I was incredibly fortunate to hear Jane Goodall speak in Halifax a couple of years ago. She was and remains a personal hero, and I am so, so sad to see her go. Hail the traveller. May we walk on the paths she created.

This week's Threshold theme continues with an invitation to discover thresholds in nature and write about them. #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency #WritersCommunity #AmWriting #AuthorLife #Storytelling

This just crossed my desk, and it looks interesting. If you're a scholar interested in the intersections of storytelling, animism, and the climate crisis (like me), this might be right up your alley. #AcademicSky www.nsuweb.org/circle-5-eco...

The CfP for next year's Folklore Fellows Summer School is now open. It's a great panel of excellent keynotes. Worth flagging up to encourage as wide a participation of younger career scholars as possible.

We can't let political chaos in a few countries make us take our eye off the ball of climate & ecosystem stabilization. If we get distracted, the social and economic instability that results may dwarf that whipped up by ideologues. #Methane is critical. otherwords.org/the-climates...

After publishing my Genre Grapevine report yesterday about book club scams targeting authors, I've received even more emails from scammers. I would say I'm surprised but with AI enabling this BS the scammers have no incentive to ever stop. 1/ www.patreon.com/posts/genre-...

Well, that was complicated, but my travel itinerary to Brighton for the World Fantasy Convention and then on to Scotland for a week of hill-walking through Neolithic landscapes and paying my respects at the monuments of women murdered for witchcraft is all settled. Looking forward to this so much.

This week's folklore and storytelling posts are all about thresholds; how they're understood in folklore, how you might experience them yourself, and how you might include them in stories. #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency #WritersCommunity #AmWriting #AuthorLife #Storytelling

I'm delighted to announce that I will be a guest at Sydney Comic Con next weekend. I'll be delivering two workshops on folklore and storytelling, and I'll be available all weekend to inspire storytellers to include folklore in their work. #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency

Just a couple of photos from today's walk with Maddy. We stopped at the top of the mountain to pick and eat apples fresh from the tree.

Okay, list is shaping up pretty well… But there’s a few more spaces if people want added, will also remove if people want me to. (Limit is 150). Folk attending @worldfantasy2025.bsky.social in Brighton next month…

Dear ones, keep writing. Keep making music. Keep making knowledge. We need your voices so much right now.

And now we meet the dreamers themselves in a Japanese folktale about an honest man and an evil man who both dream of treasure. #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency #Folklorist #FolkloreStudies #WritersCommunity #writerscorner

10 wolves have already been killed in MT since hunting season opened last week. Killing wolves is neither supported by science nor ethics, yet it becomes a reality when wolves lose federal ESA protections. As the numbers climb, how many more wolves will be lost without reason?

Trump Administration is set to remove Look-Alike Protections from 11 species 🐢🐢 Many species closely resemble one another, making it difficult for wildlife enforcement to distinguish between species protected under the ESA and species that look similar to them. Read on ➡️ bit.ly/4876mHL

Some days you just want to pop a bowl of popcorn, drench it in butter, and watch Casablanca again. Amirite?

Some months ago, I began a project; foraging on my land for sweet herbs, flowers, and other plants to make an incense that spoke to me of home. I just finished it today. The ingredients are lilac, rose, cedar, and rowan berry, harvested in season, and a bit of dammar gum to help it burn. #RealPagan

ICYMI: The "Tam Lin" episode of the Folklore & Fiction podcast was all about feminism and fictional magic systems. You can find it here: folkloreandfiction.c... #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency #Folklorist #FolkloreStudies #WritersCommunity #writerscorner

Dream logic can do wonders for a story if it's written well. This week's Wednesday Wonder invites you to try your hand at it. #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency #Folklorist #FolkloreStudies #WritersCommunity #writerscorner

Introduced by Charlie Kirk shortly before he was killed, "The Pagan Threat" is a specific and deliberate attack on my community of faith. Manny Moreno does an exemplary job outlining this threat in his review of the book for "The Wild Hunt." #Pagan #Heathen #Druidry #Wicca

This week's motif is all about dreaming of treasure and the ways you might bring both the dream and the treasure to a story. #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency #Folklorist #FolkloreStudies #WritersCommunity #writerscorner

A blessed Autumn Equinox to you. May we all find balance.

Just a quick note to fellow #AcademicSky users that Academia.edu has just updated its ToS in ways that exploit the work and likenesses of scholars registered on the site. I've deleted my profile and begun a migration to hcommons.org. www.academia.edu/terms

Monday's witch is Friday's stepmother, who has turned the poor children in this ballad into a laily worm and a machrel of the sea. #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency #FolkloreScholar #FolkNarratives #FairyTale #AuthorsofBluesky #WritersCommunity #WritersCorner

In early Ireland, satirists were feared for their ability to speak truth to power. In some cases, it was believed they could cause physical harm to those they targeted. Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel are modern satirists, and silencing them is the ploy of a petty tyrant. #FolkloreAgainstFascism

There are a number of different kinds of scholars who study folklore, so I thought it might interest you to know what goes into a Folklore PhD. Here's what went into mine. #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency #Folklore #Folklorist #FolkloreScholar

Grateful this evening for Tracy Nicholas of @folkloringpodcast.bsky.social and Mark Norman of @folklorepod.bsky.social for their work in bringing a wide range of folklore knowledge to people in accessible, approachable ways. Thanks for everything you're doing, folks.

The American Folklife Center announces the launch of the Bodkin Lectures Resource Guide, providing hundreds of hours of world class lectures on folklore, free to use and download for teaching purposes: blogs.loc.gov/folklife/202... #folklore #folkloring #learningfolklore #folklorestudies

Next week: Our next online talk is from Roy Vickery, on '50 Years of Plant-Lore Collecting'. Tuesday 23 September, 19:00-20:30 BST on Zoom. Tickets £6.00 (£4 for members with promo code). www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/50-years-o...

I've posted a short, intellectual follow-up to yesterday's announcement about the High Seat ritual on my Facebook page. I thought I'd link to it here for those of you with an interest in a more ethnographic take on the ritual and my participation in it.

Monday's witch has you in her sights, but she's giving you a choice! What animal will you become? #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency #ScienceFiction #Fantasy #FolkloreScholar #FolkNarratives #AuthorsofBluesky #HappyWriting #WritersCommunity #WritersCorner

“Experts say that detachment from nature is at the root of many of the environmental problems the world faces today, from biodiversity loss to climate change…Just as you’re more likely to help a friend than a stranger, you’re more likely to care for nature if you have a relationship with it.”

“And then remember this. The Imperial need for control is so desperate because it is so unnatural. Tyranny requires constant effort. It breaks, it leaks. Authority is brittle. Oppression is the mask of fear.”-Nemik, 5 BBY

If you're Pagan and will be near London on Nov. 2nd, I'll be the officiating Völva (Norse Witch) at a High Seat ritual in Clophill. The ritual has ancient roots, and I perform it as a trained seer in service to those who attend. We're asking for a £10 donation to cover the cost of renting the site.

I dreamed last night that I was watching a woman bake a New Year's bun of some kind. When it came out of the oven, it was warm and tasted of honey and cardamom. The bun was traditional, and the woman was South Indian or Sri Lankan. I know this is an odd request, but is there such a traditional bun?

This Monday's motif is all about witches, their transformational power, and the ways you can use it in characterization, plot, and setting. #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency #ScienceFiction #Fantasy #FolkloreScholar #FolkNarratives #AuthorsofBluesky #WritersCommunity

Yeah, I'm a witch, and today I participated in the greatest spell of them all. Next year, or perhaps the year after, this tree that I have given a home will give me apples, and I will make cider with them that I give to my friends. Hail the Mother and her children. May life endure.

We have our work cut out for us today, but it's good work. We bought two apple trees, two sweet cherry trees, and two plum trees yesterday, and today we're planting our wee orchard. Now we'll have to plan a proper wassailing for Twelfth Night.

Folklorists study a lot more than traditional beliefs and narratives! Here's a selection of photos from my research. Bottom Row: Mending a fishing net in field school, conducting ethnomusicology research at a Wardruna concert, field work at an animal rights protest. #CulturalHeritage #FolkMusic

Thomas Rymer wasn't tempted by Monday's fairy table, but he was tempted by otherworldly fruit on an otherworldly tree. So the motif applies. #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency #Folklorist #FolkloreScholar #FairyTale #AuthorsofBluesky #AuthorLife #WritersCommunity

That feeling when your husband brings you up a bar of chocolate with espresso beans in it because holy crow has this day been a week and it ain't over yet.

Sites like Wayland's Smithy are rich examples of layered folklore of place, and you can use this sort of folkloric layering in your fiction. #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency #Folklorist #FolkloreStudies #AuthorsofBluesky #WritersCommunity #StandingStones #MyPaganHeart

Dan Ben-Amos famously defined folklore as "artistic communication in small groups." So insider jokes, family recipes, hand-knitted gloves, slogans, traditional work processes, and so many other things are folklore, and you already include them in your stories all the time. #folklore #amwriting

So let's say you give in and reach for something on Monday's dangerous fairy table. What would it be, and how would it taste? #STORYTELLERSGUIDETOFOLKLORE #SerendipityLiteraryAgency #Folklorist #FolkloreStudies #FolkNarratives #AuthorSky #WritersCommunity #WritersCorner

Just discovered this folk artist and had to share her music with you. What a great sound!

My daily devotional practice has been strong of late; it helps mitigate my anxiety about the times we live in and soothes the hole where my muse fits when I'm writing fiction. I *am* writing and submitting poetry, and that helps too, but this is where I begin and end my day.

Reclamation Day has come: WOMEN OF THE FAIRY TALE RESISTANCE are taking back the fairy tale!

Old Irish wedding traditions: www.rte.ie/lifestyle/li... #folklore #irish #wedding #folkloring #weddingtraditions #irishlore

Our September colloqium is nigh! Join us this Saturday for informal chat and sharing. Everyone is welcome to participate or lurk. #MedievalSky #MedievalHistory #Medieval #Skystorians #AcademicSky #HistorySky #EarlyModernSky #EarlyModernHistory #EarlyModern #MaterialCulture #Bodies #WhatsHistory

Well, we just had a heat pump and solar panel consultation. The province offers zero-interest loans for solar panels, heat pumps, etc. so we're going to get a home energy audit, make some repairs, and do an energy upgrade. This auld manse is about to become a 21st century girl. #RenewableEnergy