Claudia Putnam

Sure, rant, but consider that some of us are SO sick of content optimized for the web and really want an immersive experience. Does that mean extra content, no, but sometimes what seems extraneous is enriching to the close reader…

I have one in the woods behind my house.

Agree

A Malayan Pit Viper illuminated by flashlight, eating a recently-caught frog. Image credit Gerard Chartier, CC-BY 4.0

Pit vipers need to hunt in the dark—they sense vibrations on the ground pretty well, but they even prey on birds or fast prey that require precision strikes.

Instead, they use some of the most sensitive organs on the planet to locate prey.

1/6 ⚛️🧪

Copper helps power the entire planet, enables the transition to greener technology, is crucial for the production of red blood cells, & makes exquisite & durable art. Throw in 100% recyclability, & you have the perfect ore. #NoLube :)

#OreCup ⚒️ sci-fi 🧪 🖖🏼 scifi Geosciences #WomenInSTEM geology 🍎 🔭🪐

mRNA in COVID-19 vaccines may call immune cells to fight tumors, boosting cancer immunotherapy. Could this be a game changer? PMID:41129646, Science 2025, @ScienceMagazine https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aed2823 #Medsky #Pharmsky #RNA #ASHG #ESHG 🧪

Self-portrait with Imaginary Brother after Willem de Kooning Eventually the "imaginary brother" becomes a wife or a lover, a daughter or a wife. A "Woman Sitting" (1943) is sitting in the middle of a war. The breast that is showing does not appear to be loved. It lives in a society of thieves: no hands. Even the pink lady isn't pink, she's a head full of teeth. Now it's 1948. Painters may not be trembling, but the world is. Turned over, the secretary is a piece of furniture, her paint running upward impossibly from the face. She'll do anything you say.

The perfect brushstrokes of this poem by Elizabeth Willis.

Nah for me it’s the new actor

Too Many Sharks: A Warning About "Agents" No, seriously

Wrote a thing about agents. If you’re a new writer or are actively querying, hope this helps keep you safe!
gabinoiglesias.substack.com/p/too-many-s...

I truly detest these people. Habitat protection and extension is the issue

Maybe Don’t Talk to the New York Times About Zohran Mamdani It’s remarkable, the people you’ll hear from. Teach for even a little while at an expensive institution—the term they tend to prefer is “elite”—and odds are that eventually someone who was a studen…

"Beneath its humdrum requests, every email said more or less the same thing: Can you explain how reading certain things can turn a person into a socialist—and, possibly, a terrorist-sympathizing antisemite? It’s a storied gambit of the right at its most grimly predictable"
lithub.com/maybe-dont-t...

Such a fun gathering!

Nice, @nataliemarino.bsky.social !

Great job!

Awesome cover!

If you are teacher and assign one of our stories for your students to read, our EiC is happy to video conference in to your class to facilitate the story and discussion questions with your class! buff.ly/rxWfDSV

We are looking for volunteer submission readers! Join a community of 200+ submission #readers at After Dinner Conversation. Help us find the needle in the haystack of submissions. (Being a #reader is the fastest way to improve your writing)

msg "info@afterdinnerconversation.com"

One Republican Now Controls a Huge Chunk of US Election Infrastructure Former GOP operative Scott Leiendecker just bought Dominion Voting Systems, giving him ownership of voting systems used in 27 states. Election experts don't know what to think.

@murray.senate.gov You are my senator, Sen. Murray, and please tell me that the Senate has noticed the purchase of the Dominion voting systems by a wealthy Trump minion. And Trump has announced euphemistically the GOP intends to steal the vote in 2026.

Why did this man buy Dominion?

Help us.

Thanks, Mike!

Awesome idea

i’ve been a regular donor to @wikipedia.org for years, but this is testing my willingness to continue. genocide denial is not neutrality. ignoring the verdict of 16 international organisations is not neutrality.

So beautiful and intriguing!!

YouTube video by NASA Space News Titan’s Magic Islands Explained: A New Study Reveals Their Origin and Evolution

"This recent video discusses a related phenomenon: the "magic islands" that appear and disappear in Titan's seas, which are thought to be floating, porous icebergs of solid organic material." www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1Q-...

There's a woman who is smashed flat between the demands of her job, caretaking, & the crush of domestic labor, making it almost impossible for her to find the time to write. Will you help her devote one month to writing so that she can tell the story that only she can tell?

storyknife.org/support/

“Never worry about the reader, what the reader can understand. When you are writing, glance over your shoulder, and you’ll find there is no reader. Just you and the page.”

-Richard Hugo

(Just a line from a book on #poetry that stuck out to me today)

Dude sitting in his car, holding up the cover of a book, The Divide, from Cornerstone Press.

Cover reveal. The author and an ARC of his beautiful new book, “The Divide,” from Cornerstone Press, release date of February, 2026. I’m so pleased with the folks at this press!

Truth right here:

Thanks to @brettpribble.bsky.social for selecting this story for Ghost Parachute, & to @b
Brooksie Fontaine for conjuring this illustration!

“In the past few years, arXiv has been flooded with papers. Generative AI / large language models have added to this flood by making papers – especially papers not introducing new research results – fast and easy to write. ”

blog.arxiv.org/2025/10/31/a...