several weeks, has probably transferred their hours to the new location! (said librarian isn't the dancer, though he's great)

herein you can 1) hear me read a sneak preview of a flash from a forthcoming @neonhemlock.bsky.social zine (!), 2) see my raggedyass prof hair before I cut it to look respectable for the new term, & 3) cackle at the wonderful @susantaitel.bsky.social's AITA take on Rapunzel!

Now available everywhere!! this is my favorite of @isabelcanas.bsky.social's marvelous novels yet (!!! it's a crowded list!!!), and it has my absolute favorite villain she's written so far! GO BUY IT SO YOU CAN MEET HIM 🖤 💀

this week's (free) post is about the adage "deescalate all conflict that isn't with the enemy" and what it means to be an enemy, and don't worry I manage to reference both Sun Tzu and Tolkien so I've still got it margaretkilljoy.substack.com/p/we-know-wh...

nearly all of the best new books I've read so far this year have been by trans writers, please keep making them I don't believe in the "oppression creates art via pressure like a diamond" myth: you all are just that brilliant regardless of the fascism. keep it up

sup Milwaukee, love to bail out the basement all night

It’s my birthday and I shamelessly would love you to buy my novel bookshop.org/p/books/okps...

"Every Ghost Story" is out in @reactorsff.bsky.social today! Edited by @jonathanstrahan.bsky.social, with art by @babswebbart.bsky.social. Incredibly excited to share this one (what do you mean I may be slightly obsessed with ghosts?) reactormag.com/every-ghost-...

Last check no support in a DAY for 6 families to eat...(The support today came from bold folks who clicked "weekly" or "monthly," which is often the only support we get.) We keep trying. We keep going. They're counting on us to eat & stay sheltered. 2205/2500 by Friday. chuffed.org/project/hope...

it would be very nice to be less exhausted all the time

The V*mpire was shortlisted for the World Fantasy Award: locusmag.com/2025/07/2025... Congratulations to all the other finalists!

Props to my local paper for covering the threats to trans youth care well. www.jsonline.com/story/news/h...

I hadn't come across the term "economy of genocide" before; it's such a concise way of capturing the global financial infrastructure supporting this evil. www.ohchr.org/en/documents...

Deeply honored that my @strangehorizons.bsky.social story-of-my-heart "The Spindle of Necessity" is here! Thank you so much, @cypayseur.bsky.social and @rykaaoki.bsky.social <3 Adore this TOC--amazing list w some of my fav working writers--& the stunning cover art by @mspencerdraws.bsky.social!

speaking of buying trans fiction: go read this brilliant interview with @nassos.bsky.social about his new novel Sour Cherry & then buy the book, which is equally brilliant! electricliterature.com/sour-cherry-...

A/S/L is the best new book I've read this year, a formal tour-de-force with masterful character work. I hope it gets the plaudits it deserves (close runner-up/tie is Isaac Fellman's Notes from a Regicide, tho comparing them is apples & oranges). tl;dr spite SCOTUS, buy trans fiction

It's still pride so I should mention, if anyone on here liked "Spindle," that I wrote a gay little novel about a man whose magic power to grow plants cannot, to his dismay, save nature. Also WWI and Wisconsin history! Get it from the lovely @uwiscpress.bsky.social: uwpress.wisc.edu/Books/D/Dry-...

lord I see what you have done for NYC and also literally my city between 1916 and 1940, if we are going to repeat the 30s anyway the least Milwaukee deserves is a decent socialist mayor

"institutions of higher learning are about to be pummeled by the looming reconciliation bill which weaponizes working-class families’ debt financing college dreams. not only will it push millions to the financial brink, it will push them out of higher ed altogether." newrepublic.com/article/1970...

having bad flashbacks to the moment in 2003 when I was a senior in high school arguing about Iraq with a deadeyed bro who gleefully repeated "just nuke them all" & for the first time I realized he & many like him just didn't see anyone in the entire middle east as people

queers, if you want a book to hold your heart through the current awful, preorder this magnificent collection by @syr.bsky.social, out in September from @stelliform.press. it's a guidebook on how to love a world (& each other) through constant, unendurable loss. www.stelliform.press/index.php/pr...

time (again, perpetually) to start finding doctors who are willing to diagnose "unspecified endocrine disorder"

the evil my nation is doing feels really overwhelming tonight. I know it's not new or unprecedented & that our job is to fight, but between Gaza/Iran/ICE/medicaid/ecocide/trans kids/everything, it's a lot, & hitting harder bc I stepped away from the news for a week to go hiking so it's fresh again

If you love speculative fiction, then you owe a huge debt to @strangehorizons.bsky.social -- a magazine that successfully brought SFF short fiction online and expanded our ideas of what genre can do. It launched my career and many others. And it's still amazing. www.kickstarter.com/projects/str...

Back from a week of internetless camping to “The Spindle of Necessity” being an @theignyteawards.bsky.social finalist! I’m deeply honored. The Ignytes are so exciting & well-curated & principled, & this shortlist *rules*; I’m humbled to be among such brilliance. Thread of the stories follows!

isaacs-law.ghost.io/dr-alan-hart/ every day I stray closer to writing a novel about Dr. Alan Hart

oh neat: "The Spindle of Necessity" is one of the notable stories for this year's Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy! lots of faves here too: @p-h-lee.bsky.social's "V*mpire," @kurellian.bsky.social's "Evan," & Tamara Masri's "House of Wisdom"! <3 www.johnjosephadams.com/projects/bes...

my midwest jesuit campus is going batshit for ope pope

this was always the plan, but the fact that they feel emboldened to brag openly to the press about their genocide is damning beyond words. www.theguardian.com/world/2025/m...

A sharp, formally thoughtful and eerily believable vision of what literary culture might look like in a few years, when the collapse happens (as it always does) unevenly.

Last fall MU’s trustees chose its current president against a vote of no confidence by faculty senate with 95% support from the biggest College on campus, Arts & Sciences; the most notable item on his resume was, as provost, union-busting the NTT union at that same College.

suspicious number of pieces in the local paper about how Milwaukee weathered the Great Depression, I wonder what people are worried about? www.jsonline.com/story/life/g...

boosting this: WI people, put pressure on AG Kaul. He is up for reelection in 2026, and if he isn't going to fight the FBI arresting sitting judges, he's not committed to the job.

scenes from the class struggle at Marquette www.jsonline.com/story/news/e...

WI/MKE people, this is bad bad bad -- US Marshals arresting judges who even appear to be objecting to ICE deportations targeting the courthouse. www.jsonline.com/story/news/b...

Read this over the weekend & it's excellent--a quiet, beautiful tribute to love as prosthetic, how we fill in each others’ lacks but also expand each other beyond the selves we thought possible (& how this model of care is something art articulates & state power grotesquely mirrors).

The judge said, “Do you realize that this is Kafkaesque?” theintercept.com/2025/04/17/i...

includes a lovely review of my "fuck AI in the literature classroom" story, "Tell Them a Story to Teach Them Kindness" (www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/tell...). thanks, @cypayseur.bsky.social!

We are thrilled to share the cover of Syr Hayati Beker's queer af novella in fairytale retellings. Art by the inimitable Carly AF. This book is a journey, so get ready to leave the world (and your ex) behind on September 4! Pre-orders are available direct from the publisher: www.stelliform.press...

Hey Milwaukee folks, Anodyne coffee is unionizing! You should send an email to support them. Details below / in alt text.

WI folks -- apparently in 2023 they made it harder to get exemption from publication of name changes in local papers. I'd missed this in the firehose of other awful.

fucking terf island. I’m so sorry, UK friends.

1. I am raising the alarm: If you are a transgender adult, your care is under threat by President Trump. You should prepare for severe supply disruptions and policies that amount to potential bans. The latest CMS letter indicates an expansion to target adults. Subscribe to support my reporting.