Submissions are now open for THE COOKOUT, an anthology of speculative fiction from the African diaspora. Send us your sci-fi, fantasy, horror, and everything in between!
#authors #blackauthors #speculativefiction
Submission guidelines and link can be found at: www.kickstarter.com/projects/and...
Text above reads "LOSS is real" above a game show style graphic. A female-presenting android with giant purple eyes, bob cut hair, purple metal turtle neck and orange and white metallic jacking raises a metal android fist in a 'pumped up' position.
If I had to suffer this jumpscare in my inbox this morning, so should you. #jumpscare #AIisreal #isthisloss
I have a new story out today in @uncannymagazine.bsky.social!
“What We Mean When We Talk About The Hole In The Bathroom” is about superstition, intercultural relationships, and yes, a strange hole in the bathroom.
www.uncannymagazine.com/article/what...
Congrats! I'm so out of the loop I can't believe I missed this story! I know what I'm going to be doing this evening... ❤️📖🛋️
Jokes on you, my protagonists are historians but so is my villain 👀
An illustration of a large purple side profile of a human with their face painted with splashes of red, purple, and orange, along with trees and birds. There is a small human figure standing on their purple outstretched hand. In the background are a green sky, orange mountains, and a moon. In the corner of the illustration reads: “7.2 cover by Frances Philip” in white text.
Our gorgeous Issue 7.2 cover, designed by Frances Philip, still stops us in our tracks! 😻
Ouch, get out of my head please 😭🫠
An illustration of a Black little girl walking through a field of yellow-purple grass, towards a yellow light. At the top of the image reads: “augur + tales & feathers” in white text. Below it reads: “Black Words & Worlds.” in white text. In the middle of the image is a spread of the covers of Augur Issue 8.1, Augur Issue 8.2, Augur Issue 8.3, Tales & Feathers Volume 3, and a cellphone with an illustration of murmurstations podcast. Underneath reads: “Celebrating voices, art, and stories during Black History Month and every month” in white text. There is a yellow arrow pointing right below. At the bottom of the image is a white border with the Augur logo.
For Black History Month, we’re showcasing Black creators’ stories, voices, & illustrations! 🌟📚
From the light-hearted to the heart-wrenching to the deeply mysterious, these creators' imaginations captured our team's hearts.
Scroll down to see their work! ⬇️
💀
A whiteboard leaned against a shelf with many trinkets. On the whiteboard, it says “When you look at a blank page, think of who you love”
In his acceptance speech for award for best screenplay, Ryan Coogler said “when you look at a blank page, think of who you love” and I dunno, that really moved me so I wrote it down and sat it on my desk to look at while I work
writing productivity doesn’t alway have to look like writing. Sometimes it’s doing research by watching deep dive videos of ocean friends. Or so I’m telling myself RN. #amNOTwriting #amwriting #writingcommunity #amwritingscifi
The sauce: www.instagram.com/reel/DU63BQ5...
I think this is especially hard for those of us working parents who only can focus on a few rewards at a time. And how much harder it is to write something like a novel, where writing is often contained to tiny rewards (e.g. I wrote 50 words) because you're building something so big/long term.
I seldom see Zora Neal Hurston or Toni Morrison's works being taught except when relegated to the "African American" curriculum--e.g. 'special' and 'separate' (but equal.) Instead, I wrote Space Treads so Malcolm and Alletheia's story can resonate with anyone reading.
It's a short story, kind of a alien meet-friend-cute, but at its heart the story is about how language, in all its forms, is powerful, frightening, unexpected, and liberating. The punishment of Black language and thought is as pervasive as ever in classrooms, but most especially in books.
I have yet to have heard anyone pick up on this, but the t'mwan is a real thing used in colonial classrooms as punishment for speaking one's native/home language (t'mwan = témoin, or testimony/witness, in French). Black students continue to be punished in classrooms for speaking "bad grammar" today
I wrote Space Treads as a subtle sci fi discourse to mirror words by Carter G. Woodson, founder of #BlackHistoryMonth: the classroom was and still is a site of violence, but students themselves can shape possibility for freedom.
Read here: www.uncannymagazine.com/article/spac...
Thread (1/?)
As someone whose DEI office was closed back in August and has been without a job since, they've already done an extraordinary amount of damage to programs, scholarships, student well-being, and entire livelihoods. It's not coming back anytime soon, if ever.
in the last few years, I've tried many ways at being a writer. One was treating it like this artisan garden that must be always perfect for viewing. You count every word, prune with abandon, and march forward like a soldier to their last battle.
I used to think if I couldn't support an author by buying a book directly for $$ reasons, borrowing it from the library was just a cop out. Until a prof was like "PLEASE just request it from the uni library, it's much better for me." Anyway, don't be a perfectionist like me. Borrow those books.
More often than not, I'm writing beyond what a chapter needs, and when I go back to editing I think, "Actually, I made my point in that chapter. She's lonely and misses her father. We can move on" and cut or move the rest of it.
Ha, I'm terrible at ending a scene. But I've also noticed, especially in longer novels, that other authors don't worry about that as much on a chapter by chapter basis, and it usually doesn't make a difference.
Roses are red
Read this thread curiously
Colorless green ideas
Are sleeping furiously
Most R1 English departments, my entire career: *very skeptical of English education*
@manshel.bsky.social: The high school English classroom is the most important literary institution in the United States, and the most overlooked by literary scholars.
Me: 👏🏾 👏🏾 👏🏾
academic.oup.com/alh/article/...
Happy Friday y'all! We'll be posting more about our 2026 themed issues, but here's a sneak peek to get your ideas percolating for the upcoming submission windows:
Summer: Black Kishōtenketsu
Fall: Conjuring Academies & Spellbound Scholars
Share with a friend who you know will eat this up 🍽️
My review of Shigidi and the Brass Head of Obalufon, by Wole Talabi #books #booksky #literature 📚💙
app.thestorygraph.com/reviews/b39c...
A reminder that people who engage with your art will always have criticism that reveals they never really understood (or tried to understand) your art.
Picture of Adobe Photoshop charging $115 early cancellation fee.
F y'all for this @adobe.com Exploiting people who are already tired on a product that we used to actually get to have on our computers?
A sweet and haunting story about growing old, ethics of care, and missed amends.
Screen grab showing web page with UNCERTAIN SONS. Black text on grey background
Reading for the Hugos, Nebulas, or Locus Awards? Please consider @thomasha.bsky.social's novelette "Uncertain Sons" in your long fiction categories. Free to read here:
undertowpublications.com/uncertain-sons
I saw this making the rounds last night and was too tired to bother clicking.
I was so, so wrong.
