posted this on the 📷 app but curious about responses on here too: what are some of your favourite fantasy novel opening scenes or chapters? prologues included because i'm not a monster!!!

Every writer I know, every artist I follow, is in the fucking trenches trying to survive this shit. GenAI is not the future because if it keeps going there is no future, and even if it was that would be no excuse.

“Don’t let the bastards grind you down. I love you all.”

I usually share a new Palestinian account every day but today I am going to do a thread of people I’ve already verified impacted by the recent flooding in Gaza. If you can help any of these families- many who lost everything again- please do. edition.cnn.com/2025/11/14/m...

One way I have found to mourn someone is to set up a monthly sustaining donation to a mutual aid effort they cared about. If you can join me in honoring Alice Wong, @sfdirewolf.bsky.social with a sustaining donation today, please do. Thank you Alice, and I will not let the bastards grind me down.

It's a tough time for non-profit, independent news outlets right now, but @globalvoices.org is nearly to halfway on our November fundraising goal! Help us keep providing free, ad-free, tracker-free, multilingual news and analysis from around the world! globalvoices.org/donate/

Im so exhausted yall, I dont know how to tell you how desperate our friends in Gaza are, because prices haven't gone down, aid is not flowing freely, there is no infrastructure and no work, but no one is donating. The horrors continue, the stress accumulates and they are all confused and frustrated

A very timely ask. I’m extending the submission period for The Apocryphal, the sequel to the award winning Thyme Travellers: An Anthology of Palestinian Speculative Fiction. I’ll have the details soon. But if you’re Palestinian and want to write horror, get in touch with me.

Anyone wanting to show solidarity to Sudan should challenge the "no one cares about Sudan/no one is helping" narrative. WE care. Sudanese people at home & in the diaspora & our comrades have worked relentlessly to support people & dream of justice & freedom for all of us.

'No shame': UK invites private firms to compete for Gaza reconstruction contracts - https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/british-mps-slam-uks-private-finance-efforts-rebuilding-gaza

Boycott, Divest, Sanction: A ceasefire today will not stop Israel’s genocide against Palestinians, only meaningful accountability will. Our work is not done! Read more: loom.ly/TsJOHwo

hello #amquerying friends! apologies for the late notice but i will be remaining closed to queries this month as i am in the depth of frankfurt book fair prep chaos (seriously, where has september gone, does it have somewhere to be?!?) i will be back open at the end of oct for a week as per usual!

ughhhhh been in calls and surprise meetings all day and now i have task paralysis at a time when i cannot afford task paralysis i love fall in publishing 🙃

Israel closes West Bank-Jordan crossing 'until further notice' - https://www.middleeasteye.net/live-blog/live-blog-update/israel-closes-west-bank-jordan-crossing-until-further-notice

More than 5,000 cases of malaria, typhoid and dengue fever, causing dozens of deaths, were reported in last month.

Opinion: At UN, western powers push phantom 'Palestine' recognition to safeguard Israel - https://www.middleeasteye.net/live-blog/live-blog-update/opinion-un-western-powers-push-phantom-palestine-recognition-safeguard

I'm about halfway thru this and it is incredible. A lifeline. Preorder it so it gets even more support!

We are so thrilled to welcome @melisfluous.bsky.social to CookeMcDermid! She is represented by Hana El Niwairi.

Some news! 👀 In a crazy ass turn of events, I have somehow found myself ✨AGENTED!✨ I'm THRILLED to now be represented by Hana El Niwairi @hel-no-wai.bsky.social. I cannot wait to see what shenanigans we get up to together. 🥰

You see, I get frustrated by those who imply Palestinians can't be trusted to relay their experiences reliably online. Because I knew the information in this article before I read it, having been told about it by people in Gaza. mondoweiss.net/2025/09/how-...

A group of journalists gathered at Lebanon's Martyrs’ Square in Beirut to express support for their Palestinian colleagues reporting in Gaza, holding the pictures of some of the 274 Palestinian journalists killed by Israel since it began its war on the enclave.

I love my fellow artists and writers but I do feel like sometimes we get lost in the power of story because it’s important to us and easier than the tangibility of action, pressure, protest, divestment, declining, standing up, and risking connections that might have been advantageous

WE WILL RISE AGAIN: SPECULATIVE STORIES AND ESSAYS ON PROTEST, RESISTANCE, AND HOPE by Karen Lord, Annalee Newitz, and Malka Older is also on my radar as I love each of those authors individually and am interested in their message. #ewgc #booksky

i am once again here to let y'all know that all AI has done for me thus far in my life is MAKE IT MORE DIFFICULT, like exponentially so, in every facet, i hate it so much 😭

If you’re drawn to otherworldly coming-of-age stories that blend myth and memory, then @indrapramitdas.bsky.social's The Last Dragoners of Bowbazaar is the perfect read for you! Pick up your copy from your nearest bookstore or online.

oh hey it's pre-order sale time again at @barnesandnoble.com which makes it a great time to pre-order WE WILL RISE AGAIN, an anthology of speculative fiction, essays, interviews about activism, protest, and collective action, edited by @drkarenlord.bsky.social @annaleen.bsky.social & yours truly

I will never forget Hind as long as I live. And I will never forgive Israel.

I'm in this! With a little fabulist story about bird mom problems aka what happens when you have an immigrant parent and the choice to assimilate is made for you.

Broken record territory rapidly approaching, but once again: Homelessness is not a societal inevitability. It's a policy failure. This is a solvable issue with a known solution, even under capitalism, because that solution is less expensive than the current responses. We just don't want to do it.

Go read the novella that really hurt my detached-from-my-origins feelings, and made me cry a lot (affectionate)

A reminder when talking about famine in Gaza.

What’s happening in Sudan is not a “civil war.” A civil war suggests ordinary people fighting each other. What’s really happening is two elite armed factions, both backed & funded by foreign powers, are massacring civilians through ethnic cleansing, mass sexual violence and starvation tactics

Honoured that the Spanish edition of my novella THE LAST DRAGONERS OF BOWBAZAR (@duermevelaed.bsky.social), translated by Rebeca Cardeñoso, is a finalist for the Ignotus Awards. Congratulations to all the finalists!

Many westerners can’t seem to imagine that this could be their son. Imagine your son’s face being here. 💔

The update!! I’m thrilled to share that I’ve joined The Caldwell Agency! My query inbox is now open and I accepted queries through QT, so please consider querying me if you think I’d be a good fit for you! #amquerying

Hani Mahmoud reporting from Gaza city: what Israel is doing in Gaza city is what they did in Rafah, scorched earth, destroying everything, depopulating the city by making it unliveable.

If the AI bubble really is bursting, please take this lesson from it: Nothing marketed to you this relentlessly is ever worth it. If it was, they wouldn’t need to beg you.

"the greatest social desensitization laboratory ever" That is exactly what it is.

I don't think people are concerned enough about the fact that the majority of people in the world have objected to this genocide for nearly 2 years and nobody in power cares one bit. They're conditioning us to do what we're told. This isn't just about Palestinians. Just wait until the next pandemic

🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨 Massacres are currently unfolding in northern Gaza and in eastern neighborhoods of Gaza City, such as Zaytoun, Sabra, and Shuja’iyya, yet there are no journalists on the ground and no media coverage from these areas.

Hi, I need to sell 3 tickets to Oasis in Toronto next week (8/25, 7:30PM, Rogers Stadium). Just looking to sell at cost and transfer tickets over. Reply and I'll DM you w/ more info!

Mom is only $715 away from paying off her sewing shed, which will help her return to her creative pursuits and give us an additional safe place to shelter during the winter when the RV gets too cold. Please boost and share!

Palestinian children who have lost parents were overcome with emotion as they graduated in a ceremony at Gaza's al-Wafaa Orphan Village. The UN says Israel has damaged 97% of educational facilities in the besieged enclave.

The Planetfall novels are heavy near-future dystopian SF that explores mental illness, the horrors of unfettered capitalism and how it intersects with technology. Quite a lot of it has been coming true lately. Which is... not good. But anyway, I'm proud of those books.

Thank you, kind folks, for using my tip jar. If you’d like to help with my internet bill, I would appreciate it. Otherwise, I’ll have my commissions sheet ready tomorrow. ko-fi.com/soniasulaiman

Money is very tight so I’ve decided to finally open to art commissions for a very limited time. I’ll be making up a sample page and price list tomorrow. Think character art in a classic folkloric style of illustration. Pencil, ink, paints. All that jazz.

Israel has killed Al-Jazeera’s journalists in the Gaza Strip in preparation for “a major massacre” that it does not want to be covered by the media, Dr. Mohammed Abu Salmiya, the director of al-Shifa Hospital, has warned. palestinechronicle.com/israe… The Palestine Chronicle

The blood of Anas al-Sharif and other slain journalists is on the hands of Western media figures who have justified Israel’s crimes while ignoring, or excusing, the killing and intimidation of Palestinian journalists.