Ah, yes, early November where if you dress warmly, you're too warm. If you don't dress warmly, you're too cold. And if you try to end up in between, you'll likely just be cold and then warm and then cold and then warm.

I have stalled out for the day, which is a bummer b/c I wanted to get this one section completely finished, but I am now half-way through the first draft & I'm pretty sure this thing is going to work.

A reading of Percival Everett’s novel James in the context of Jameson’s postmodern pastiche: orbit.openlibhums.org/article/id/2...

I read the Booker Prize shortlist (again). Rum do, this year - but not uninterestingly. On the bourgeois novel:

This guy gets it

I was going to say that the weird sad libertarians is the name of my dark ambient project, but really, each is implied by the other

I'm not sure I fully understood it (b/c I don't engage much with horror and don't have much grounding in philosophy or theology) or agree with it, but this is the most interesting, thought-provoking thing I've read this week:

For anybody interested in Poe, this is a thorough overview of David F. Gaylin's exhaustive study of what is an can be known of Poe's death. I read Gaylin's book a month or two ago and was impressed, but it's ... very detailed. This review does a nice job of sythesizing. muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/articl...

silence, the silence that can be interrupted by a thought or even a whisper, as a luxury, a necessity, a refusal, a denial, a statement, a protest, a scream, a shrinking from, a standing up, an ambiguity that seeks to lance the boil of all the false meaning being thrust into the world

My new post on Haldór Laxness's remarkable INDEPENDENT PEOPLE, about a poor farmer's obsession with independence at the cost of his family. By turns comic & tragic, and filled with sheep, ghosts & blizzards, this is an atmospheric & riveting novel. readersretreat2017.wordpress.com/2025/11/07/i...

WRYTE WEIRDE BOOKES

It is a crying shame that Shepard is so obscure. (Not sure if it's still in print, but the Fantasy Masterworks series in the UK has a collection of all but one -- I think -- of his Dragon Griaule series that's well worth your time.)

My take on THE THOUSAND YEAR BEACH by Tobi Hirotaka (tr from the Japanese by Matt Treyvaud), from Haikasoru: #SFinTranslation www.sfintranslation.com?p=15552

A reading of Percival Everett’s novel James in the context of Jameson’s postmodern pastiche: orbit.openlibhums.org/article/id/2...

Me interacting with any ecommerce site/app these days:

www.wired.com/story/data-c... It's not AI killing jobs but data center investments

I had time yesterday before my commuter bus showed up so I stopped by Minneapolis Central Library. Things escalated.

I’m sure this won’t lead to any problematic or completely hilarious or incoherent mistranslations at all: www.theverge.com/news/815987/...

I had time yesterday before my commuter bus showed up so I stopped by Minneapolis Central Library. Things escalated.

Inside of me there are two wolves. One wants to go to sleep right now, and the other went to sleep an hour ago.

My response to reading the English translation of Han Kang’s latest novel was similar to Gautam’s—this dawning, inevitable realization. Perhaps even more so b/c I’m a U.S. citizen. Realization about what? Read his email:

love is real

Web of Angels is fascinating: of its time, ahead of its time, and uniquely, utterly Ford. Not really cyperpunk but akin to it just like Ford’s The Scholars of Night isn’t really a technothriller but is akin to (and presages) technothrillers.

just painting genre into a corner (but hopefully the how of it is both pleasurable & interesting): wmhenrymorris.com/fiction/oddi...

Publication date is April 28, 2026 🫠 But seems worth the wait: press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...

encountering Watkins work feels like stumbling across an historical object that retains radical unfulfilled potentials and at the same time, a glimpse at a future from which a better, more politically engaged mass media never fully arrived - a vision of what could have been.

🎧New Critical Friends! It was a real pleasure to convene this talk with Paul March-Russell of @sffoundation.bsky.social and Jacqueline Nyathi of @hararereview.bsky.social. On the hopeful imagination: “We should have a much bigger perspective when we’re thinking about how to get to the future.” (JN)

and they keep making more!

it continually blows my mind that @strangehorizons.bsky.social has been an open-access, diverse, international sff space for fiction, poetry, art, _and criticism_ for 25 years now -- and that they have a branch devoted to literature in translation. like: ! samovar.strangehorizons.com/issue/27-oct...

Eeee, it’s Nov 3! Happy book birthday to me! 📖🍰

I occasionally have opinion on men's fashion. Here's one: I hate that men's flannel, denim, chambray, and canvas shirts so often have pockets with flaps. The flap corners almost always curl, even with some of the better made, more expensive shirts. Just give me a standard patch pocket.

I occasionally have opinion on men's fashion. Here's one: I hate that men's flannel, denim, chambray, and canvas shirts so often have pockets with flaps. The flap corners almost always curl, even with some of the better made, more expensive shirts. Just give me a standard patch pocket.

Been mulling over the late Joel Lane's Where Furnaces Burn and how the noir police procedural aspect of the stories grounds them such that they avoid some of the traps @aelkus.bsky.social has identified in contemporary weird stories that try to eschew plot.

Here we go:

_Part of the whole point of Infinite Detail is that the internet isn’t just data flowing along fiber and routers and wireless access points: it’s culture and politics and socio-economic activity_ www.bigecho.org/salvage

I clearly have not watched enough films this year because the only four star or above films I’ve logged so fare are Certified Copy and Decision to Leave. Both good films, but they need some friends.

On this hallowed eve, may the spirits of our dead comfort us in these difficult times and may they also haunt those living who deserve it.

This is why we need experts

Maybe this would also be a good time to mention that everything in my shop is 20 percent off this weekend? I've got shirts, mugs, stickers, and much more for word nerds and grammar lovers. No coupon code needed! arrantpedantry.myspreadshop.com

On this hallowed eve, may the spirits of our dead comfort us in these difficult times and may they also haunt those living who deserve it.

"To have a life of one's own..." A Halloween shout-out for the very best witch of them all. Also if there is a book out there that has a more perfect final paragraph than Lolly Willowes, then I want to read it.

Here is my nomination for a Best Related Work Hugo for 2025: youtu.be/TMdYNoA3E_Q?...

From the story "A Conversation with The Distinguished Finder Gjonill" in my new collection Oddities: Fantasies & Science Fictions: wmhenrymorris.com/fiction/oddi...

_I don’t charge fees. I accept gratuities. In this particular situation, I donated the gratuity—which, incidentally, Princess Megritti insisted I keep—to the Lledjong Cultural Center here in the City. It has been severely underfunded since the recent changes to the taxation and sumptuary code_

Here is my nomination for a Best Related Work Hugo for 2025: youtu.be/TMdYNoA3E_Q?...

_I don’t charge fees. I accept gratuities. In this particular situation, I donated the gratuity—which, incidentally, Princess Megritti insisted I keep—to the Lledjong Cultural Center here in the City. It has been severely underfunded since the recent changes to the taxation and sumptuary code_

Reading the deadline piece about Doctor Who and feel like I’m losing my mind reading these quotes about how hard the show is to promote in America. It’s not Star Wars or Marvel but that thing penetrated US nerd culture extensively from 2008 till 2015.

Have commuted on public transportation my entire life (Oakland, SF, Minneapolis). In 25 years, have only witnessed 4 or 5 somewhat scary incidents none of which got violent Meanwhile, when I used to wait on BART platforms, seeing what people did while driving was terrifying.

that feeling when you’re starting a story, and it’s solidly mimetic, and you don’t when and how it’s going to turn into something stranger or weirder or solidly genre or, and, while unlikely, the thought is somewhat thrilling, maybe it won’t turn at all