“She laughs and her short red hair is an inkblot in the starlight, and you love her and miss her more than you thought was possible, all your feelings driven by this new wild blood. Was this yours, this brain full of such fierce fire?” @ambersparks.bsky.social in short story long 💜

This is what democracy looks like! A people united will never be defeated. We want federal forces out of DC NOW! #WeAreAllDC #FreeDC

“Because the taste of mangoes clings to your teeth like a hymn. Because the boy on the bus folded his laughter into a paper crane & left it on your seat.” an absolutely perfect tiny story in @trampset.bsky.social ❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹❤️‍🩹 trampset.org/reasons-to-s...

🤦🏼‍♀️🤦🏼‍♀️🤦🏼‍♀️

Last night DC neighbors showed up at a police checkpoint at 14th & V ST. NW with handwritten signs warning drivers to avoid the block. After realizing that the community was successfully diverting all traffic, agents packed up the checkpoint and left. #WeKeepUsSafe

"The morning of June 27th was clear and sunny, with the fresh warmth of a full-summer day; the flowers were blossoming profusely and the grass was richly green." Happy Lottery day to you and yours.

Thanks to the generous sponsors for my stair climb challenge, I have free spots for low-income writers on all my upcoming #WriteBeyondTheLightbulb courses. Details about the courses: www.mattkendrick.co.uk/courses-work... Sign up to the "lottery": docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

“in this big house full of small suites, the loneliness of motherhood dissipates, mostly, and the safety net needed to create art becomes visible, connective.” @amiesouzareilly.bsky.social w/a perfect mother’s day essay about isolation, creativity, & the small moments of community we all need. ♥️

Every book published in the United States is sent to the Library of Congress. Also, if you are under 16 you cannot use the reading room or order books.

Dr. Carla Hayden has more sense of American history, better bureaucratic understanding & capability, and a stronger sense of justice in her little pinky finger than everyone in the Trump administration & all those aiding and abetting that administration.

Shocked & grateful (thank you Stillhouse Press for giving my book a chance ❤️)

all i can think is chicago pope, thursdays on nbc.

Meet our new managing editor, @elenamacdonald.bsky.social ! Elena Macdonald (they/she) is a writer from Virginia. Their work has been featured or is forthcoming in The Ekphrastic Review, Kitchen Table Quarterly, and Twin Bird Review. Elena is grateful and excited to be taking on this role.

So many, many bargains still on the Genre Creators for Trans Rights charity auction, including a just-added-this-minute signed Patrick Rothfuss, as well as handcrafted gems. www.32auctions.com/genrefortrans And here's a statement from our South African beneficary, @triangleprojectngo.bsky.social.

This book - so many iterations and rejections and years of giving up and starting again - and now I’m so happy to see it on this finalist list. (Biggest thank you Stillhouse Press and Bingham judges 💚).

“We talked in our own accents, used our own language, told them our creation stories, fed them laksa and posole and bamya.” this almost impossibly hopeful story from @pleomorphic2.bsky.social in @bendinggenres.bsky.social is exactly what i needed to read today. 💜

“I fix my eyes on Gladys and stroke the smooth wool of my pink coat, finding the buttonhole edges with my fingers, and that’s when Gladys stares straight through me. Like she knows.” @sarahillswrites.bsky.social in @flashfrog.bsky.social with this 🔥

“I’m a crime writer – I understand theft when I see it.” Authors call for UK government to hold Meta accountable for copyright infringement. www.theguardian.com/books/2025/m...

“It’s more like watching and wondering about the life you might have had if anyone had ever found out what you were concealing from them after you’re already gone. We all think this sounds like a nightmare. And that we better try even harder not to die just in case.” oh, this story 💔 it’s perfect

tons of amazing stuff still up for auction and you’ll be supporting the transgender law center too: www.32auctions.com/writers4tran...

got the new @otherppl.bsky.social pick & immediately remembered the nightmares i had from the 2015 NYer article abt the cascadia fault line, but then tore through the book in a day anyway. and it also wrecked me. it was so brilliant and so gutting and so alive and so terrifying and so beautiful. 💔

“[AI] will never mimic a writer’s soul or how he or she produces meaningful writing—that process by which an individual idiosyncratic mind works out a problem, granting readers access to the inner life of another person, that constitutes the lifeblood of writing and storytelling.” all this, really.

A mere 33 years into my writing career, I published a book. It's such a thrill to see it here. (much ❤️ Stillhouse Press! Big thanks @penamerica.bsky.social & [email protected] Sarah Shun-lien Bynum @wendywimmer.bsky.social. (Happy to be here w my friend @janellebassett.bsky.social!)

“She’s still down there, bones picked clean by river fish, snapping turtles risen from swamps. She thought prayer would save her, an invisible, tide-halting dome cast over the house.” @coreyfarrenkopf.bsky.social with this gem in @flashfictiononline.bsky.social. every single sentence is so good. 🩵

😡😡😡 www.theatlantic.com/technology/a...

Help litmags transition away from Twitter, follow them on BlueSky. go.bsky.app/7cWNC2j

Writers over at @porcupinelit.bsky.social are currently being targeted by the MAGA crowd. Read and share the work of teachers. ♥️ 💪 www.porcupineliterary.com

this place, guys. it’s beautiful, it’s quiet, it has tons of space, it’s an easy drive from dc, and i accomplished more here in 5 days than i’ve gotten done in the last year. #areasontowrite @ellenweeren.bsky.social ❤️❤️❤️

excited to talk all thing flash fiction at shepherd next month!

“You realize how much of your body you’ve never touched with intention: the satiny inside of your arms, your knuckles’ bony hills…” @claudiamonpere.bsky.social in @fracturedlit.bsky.social. chills from this one. 💔

OpenAI says it has proof that Deepseek used its work without permission to create something meant to undermine and destroy its product. On behalf of all the authors whose novels and stories were taken as training data, oh no that must be so hard for you.

Damn straight, Tim Walz

“I thought I’d left that all behind, the urge to fix what wasn’t mine.” @sightlined.bsky.social in @hexliterary.bsky.social 🩵

Nice people are struggling over the revelations on Gaiman, and something I keep hearing is, 'His work had a big influence on how I shaped my own identity.' So here's something to remember: You did that. He didn't do it for you. 1/

“Her grip was so tight that her fingers left horizontal marks, lines so perfect you’d think a cartographer drew them using a parallel ruler to trace the course of bearing.” one of my favorite people with this beautiful story in the new issue of stirring: www.stirringlit.com/vol-27-ed-1-...

Writers! Do you write fiction that’s speculative, fabulist, or magical in any way? I’m putting together a Substack post on the best craft guidance (& reminders) for writers working in this mode, and I’d love to include tips from others too! Send me a DM if interested (or comment here if you prefer)!

“two arms stretched out like a cross a hug a headstone” beautiful little micro from @sabrinahicks.bsky.social in 100 word story 🏜️

Raise your hand if you’re joining nearly 10,000 other writers in this winter’s Mini 1000. Starts Jan 3, 5 days of us writing 1000 words a day with letters from me (and some special guests!) It’s free and fun and it’ll kick your writing year into gear. 💪 mini1000.substack.com/p/the-next-m...

day after christmas scene: a four-year-old, surrounded by a mountain of new toys, spends the entire morning playing keep-away with a piece of bubble wrap. she is deliriously happy.

“She’ll put on the sailor outfit if they ask nicely. If they’re good in the only way that still matters.” @angelaliu.bsky.social with a brilliant version of sailor moon in @hexliterary.bsky.social

“they used to fade out as if the music hadn’t ended at all, was still playing somewhere and it was us who’d moved on, already singing the next song even as the first one continued in some other room…” @amorak.bsky.social with a bit of music on today’s slowdown 🎶🎶

There are now 279 lit mags and small presses on this list (which is NOT a starter pack) - you can follow the list (pin it)-without following all the accounts and it becomes a feed/tab. Please share (it's the biggest list so far) bsky.app/profile/laco... #litmags #litmag

dmv lit news from @writesloud.bsky.social - excited to see this new column in washington city paper 💙

My December #WritingCraft article is a round-up of everything I've published over the last 5 years. If I've counted correctly, there are about 50 resources in total; feeling quite proud to see it all in one place. Hope it's useful! prattlefogandgravelrap.substack.com/p/everything...

this tiny story from @manthes.bsky.social in @fracturedlit.bsky.social 💙

As of yesterday booksellers at The Strand are on strike. Solidarity with them. Don’t cross the picket line, even virtually.

“For months now, the husband has been trying to tell the wife about his dreams. Paper skies, torn at the edges. Dead trees, leafless, brittle, the bark peeling in strips.” wow this one is excellent 🩵 @lmariharris.bsky.social in @leonliteraryreview.bsky.social

“Her: cleavers and handsaws and rare roast beef. Him: tarts studded with berries, snow of confectioner’s sugar.” love this story from @sfreligh.bsky.social in the new issue of @jhhnow.bsky.social 🔪 🍮 gooseberry-pie.com/Restaurant-A...