Reupping this for all those last minute gifts 📚📚📚

A beautiful thread, both for the brilliant art and the love shining through it all

A thread to read up and down.

Dec 20th's 2025 book advent choice is The Salt Oracle by @rainewilson.bsky.social, a tale of dark mystery and murder aboard a floating research college in a post apocalyptic world of climate disaster and internet collapse, which has left drifting digital ghosts infecting the human world... 💙📚🪐

I always enjoy Womble's end of year lists, so it's extra delightful to see THE SALT ORACLE in such good company 🖤

Hugely appreciate the authors who are willing to do this kind of self scrutiny about the community labour (which is what blurbing is) they/we do. As Kate says - a big part of this kind of bias lies outwith the author, but asking the question of yourself is still so important. 💪🏽

Fronds I have finished my list of pre-holiday writing jobs! I have one during-holiday writing task (or two), because us authors know how to take a break, don't we? BUT STILL if we pretend we can't see those, then WOO HOO!!!

People in and near Glasgow, I’m thrilled to participate in this panel on Scottish Speculative Fiction next month at Waterstones Glasgow Argyle Street! Tickets available via link: www.waterstones.com/events/an-ev...

An almost-noon almost-solstice sea

Rhiannon's put together a splendid list of awards eligible work in this thread, please do go check it out for voting/reading inspiration 🖤

I hadn't heard of a few of these so am all 👀🤩

✨Next event is live!!✨ What do you need to get you through the January slump? How about coming to hang out with me and these three splendid humans, surrounded by books? www.waterstones.com/events/an-ev... @solarisbooks.bsky.social @waterstonesargyle.bsky.social

My most popular blog post ever was (partly) about how there's always *something* being touted as The Thing authors *must* do to sell their books, and how that's never actually true. Having some socmed presence is good, but find the platform(s) you enjoy & ignore the rest with unabashed glee

The Salt Oracle, by @rainewilson.bsky.social (pub by @solarisbooks.bsky.social) is another excellent novel set in the world of We Are All Ghosts in the Forest, a gorgeous exploration of dark academia blended together with a locked room mystery. Full thoughts: jamreads.com/reviews/the-... 💙📚

🚨 The UK government just published a breakdown of the responses to its consultation on AI & copyright: - 95% of respondents want AI companies to pay for their training data (made up of 88% saying strengthen copyright law, & 7% saying leave it as is) 🧵 1/2

Y'know, having enough boxes for all my Xmas parcels would be infinitely easier if a certain Terrible Void didn't see all boxes as an affront to cattenhood requiring instant demolition

✨Another newspaper review for THE SALT ORACLE ✨ Which is truly fantastic given the squeeze on trade reviews & the mountains of books these editors are sent. Super grateful to them & the magic M&P team at Solaris 🖤🖤🖤

It's odd posting about awards eligibility & asking please consider me when my book's barely out so not many of you have read it. But I have one sole eligible thing this year, and I'm proud of it in all its briny strangeness. So hey, please consider THE SALT ORACLE if you're nominating? 🖤🖤🖤

Oh hey I spy a Salt Oracle! 😍😍😍 @solarisbooks.bsky.social

Massive congrats to this fabulous team. It's such a good podcast, even if everyone always gets the last question wrong 😂 #TeamEbooks

Reached the dead gannet scene in this book. Had forgotten how much I love the dead gannet scene 🖤💀🪿

2025 books I've enjoyed! The Salt Oracle by @rainewilson.bsky.social - a stunning follow up in the same world as We Are All Ghosts, bringing even more intrigue to this strange dystopia, but with new characters and moral quandaries galore! A beautifully eerie locked-room tale like no other! ✨️🌊💙

My annual holiday reading/buying/hoarding recommendations list is UP!! It has many splendid books, I had to miss off even more, so let me know your suggestions! www.patreon.com/posts/holida...

Underfloor heating (the top of the noodle's vivarium)

How many books is too many books to include in an end of year 'hey these books I read are awesome' blog??

TIL about a memorial ceremony in Iceland in 2019 to mark the end of a glacier, changing the place name from Okjökull to Ok (jökull = glacier). Uncompromising wording on the bronze plaque: "This is to acknowledge that we know what is happening and what needs to be done. Only you know if we did it".

Welcome to @rainewilson.bsky.social 's THE SALT ORACLE, where a diverse group of academics, engineers & boatmen are cloistered together on a giant floating college, with an uncanny girl who can channel the digital ghosts scattered throughout their post-internet world... Buy https://geni.us/saltorac

Not to be salty on a Saturday, but just listened to a podcast with a very famous SFF author exploring books he's loved & been inspired by. He said a couple of times how very widely he reads... ...Folks, among the dozens he mentioned? ZERO women authors.

"Wildly inventive" @rjbarker.bsky.social "Dazzlingly fresh" @gautambhatia88.bsky.social "At the cutting edge of the genre" @julietemckenna.bsky.social "Superb" @adamroberts.bsky.social "A true SF gem" @aptshadow.bsky.social "Visionary, mind-bending" @rainewilson.bsky.social

" @samkhorton.bsky.social is a storyteller outside of time, I suspect he may be fae." Frankly @rainewilson.bsky.social , so do we! Thank you for this beautiful blurb for a beautiful book. Deliciously dark historical fantasy RAGWORT, sequel to GORSE, is out now! geni.us/ragwort

I wrote a thing! Over with the fab @scifinow.bsky.social crew! About our relationship with the sea, some splendid books which explore that, and some of my, ahem, Opinions... 🖤🌊🖤 @solarisbooks.bsky.social www.scifinow.co.uk/books/gazing...

🚨 Book deal klaxon🚨 For an absolute belter of a book too!

In the last 4 writing days, I've written 11k of a new project & idk guys, it's kinda fun? Gruesome murders ✅ Scientist struggling with her research ✅ Significant Birds ✅ Is it utopia or dystopia, who can possibly tell? ✅ Tea as therapy ✅

Never not offended when Scotland pulls a 'streetlights on at midday' day 😩

Delighted to be part of the gradual Scottish take over of Solaris 💪🏽

It's the last day to grab Double and Triple Stamps at Waterstones, so why not snap up some special Solaris titles, including new releases and exciting preorders from @kerstinhall.bsky.social @shaykauwe.bsky.social @aptshadow.bsky.social @rhiannonagrist.bsky.social @rainewilson.bsky.social & more?

Fab to see in @waterstones.bsky.social Dundee, Limelight and Other Stories in the signed/special editions shelf in excellent company with @mkhardywrites.com and @rainewilson.bsky.social 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿💙 The hardback from @shortwavebooks.bsky.social is so beautiful its always cool to see it out and about!! ✨️

I know this petition has much more support than it currently has. Please share far and wide. Petition to require generative AI to carry a watermark and to make it illegal to use a person’s likeness in generative AI without permission. petition.parliament.uk/petitions/73...

A bit of vital reading here, for the many of us who want SFF to be better, to imagine better strangehorizons.com/wordpress/no...

Such a good thread up & down, highlighting the importance of holding tight to your love of the craft through the storm that is publishing right now

Good thread, very informative. NB a key reason the traditional publishers' advance/royalties finance model no longer supports most UK authors is that assumes steady backlist sales but these days publishers don't take returns on titles more than 18 months old, so high street shops don't stock them.

So much this! I have notebooks full of ideas. Give me some dice & 20mins, I'll give you 3 more. Ideas are the easy part & they don't make you a writer. Investing that idea with heart & beauty & tangled human *meaning*, caring about every word - that's what makes you a writer.

it's here it's QUEER it's the 2025 Queer Adult SFF Books list!!!! 🌈📚🌈📚🌈📚🌈

I don't go looking for reviews of my work (that way lies trauma), but the lovely @rainewilson.bsky.social spotted this and shared it with me: skiffyandfanty.com/uncategorize...

And this is the novel, if you like dark fantasy about warring Mage Houses, sibling rivalry, disaster queers and terrible bargains Listen to The Shape of Monsters by C L Hellisen on Audible. www.audible.co.uk/pd/B0FGDJ5X1...

Last chance for a spooky bargain!

Me planning new book - ...do we deserve weird little murder interstitials as a treat? Yes. Yes we do.

The amazing #Creatives4Sudan charity auction is now live! There's hundreds of bookish & arty items & opportunities up for grabs, all going to Darfur food kitchens. Please check it out & support however you can? app.galabid.com/creatives4su...

This is a brilliant read & has added several books to my 'please please let there be a UK edition 🙏🏽' tbr list

This is both a *brilliant* study omg, and also has me side eyeing 62% of us