writing

88d

When you're reading and someone assumes that means you're doing nothing and they can interrupt you.

#books #reading #writing

At Vespers by Halle. A young woman looks up from reading a book. It's probably some religious thing, but I've cropped out the cross and I just like the intensity on her face.

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66d

Ebook and paperback: https://books2read.com/FeyFighters

Two soldiers on opposite sides, pixie Commander Stargazer Candleflash and human Sergeant Edwin Harris, find their fates forever entwined, first by revenge, but as they crash together in a dangerous rainforest, they’re forced to work together, just to survive. Will they make it or will their bickering get them killed?

@bookstodon
#author #indieauthor #writing #fantasy #scifi #sciencefiction #sff #sciencefantasy #scifi #actionadventure #fiction #books

(Left) The cover of Fey Fighters, by Owen Tyme.

The background is the stars of space, with nebula-like clouds, in blue. This has been divided into jigsaw puzzle pieces by dark lines marking the lines between pieces.

The foreground features an enormous, stylized phoenix, which is composed of fire. The phoenix looms over an Earth-like world heavily obscured by cloud cover.

(Right) The same world from the cover orbits a purple gas giant, with a stream of flame above it, which may be the phoenix, with the following text over the top:

“We’re in a human-made, goblin-enchanted spacecraft, powered by a dryad that’s under the mistaken impression she’s a nuclear reactor, half-piloted by a pixie and half-piloted by a human.”

“Is there anywhere we can go we won’t be shot on sight?”

(Bottom) https://books2read.com/FeyFighters

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100d

Ebook and paperback: https://books2read.com/TheThirdWish

Spies, aliens, trolls, wizards and a disowned prince use a time machine, to improve their place in history, but Levi Jacobs stands in their way, despite having just lost his parents in war. Will he stop them or will the time travelers kill his father at a pivotal moment, on which the fate of the galaxy hangs?

@bookstodon
#author #indieauthor #writing #fantasy #scifi #sciencefiction #sff #sciencefantasy #scifi #actionadventure #fiction #books

(Left) The cover of The Third Wish, by Owen Tyme, illustrated by Ryan Johnson.

A wizard in a black robe that glitters with hints of gold stands on a mountain and looks down at a city of sky scrapers covered in greenery. In his shadow lurks a creature with glowing red eyes.

In the background, the sun is setting and stars are becoming visible.

(Right Background) Four images separated by black lines, with the silhouette of a woman wielding two swords laid over them. She's outlined in black and her interior is yellow clock-based imagery that spirals outward from the center.

The upper left quarter is a queen in a red, furred robe, wearing a gold and diamond crown. She has dark eyebrows and blond hair.

Upper right is a planet seen from orbit.

Lower left is a symbolic wire frame representation of the view inside a wormhole, in green and yellow.

Lower right is dandelions among grass.

The angle of the planet, one of the woman's swords, the yellow highlights of the wormhole and some of the dandelions form a line that draws the eye along a sweeping curve.

(Right Foreground) The following quote:

He admired the flawless beauty of the insane swordswoman’s fluid movements as Ida took desperate step after step, backwards!

He felt waves of mental energy pour off the panic-stricken troll, but the energy bounced right off of Nicole’s mind, as though she’d shut herself inside a solid, red-hot, steel box of rage!

(Bottom) https://books2read.com/TheThirdWish

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1y

Was once again reminded of Ursula K. Le Guin's daily schedule, and why this woman was an icon on every single level.

#UrsulaKLeguin #Books #Bookstodon #book #Writing #WritingCommunity

Ursula Le Guin‘s daily schedule

5:30 a.m. - wake up and lie there and think.
6:15 a.m. - get up and eat breakfast (lots).
7.15 a.m. - get to work writing, writing, writing.
Noon - lunch.
1:00-3:00 p.m. - reading, music.
3:00-5:00 p.m. correspondence, maybe house cleaning.
5:00-8:00 p.m. make dinner and eat it.
After 8:00 p.m. - I tend to be very stupid and we won't talk about this.

This was Le Guin's daily schedule first appeared in an interview she gave in 1988 (and more recently reappeared in Ursula Le Guin: The Last Interview and Other Conversations).

Edited 1y ago

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87d

Word of an awful contract from Shadow Light Press is circulating.

Never forget a contract can be wildly unfair in terms of who gets the money, massively exploitative over rights, lack all accepted-as-standard industry clauses on reversion, and much more besides - and be entirely legal and enforceable. If you sign it, you'll be stuck with it.

Take expert advice first! In the UK, ask the Society of Authors, or the Writers Guild of Great Britain. In the US go to the Authors Guild.

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87d

From PEN America:

Top 52 Banned Books: The Most Banned Books in U.S. Schools

"The 52 most banned books of the last four school years include National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize winners, bestsellers, and beloved books by authors including Toni Morrison, Margaret Atwood, and Judy Blume."

#books #writing #writersofmastodon #WritingCommunity #bookstodon @bookstodon

https://pen.org/top-52-banned-books-since-2021/

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87d

A nice review of the second part of my "Fantasy/Attempted comedy" story The Last Philosopher 😊

Link to first part as #Free #Ebook

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/tynp5wgkwr0dkvmf3dzp3/The-Last-Philosopher-Part-One.epub?rlkey=n61zknkz05eakr809gcs19kzd&st=fymuxn6v&dl=0

@books @reading l @writers @keepwriting @writingbooks @worldbuilding

#AmWriting #WIPWednesday
#Reading #Readers
#Fiction #Fantasy #Comedy #SFF
#Author #Authors #IndieAuthor #IndieBooks #Writing #WritingCommunity #Writinglife #WritersOfMastodon
#Bookstodon #Mastobooks #BooksofMastodon #FantasyBooks
#Review #Bookreview
#BookRecommendation

Review by crig Dec 16, 2025

Challenging and compelling
"If you are looking for something different from the usual inkitt offerings, try this. If you are looking for something with a very original storyline, indeed, quite unlike anything else you might have read, try this.
As it is written in a very readable style, what are you waiting for?
Style Give it a go.
Colin Rigby"

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83d

I skipped all the other stages and went straight to 'old weirdo' and I've never been happier 😂

@galacticwriters @writers @books @fantasy @bookstodon
@writingbooks @keepwriting @humor @humor@lemmy.world @aiop

#WritingMemes #Memes #Humor #Humour
#Author #Authors #IndieAuthor #IndieBooks #AmWriting #Writerdons #Writers #Writer #Writing #WritingCommunity #Writinglife #WritersOfMastodon #Bookstodon

An image of a time-line from birth to death.
Caption: Life of an artist
Start: Gifted kid
Middle: A burned out disapointment
End: An old weirdo with a home studio.

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65d

Chapter 50 of Stone Prophet is available to read on #RoyalRoad: https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/108234/jigsaw-city

Olyna begins to lose herself in the future, while Ogomid finishes his discussion with Reason, convincing him to turn against the painted witch. That leaves her unable to think at all clearly, turning her mind fully illogical.

Meanwhile, the six pieces of the sage meet...

@bookstodon
#author #indieauthor #writing #fantasy #scifi #sciencefiction #sff #actionadventure #fiction #fairies #webseries

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86d

So recently I was hosted in a #podcast by @GavinChait and together with Cheryl Ntumy I discussed the experiences and frustrations of publishing while being African, and we were joined by @Jeremiah from the Interledger Foundation, and we assessed the state of open payments and our hopes for widespread adoption of the standard. Give it a listen!

"Unlocking Possibilities: The role of Open Payments in African speculative fiction"
https://podcast.interledger.org/@InterledgerSalon/episodes/unlocking-possibilities-the-role-of-open-payments-in-african-speculative-fiction
#writing #writingcommunity #blog #sff

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86d

@bookstodon #Writing #Publishing #Translators #PSA

Some publishers are delegating translation of your work to GenAI/LLMs, which a) puts humans translators out of work, and b) ensures you'll lose readers, because GenAI/LLM translation is basically Google translate: no context word for word translation.

So you need to contact your publisher about this AND make sure you future contract include a clause demanding human translators for the FULL job--not just "fixing" slop.

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2025/02/03/how-translation-works-book-title-edition/

Apolline Dsc @apolline.bsky.social:
French publishing house Harlequin decided to use AI translation instead of human translations.
All their freelance translators (some of whom had been working with Harlequien for +30 years) were told they would no longer receive work from Harlequin.
If they want to keep getting work, they can review (meaning rewrite) the AI slop, for one third of their normal rate (which was already low to begin with).
Readers, we have to complain about it, hold the publishers accountable, and boycott these books.

John Scalzi @scalzi.com (on Bluesky):
Remember how I said I have it written into my foreign language contracts that my work has to be translated by an actual human? This shit is why.
Those book translations are gonna suck. The'll save money putting out books that are going to be painful to read. That's not a great long-term strategy.
(quoting Apolline's Bluesky post about Harlequin switching to GenAI translations)

John Scalzi @scalzi.com (on Bluesky)
Authors, remember that you CAN insist on human translation of your foreign-language editions and have it written into your contracts. You can no longer just assume you're going to get a human to work on the book whose every word you wrote wit intent.
I wrote a piece about translation earlier in the year, talking about how a good translation isn't, and can't be, just matching words one for one.

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84d

New on my #blog: "Holiday Post 2025: Books and reading." https://itinerantlibrarian.blogspot.com/2025/12/holiday-post-2025-books-and-reading.html

Third post in my holiday series, and today we at some of those book lists out this time of year.

#books #reading #ItinerantLibrarian #Christmas #holidays #writing #bookstodon 💙📚

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84d

Looking for some soft, comfy reading to ring out this hard old year? You're sure to find something delightful in my whimsical fantasy story collection. Elves, gargoyles, mischievous young magicians, heroic aunties, brave doggo, and much more.
#fantasy #wizards #monsters #fae #witches #sorcery #elves #heroines #FoundFamily #GoodBooks #reading #writing #AmReading #FediBookfair @bookstodon

Bookshop.org
https://bookshop.org/p/books/relics-from-a-traveling-show-k-m-herkes/0abf2118b4e0a1c2?
Other booksellers:
https://books2read.com/RelicsFromATravelingShow

3D mockups of a paperback and ebook for Relics From a Traveling Show by K. M. Herkes on a green background with dancing gingerbread figures wearing top hats in the foreground and strings of vintage holiday bulbs hanging overhead. The cover of the book shows a figure in a green and blue traveling cloak, shown from the rear, seated at a desk gazing out an arched window at a carnival tent bathed in sunset light. The figure has short brown hair, and they are petting the ears of a dog sitting beside them. The dog's mouth is open in a happy doggy grin. An eldritch lamp decorates the desk, beside a binder labeled "DPS Orientation Guide." At the left stands a tall bookshelf filled with artifacts, books, and knickknacks. A bonsai tree sits on the windowsill, and a pair of sinister glowing eyes lurk in the shadows behind the chair.

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72d

Welcome to WordWeavers 2026! Here are January’s #WordWeavers questions!
Written by @AlinaLeonova & I, you’ll find the month’s questions pinned to our profiles on the 1st. All are welcome to join in.
Participate with a WIP or an already published book.
As always, play the days you want, skip the others. Please use CW as necessary. Looking forward to seeing your answers & meeting new friends.
#amwriting #writing #authors

January 2026 #WordWeavers 1. What are your wildest (writing-related) dreams for this year? 2. How does your MC talk? Describe their voice and speech. 3. What does the way your MC talks reveal about them? 4. Describe an uncomfortable situation a character experiences. 5. Tell us about something funny that happens to a character. 6. If your antagonist played video games, what would be their favorite kind? 7. What's your MC's family like? 8. Antagonist POV: What advice would you give to people 10 years younger than you? 9. Have you invented any words/sayings/swears etc. for your story? 10. SC POV: Describe a perfect setting for you to relax. 11. What does the opening chapter of your story reveal about the world it's set in? 12. Does your MC have a good support system? 13. Where was your latest writing session? How did it go? 14. If your MC lived your antagonist's life, what would they be like? 15. MC POV: What's the most exciting thing that ever happened to you? 16. If your MC had one photograph near where they sleep, what or who would it be? 17. If cost wasn't an issue, what would your ideal setting be for you to write in? 18. Your antagonist gets a call or message from their mother. How do they respond? 19. Who is the most moral character in your story? 20. Do you make use of weather in your story? If so, how? 21. If in the middle of the book your MC discovered a foundling, what would they do with it? Created by @BranwenOShea@writing.exchange &@AlinaLeonova@wandering.shop

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82d

50% off @ #Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1667520

The Hunter seeks peace and quiet to mourn the loss of her best friend in a world that seems bound and determined to make that task impossible. Enemies attack when she’d rather be alone, allies can’t take a hint and the arch-demon Wrath seeks the Hunter’s hand in marriage, even though she’d sooner kill him.

@bookstodon
#author #indieauthor #writing #fantasy #actionadventure #fiction #books #EOYSale25 #ebook #sale #books2read #indiebooks

(Left) The cover of She Seeks Peace, by Owen Tyme.

The background is a snow-capped, craggy mountain with green, grassy hills at its base, which feature yellow and blue flowers.

The foreground is dominated by the round symbol for peace, in gold. Along the bottom of it are two olive branches. At the top is a dove in flight. Arranged on the lower three spokes of it are three figures based on the AIGA symbol for a woman. The figure on the right is blue. The one in the middle is a very dark gray, bordering on black, which includes a top hat. The figure on the left is red and has horns, like a demon.

(Right) The background is a view from the interior of a gun's barrel, with the rifling very apparent and the following quote over the top:

Reggie looked down the barrel of one of his own pistols, which the girl held in both hands, because the M1911 was a little large for someone so small.

There was a long, silent moment as the girl giggled and met his gaze. The murderous look was gone, replaced by something more playful, like a cat toying with a mouse.

(Bottom) https://books2read.com/SheSeeksPeace

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79d

Chapter 44 of Stone Prophet is available to read on #RoyalRoad: https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/108234/jigsaw-city

Nicole flies through the air, thrown free of Olyna's attempt to step on her by the extreme air pressure!

Seeking control, she uses a little known fact: self-image determined shape within any mindscape.

Nicole forces herself to believe she's a dragon and begins to change form...

@bookstodon
#author #indieauthor #writing #fantasy #scifi #sciencefiction #sff #actionadventure #fiction #fairies #webseries

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81d

Free @ #Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1462617

Having an abusive assassin for a sister was bad enough, but when Lyra’s older sister, Nicole, becomes obsessed with killing the teenage troll, her life becomes a special kind of nightmare. Will she escape, or become just another victim of the unstoppable woman?

@bookstodon
#author #indieauthor #writing #fantasy #scifi #sciencefiction #sff #sciencefantasy #scifi #actionadventure #fiction #books #EOYSale25 #ebook #sale #books2read #indiebooks

(Left) The cover of Troll Song, by Owen Tyme, Illustrated by Ryan Johnson.

There's a woman in mud spattered white, leather armor crossing a pair of short swords against the neck of a terrified, shirtless dwarf.

The woman has white hair and a darker skin tone on the left side of her face. Her left eye is green and her right eye is blue.

The dwarf's hair and beard are blond.

The background is a green forest, with some flowers among the tall grass.

(Right) The background is a snow-covered forest, with a pair of dark silhouettes in it, one small and the other large, like a giant. The smaller silhouette is of a young woman walking away and the interior is filled with musical symbols, in green, white and two shades of blue. The larger silhouette is a woman wielding two swords and the interior is full of blood spatter. The larger one appears to be chasing the smaller one.

The following text is laid over the scene:

“I can’t die until Lyra takes her last breath! She’ll regret betraying her sisters!”

“There’s no price I won’t pay to see that happen, no pain I won’t endure and I’d sacrifice the whole world to seal her fate!”

(Bottom) https://books2read.com/TrollSong

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43d

“I love winter… I love the peace of the nature reserve with its labyrinths of bare branches and its startling sunsets. I love the blitz of wee birds at the feeders in the garden. I’m not so keen on the damp grey days, I admit. So It’s no hardship to stay at my desk.”

—Val McDermid on how winter fuels her creative process – via @literaryhub

@writingcommunity

https://lithub.com/ice-and-inspiration-an-ode-to-writing-in-winter-from-val-mcdermid/

#Scottish #literature #writing #winter #creativity #crimefiction

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82d

Fedi hive mind, I'm writing a story. The MC investigates a Luo folk song (re: oral history, Uganda/South Sudan) that has clues saying 500 yrs ago an astronomer from China visited and documented Luo space travel technologies (portals to the stars). This knowledge is now lost and my MC has to unravel the clues, but what clues could point to China without usung racist stereotypes? Perhaps a word, a name, a description, something?

Context in the next toot.
#writing #writingcommunity #sff

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85d

Hello, I’m new to Mastodon. Here is a little bit of information about me.

#Photography #Canon R5 Mk2
 #fiction/#nonfiction #books
# fountainpens
# tea+#chocolate
# history 
#Writing #poetry/short fiction

(no description)

Edited 85d ago

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79d

50% off @ #Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1559436

Spies, aliens, trolls, wizards and a disowned prince use a time machine, but Levi Jacobs stands in their way, despite having just lost his parents in war. Will he stop them or will they kill his father at a pivotal moment, on which the fate of the galaxy hangs?

@bookstodon
#author #indieauthor #writing #fantasy #scifi #sciencefiction #sff #sciencefantasy #scifi #actionadventure #fiction #books #EOYSale25 #ebook #sale #books2read #indiebooks

(Left) The cover of The Third Wish, by Owen Tyme, illustrated by Ryan Johnson.

A wizard in a black robe that glitters with hints of gold stands on a mountain and looks down at a city of sky scrapers covered in greenery. In his shadow lurks a creature with glowing red eyes.

In the background, the sun is setting and stars are becoming visible.

(Right Background) Four images separated by black lines, with the silhouette of a woman wielding two swords laid over them. She's outlined in black and her interior is yellow clock-based imagery that spirals outward from the center.

The upper left quarter is a queen in a red, furred robe, wearing a gold and diamond crown. She has dark eyebrows and blond hair.

Upper right is a planet seen from orbit.

Lower left is a symbolic wire frame representation of the view inside a wormhole, in green and yellow.

Lower right is dandelions among grass.

The angle of the planet, one of the woman's swords, the yellow highlights of the wormhole and some of the dandelions form a line that draws the eye along a sweeping curve.

(Right Foreground) The following quote:

He admired the flawless beauty of the insane swordswoman’s fluid movements as Ida took desperate step after step, backwards!

He felt waves of mental energy pour off the panic-stricken troll, but the energy bounced right off of Nicole’s mind, as though she’d shut herself inside a solid, red-hot, steel box of rage!

(Bottom) https://books2read.com/TheThirdWish

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1y

New article: Dependence - Confession 95

https://reader.tymoon.eu/article/438

#creativetoots #writing

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1y

#Society always tries to convince you that you need a solid reason to do something. It has to be worth your #time, whatever that means, and I always found that idea confusing.

For starters I never chose to have all this time. It was given to me randomly one day and I appeared here with a bunch of it, that everyone always wants.

What's worth my time is for me to decide, society just wants me to think differently so they can have a piece cuz it's valuable.

#philosophy #writing #lifelessons

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77d

50% off @ #Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/1657116

After experiencing the death of his wife and child, destruction of his home world, an addiction forced on him by the one responsible and a third of the galaxy falling under the heel of that tyrant, Levi Jacobs, a wizard, seeks to unravel the secrets of time and fate.

@bookstodon
#author #indieauthor #writing #fantasy #scifi #sciencefiction #sff #sciencefantasy #scifi #actionadventure #fiction #books #EOYSale25 #ebook #sale #books2read #indiebooks

(Left) The cover of The Inverted Glass, by Owen Tyme.

The Background is a pink and purple nebula in space.

The foreground is largely line art, in white, with a black shadow outline.

At the center is an hourglass. The bottom has black sand, with a white figure standing in it. The top has is an inverted mirror image of the bottom, with a black figure in white sand.

The hourglass serves as the balance point for a set of scales, which hold a heart and a feather. The heart is on the left and the feather on the right. The heart is lower than the feather.

(Right) Lying in blue sand is a heart made of the same sand, full of cracks. It glows from the inside in a warm, yellow color. Over that is the following quote:

Nicole felt an extreme kind of loss, realizing she’d been stolen away from the afterlife, just before finding out if she deserved punishment or not!

“How dare you do this to me? Why?”

“I’m always in need of strong spirits and I’ve seen none stronger. You have unique talents I refuse to see go to waste.”

(Bottom) https://books2read.com/TheInvertedGlass

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43d

RE: https://mastodon.scot/@scotlit/115984516098304467

Also interesting to see that walking is an integral part of her #writing process:

“ I’ve walked for miles around my local nature reserve, or on the Fife Coastal Path, or along the banks of the Water of Leith in conversation with my characters, teasing out the idiosyncrasies of their speech patterns, testing how they navigate conversations, deciding how they will react in moments of crisis or revelation.”

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