“Look on my werks, ye bitches, and DESPAIR!” —Aurora Thunder, at the height of her successful debut at the Darkness and Light Ball …Aurora swept down the catwalk like an oncoming storm, trains of filmy black fabric trailing her like thunderheads. Facet gasped… www.kickstarter.com/projects/tri...

I have OPINIONS after World Fantasy Con and it's time you saw them too. In no particular order: @jamesbennett.bsky.social is a delight and should be on every panel ever. @realjacksonford.bsky.social is even lovelier in person and deserves to be more widely read. 1/

Get absolutely to fuck. Do not pass go, do not collect £200.

If you have even the slightest respect for your own work, don't touch this with a ten foot pole.

So loss making OpenAI is now begging for US government money to finance its research based on unproven promises of riches to follow at some unspecified date. Is anyone else recalling renaissance alchemists persuading rich patrons to support them because they'd be turning lead into gold any day now?

We are almost done with the Kickstarter campaign. Here's an update on what happens next. And if you were thinking of pledging, please do so now as there are only a few hours left. www.kickstarter.com/...

Zohran's campaign was his determination to make New York a city everyone can afford to live in. Huge congratulations! His success will resonate throughout the world. A story where no one is left behind. It's time to write that story across England & Wales too.

Sometimes, opinions, ideas, or takes seem too soon or too late, often depending on hindsight being 20/20 and all that. Right now, Alex Garland's Civil War (2024) feels like one of those films that sits *somewhere* on the too-soon-to-too-late line, but I'm stumped as to where.

Oh no.

Incidentally this is why it's so devastating when a convention fucks up dealer table placement / layout, doesn't advertise or promote the existence or whereabouts of the attending indie creators, etc. We're on shoestring budgets, and failing to break even can ruin us.

In addition, so many events don't understand (or care) that blank walls and empty spaces subconsciously signal to guests that there's nothing there. This was my view all weekend at MCMxEGX:

I guess my point is this: If you run events and you charge people a huge whack of change for a vendor table, you ought to do even the smallest due diligence to help the people who pay you for them earn back their investment.

New awareness campaign

I really love this Vincent Van Gogh quote: "To do good work one must eat well, be well housed, have one's fling from time to time, smoke one's pipe, and drink one's coffee in peace." No romanticizing the starving artist. Van Gogh said UBI all the way.

We had a fascinating panel at @worldfantasy2025.bsky.social on 'Embodying the Non-Human' brilliantly chaired by David Watkins. @tiffaniangus.bsky.social asked me to remind her of the books I recommended on the subject, so here you go: a thread! 1/

Last night I went to the Puca Festival in Trim, Ireland. It's all fun and games until someone unleashes a giant demonic hare.

15 million Americans are going to lose their health care.

Is there a Welsh version of Hallowe'en? Of course there is. But beware the Hwch Ddu Gwta! www.kickstarter.com/...

Three minutes of spooky animated goodness. Happy Halloween! 👻

2. Culinary Witches

On my way to Brighton for World Fantasy Con. My panels are tomorrow, and I’ll be at the awards on Saturday night to clap for the winners, but my main goal is seeing friends.

Wish these people would go misunderstand some other genre for a while.

Tolkien is not perfect but he did, in fact, hate the fucking Nazis.

Remember: The richest 1% evade over $160 billion in taxes every year. That amount would fund SNAP for a year with money to spare. Ask yourself who the real freeloaders are.

Our final cryptids guest announcement (for now?!) represents something a little different for Writing the Occult... We're taking a walk on the spicy side. 🧵⬇️

The number of people out there who believe that writers and musicians and film crew and reporters and editors don't deserve to get paid for their work continues to surprise me. "I'm an anarchist and fuck their intellectual property" is not a position I feel any need to respect.

"What if they want to use the money to buy junk food? Or EVEN WORSE, fancy food?!" *taps the campaign yard sign* Y'all know what I'm going to say.

"But then how will they learn from their mistakes*?" *mistakes may include: getting pregnant, losing a job, trusting the wrong person, driving drunk, getting divorced, reporting your boss for sexual harassment, fill in your own blanks here Shut. Up. And. Feed. People.

I'm going to start a new political party. It's called Shut The Fuck Up and Feed People. "But what if they're on drugs?" Shut The Fuck Up And Feed People "Or not really THAT poor?" Shut The Fuck Up And Feed People "What if they have a phone and nice nails?" SHUT THE FUCK UP AND FEED PEOPLE

2 words: Lazy MOFOs

This is the same park Lola was dumped at. She was just spayed today so I’m not able to take these two even temporarily. If anyone is in the Austin area and can help, I’d much appreciate it. ME 2/2 www.facebook.com/share/p/1SWg...

Things I remember from our kitchen growing up: - Milk and Cheerios from WIC - Long boxes of government cheese by the pound - Random soup and vegetables from the food pantry I am "when food stamps were paper" years old, and the idea that in AMERICA... 1/

Remember: The majority don't support Nigel Farage or Reform. The majority never will. It's only a broken election system that gives them any power. They can be defeated.

But of course, AI isn't here to replace humans, no of course not, its here to make their workloads easier!* *A lie I've heard from a lot of people over the last few years whilst watching profitable companies chuck people in the bin for 'cost efficiencies.'

Farage: epic grifter

The Walton family (who own Walmart) are worth over $400 billion, yet many of their employees are on SNAP. Bezos is worth over $400 billion, many Amazon employees require SNAP. The people who need help are not the problem. It’s corporate greed. It’s an unwillingness to pay a living wage.

Reminds me SO MUCH of the library on the UCSD campus (familiar to all the Clarion kids)! But I won’t state on the record whether or not I saw tentacles there.

If you're new to @bsky.app and you're wondering where all the sci-fi and fantasy folks are, this starter pack contains a lot of great people to follow: go.bsky.app/Pmq3Moa

When a chatbot gets something wrong, it’s not because it made an error. It’s because on that roll of the dice, it happened to string together a group of words that, when read by a human, represents something false. But it was working entirely as designed. It was supposed to make a sentence & it did.

Chatbots — LLMs — do not know facts and are not designed to be able to accurately answer factual questions. They are designed to find and mimic patterns of words, probabilistically. When they’re “right” it’s because correct things are often written down, so those patterns are frequent. That’s all.

ALSO: how have these heartless assholes forgotten HOW JOBS WORK? Even if person A has time/transpo/etc. to *apply for* a 2nd/3rd job, you have to be interviewed, etc. before starting AND you do NOT get paid right away. All of Nov could be just applying/interviewing/going thru hiring process. 🤨🤨🤨

Speaking of SNAP:

What the holy fuck is wrong with these motherfuckers? What is it about AI that makes people lose their damn minds and spew bilge from their mouths? (The key thing here is 'licensing deal' which = money, the love of which is root of all evil.)

Chilling out this winter? ❄️ Win 2 tickets to the Winter Haunts 2025 online festival of ghost stories! Feat. Michelle Paver, Bridget Collins & more. Answer one simple question to enter. gnofhorror.com/competition-... @tiffaniangus.bsky.social @ashleystokes.bsky.social @kitwhitfield.bsky.social

Reminder that tear gas is an abortifacient. Please read that again. Meaning pregnant women in ALL of those neighborhoods have been put at risk of miscarriage and possibly dangerous complications, without their consent.

May I present a former clerk to Justice Gorsuch.

SNAP isn't about "people who don't work." It's about people who don't get paid enough to live. Of the 40 or so million people who rely on food stamps: * Two-thirds are children, seniors, or disabled * Most working-age adults who receive SNAP are employed—but in jobs that pay poverty wages

You wanna know who the real freeloaders are?