Alright. I’ve grown wine cap mushrooms. They’ve popped up where I planted them. They have root looking rhizomes, the little ring around their long stems, they’re darkish at the tops and have a purple black spore stem………… why can’t I convince myself to eat them.

Trying to give my children all my own romantic childhood memories of foraging hickory nuts and catching bass and bluegill only to realize that the difference between us is I was taught all these skills by expert relatives who relied on these skills to eat, and I am an enthusiastic amateur hobbyist.

#appalachianhorror recs - the Old Gods are stirring @spookywv.bsky.social @authorallisongunn.bsky.social ‪@ronaldmalfi.bsky.social @bearishterror.bsky.social @chuckwendig.bsky.social @eakilcoyne.bsky.social @geraldbrom.bsky.social @crystallake.bsky.social @titanbooks.bsky.social

So determined not to go to the grocery store and look at people that I just mixed my own barbecue sauce from scratch. It ain’t half bad.

The infusion center is playing Jesus Christ by Brand New over the speakers and I’m really not sure what to feel.

Love Kentuckians. Just walked by two horses whose owners had ridden them down to see some titties at the burlesque show.

I have recently healed an injury that would have been a death sentence a hundred years ago with minimal complaint, but I’ve just developed hay fever and oh my god it’s over. It’s over this time. I can see the light.

I’m only good at manifesting one thing and brother that thing is POISON IVY RASH

It’s worth noting that JK Rowling is not only funding meritless legal challenges against trans people until they can appeal up to the court that will back them, she openly gloats about how this is where her money is going. This is what the Harry Potter TV show is bankrolling.

The rich feel safe advocating for this shit because they have enormous resources to protect their investments & you do not. Further eroding the barriers of intellectual property between creator & corporation merely hastens the speed at which what's yours is theirs. What's theirs will still be theirs

All this talk of hashtag ancestral diets and none of yall are out here eating pigeon.

I did see someone say that no one should comp to Gideon the Ninth because there’s nothing like it and, I’m sorry, but that simply not true!

Glancing over a scene I wrote in my first trimester and tell me why I wrote “the warm roomed” and no one so far has caught it.

Spotify algorithm recommending I “discover” A Better Son/Daughter and Rainer Maria’s Artificial Light. Do you not know me?????

please don’t text me war plans, because I’m actually at capacity right now and I don’t think I can hold appropriate space for you. do you have someone else you could reach out to?

Is Substack worth it or are there alternatives y’all enjoy more? I’m creating a newsletter, just deciding where I ought to host it.

There is a certain baby babble that sounds a little bit as though a tiny wizard is casting a spell on you because you dared to move him from the milk after he’d been asleep for five minutes. I choose to believe it’s a blessing.

A lot of my fellow authors are freaking out after learning more about the conduct of Meta (and other AI). I'm one of the authors who has been involved in suits against Meta and OpenAI since 2023. Authors who'd like to know more about the cases and the latest updates, see llmlitigation.com/index.html

They're going to kill Libby and all your other library book reading apps, programs funded by Congress which the administration (and certainly not Elon or his teen Nazi psychopath goons) has no power to shut down. Maybe a day to call all your reps again and to demand action

Jeremy Szal isn't the only SF/F author or fan no longer coming to Worldcon or other U.S. conventions b/c of Trump's actions. I know of many other people doing the same. U.S. fandom has yet to truly process how all this is harming and changing international connections in the SF/F genre.

I know you’re not supposed to acknowledge the haters, but for a minority of them the real scary part of WAKE THE BONES was having to empathize with the fears and experiences of queer rural teens for like, two seconds and that still drives me nuts to this day. Can’t win ‘em all, but…

Ways to show up for our libraries: -Get a library card -Regularly visit your library -Use library services -Donate books -Attend library events -Become a library “friend” -Purchase their merch or from their book sales -Volunteer

No hate to farmers, this is said with adoration and respect, but I think a lot of the homesteady raw milk drinkers who “trust their farmer” but don’t trust pasteurization did not grow up around farmers. Pasteurization is the same every year and has never had to cut a corner to put food on the table.

I bet hands in the sky (big shot) is a religious experience live

Everyone doing this work for any period of time knew this was coming. It's no longer "I'll do it some day," as so many thought to themselves when we threw warnings out in 2020, then 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2024. NOW is beyond time for doing something to protect your libraries.

Librarian criminalization bills are growing in numbers across the US, but they're not new. Get to know what they are, how they began, what they mean, and what states are proposing them in 2025. That, plus this week's book censorship news: bookriot.com/librarian-cr...

ONE parent. And in Florida, ONE man is responsible for 40% of all book challenges in the state. The book banners are a tiny minority. Make that clear by speaking up in favor of the freedom to read. (Email your school board!)

Telling a story, creating a scene and crafting a sentence are three different skills. How you learned to do each gives your writing a distinct flavor and your grasp of each informs the effectiveness of the other. I’ve never seen AI come close once to holding all those threads in tension at once.

I keep thinking my pregnancy wasn’t that bad/riddled with emergencies but I’ve spent the entire day catching up on business I let drop last October. Which isn’t a… shining endorsement of how well the subsequent months went. And the fact that I’m explaining surgeries plural. Not great? Maybe?

Lying in the sun, listening to the birds, writing about the horrific mutilation of a corpse.

See also the step from "revoking a green card due to political beliefs" to "using the rest of the punitive power of the state against disfavored political beliefs"

One of my favorite things a piece of media can be is Hamlet.

NEW VIDEO ALERT! Today on Bar Cart Bookshelf we're talking about THE BOOK OF LOVE by @kellylink.bsky.social. A transformative epic brilliant with life, death, sex, love, and rock & roll, with palpable potent magic & dirt under its nails. Our drink, Lovesend, is heady, with a kiss of aromatic spice.

I do like when a post has gone so badly that the author has to post a series of fourth grade reading comprehension short answer questions beneath it.

Upon occasion you will read a piece of fiction that, regardless of how good it otherwise is, makes it clear that the author has never had actual moonshine before. Particularly any of quality.

#18 "Wake the Bones" was 5 stars!!!! So good. Kentucky folk horror full of rot, bones, graveyards, devils, and witches. I devoured this book. Beautiful writing and imagery. Interesting characters and queer relationships. GREAT twist near the end. 💚

lol just remembered this

WHAT did they put in season two of Justified to make it that good I’ve probably watched it fourteen times now

Honestly one of the best parts of being a published writer is when I meet someone whose work touched me as a younger person, and that person says they like my writing. It's like a time-bending circuit has formed between my adult self and my young self and it's made of happiness and satisfaction.

This is so heartbreaking to hear. The details of Jonah’s suffering are gruesome and I’m praying for a bright future and an end to his grief.

I need to maybe stop singing Fugazi to the baby but in my defense he IS a patient boy

Wow can't believe there's a loss in productivity from sending every employee an email demanding they drop everything to recount what they did, with their job on the line. Totally unforeseeable, so long as you're a nepobaby who has never done a day of real work in your life.

Remember: If you're not paying attention to what is in circulation about your local annex or community library- the fascists sure fucking are! They have been attempting to dictate library content for decades- And they have been successful

Big time “thanks again" to everyone who breathlessly lifted up Hilbilly Elegy

Caroline and I spent so much time on Skype when we first started dating I practically count it as our first apartment together. RIP Skype.

THE BOOK OF LOVE by Kelly Link may be my new favorite book. I love a story so vibrant it feels like the book itself is a little bit alive and it’s one of those.

A really fascinating new way to interact with grief: creating a totally new human being who has the features of a whole bunch of people you love who’ve died on his face. 90 percent of the time you don’t notice and then the light will hit just right. Which, grief in general.

The baby is dozing on my chest and if I stop singing he starts wiggling just enough to let me know he’d like me to continue.

I both wrote down the experience and told others about it so I wouldn’t forget the intensity and pain of unmedicated childbirth and now three weeks later my brain is like “the person who I was when I experienced this is wrong childbirth didn’t hurt at all actually.” Like what. Why do I think this.

I plan on watching Severance at some point but it doesn’t even make sense to ask people to tag spoilers because every spoiler sounds completely incoherent without the context I’m missing.