I've updated my blog post on Amazon's new Ask This Book feature. Possibly in response to concerns from the Authors Guild (not to mention widespread media coverage), Amazon has tweaked the feature to be less expansive writerbeware.blog/2025/12/12/k...

a beautiful and mesmerizing piece of animation that is part of the MTA's art in the subways project. strongly recommend watching on a decent-sized screen to see all the details. I've watched it 3 or 4 times already. youtu.be/oye-ao4U2-o?...

I am a ghost.

Anyone who thinks the trans panic is about protecting women hasn't been paying attention.

Ooooh, US readers!!! ✨ From today until 1st January! A FOREST, DARKLY by A.G. Slatter is available to preorder from Barnes & Noble with 25% off! Just use the code PREORDER25 at checkout! #BNPreorder bit.ly/4pNvhWL

This is a public health crisis and cis people acting like it isn’t because it targets trans children primarily (even though it will affect cis children too!!) is nasty business

The thing to understand is no compromise would be enough for the GCs. It is not enough that they are allowed to exclude trans people from single-sex spaces. Everyone else must be forced to do so. It is not enough that they are allowed to speak their views. Everyone else must be forced to listen.

This is dark & weird & creepy & you should read it!

Tiny suspicious owl is fab.

This is how I have felt every year since 2016. @tkingfisher.com put it best.

Dear Jon Stewart, No one randomly owes you information about their health, their loved one’s health, or, understandably, just wanting to avoid Covid, which is the only way to prevent Long Covid.

Ok all sarcasm aside, what these white supremacists are really talking about is when they are asked to apologize for doing racist things. Which happens. Because racism is something to apologize for. What they are saying is that no one should have to apologize for racist actions or statements.

That Tish James will do the official swearing-in feels completely apropos to me.

Dear bluskeeters! I'm doing research with a friend. If you're a Black Author with a speculative book publishing in 2026, could you please pitch and link me, please? This a difficult to sus intersection. Please add your friends' work. Please tag people. Please share

so many of their things are wonderful but this necklace is just fucking gorgeous and surely one of you will want it?

This is great, "Why one small American town won’t stop stoning its residents to death," a story where Isaac Chotiner interviews the guy who administers the lottery from "The Lottery" archiveofourown.org/works/733964...

Still seeking. I know someone must have received these in a Lucky Bag and gone "oh but it's so...pink."

Remember when the corner of an apartment building in NYC fell off? Here's current status. gothamist.com/news/it-stay...?

Some authors just seem so miserable about he actual writing process. Like, why are you doing it? For the money? Because if so ... deep breath ... HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Black folks don't only love being Black as individuals. We love each other in a way that's almost completely obscured outside of ourselves. If you watch the evening news, you'd think we hate each other. Our kinship - blood, "play," and fictive - is all the way real.

Guillotine!

Indeco IFP28X pulverizer with googly eyes.

Whipped through CINDER HOUSE by @freyamarske.bsky.social this morning, then immediately reread the last 25% or so because I was so delighted with it. Loved the spin on traditional elements of the Cinderella story, clever stuff there. Really loved the ballet scenes.

Incredible what you find when you start looking for data on the "white men can't get jobs anymore" phenomenon www.peoplespolicyproject.org/2025/12/17/w...

Actually if someone has a nice atmospheric shot of flooded modern city ruins / a subway especially that would also serve.

Looking for a Christmas miracle for a kitty (aging parent situation) for Baltimore pals: (1/2) ""My mom can no longer keep Angelo (alas!!!) and we are looking to rehome him. Angelo is a total sweetheart. He is 6 years old, gentle, playful, friendly, and a lovebug."

Periodically I punch the area where I used to live into Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace and search for a miracle. See, when I was sixteen, my mother lost our family storage unit for non-payment. And that included my original Pony collection.

nice review of one of the books I edited this year: www.criminalelement.com/book-review-...?

my cat commandeered a tribble so I know how this sort of thing happens.

Some of you have forgotten that only three years ago you were perfectly capable of writing a text, writing an email, telling a bedtime story to a child, and it should worry you that powerful companies have convinced us we can’t do things we’ve been doing since the dawn of time.

I have filled my hole in January. Now booking for late February and beyond.

I haaaaaate "said is dead." I'm sorry, but "'well done,' he nodded" is just wrong wrong wrong and when I line-edit, I kill as much of that sort of nonsense as possible. totally agree about eyes vs. gaze as well, I hate hate hate it. (exception for non-humans who may have mobile eyes)

The cashier at Target should be able to work full-time and afford their bills with a little left over. That’s not radical.

can't remember if I already posted about this or not, but I really enjoyed @mcflycahill90.bsky.social's AUDITION FOR THE FOX. Interesting world, fascinating pantheon, characters I liked, good story. I particularly liked the interweaving of the "tales" with the main story.

15, but nearly all for work trips. Not counting NYC since I live here.

Just had a client drop out of January, so I have space for a full developmental edit or assessment edit (less detailed, less expensive) if you have the need . . . .

Predictably, publishers have made partnerships with AI companies to handle production. And even more predictably, it's not going well AT ALL. You can and should choose a publisher based on their operational ethics. @leverpress.bsky.social is platinum OA, library-funded, and we *do not* use AI.

I've had 2 Samsung Flip phones in a row now. I like this phone because it is small enough to fit in my purse or pocket and because my hands are small so a large phone is hard for me to use. Both times, I bought OtterBox cases, having had good luck with them for previous phones.

When we say "no, everything hasn't been digitized," I need you to understand that we really mean is that virtually nothing has been digitized. This is because the realm of primary sources that historians use is incomprehensibly large.

"Bubbe Hates You" was published in the Punch A Nazi anthology, a benefit for the Trevor Project to support LGBTQ+ youth. We raised over $800 before the benefit ended, but you can still read the story and see the collection of fiction and comics on my website.

Thread:

Mine have all been basic domestic shorthair, though Minerva was labeled "half Russian Blue" by the shelter. She did look very much like a Blue, and had no voice, which is a Blue trait. She had like 6 white hairs though. Thalia looked and sounded like an Abyssinian-tabby cross. The rest? Tabbies.

In 2025, I worked on around 15 projects. I've helped writers with their queries (some of them got agents, yay!). I've done partial edits, full edits, and line-edits, and written copy.

Color me shocked.

It’s the “season of love and giving”…but this year, doesn’t it seem more like a “season of fear and taking”? Like many of you, I’ve been saddened by the human impact of draconian government budget cuts and how angry many housed Americans are at unhoused Americans. 🧵 1 of 9

I very much value copyeditors, who catch all kinds of shit I miss, but I am still the sort of editor who abruptly realizes, thousands of words into a line-edit, that the author wrote something as a 2-word phrase part of the time and a compound words part of the time, and goes back to fix it.

When J was little, we put 10% of her allowance into a tzedakah box every week. When it was full, we'd discuss how she wanted to use it. I'd do research but she chose where it went. Our synagogue had monthly charity drives. Food, coats, toys, etc. She helped choose what we gave.

gee, it's not like they had any warning or anything.... even I have now switched to OMNY, and I waited until I really had no choice (MetroCard machines ripped out at my station).

Awesome

Unluckily, you forgot you heard cat barf noises from there before stepping into a dark hall. Luckily, you were wearing hard-soled slippers. Unluckily, it was a big barf. Luckily, it was on the washable mat you put there because when the cat barfs, it's always there. So how's your day going?