J. Ashley-Smith

Scene from Twin Peaks - The Return. An enormous black kettle spewing steam, and the numbers 4, 8, 5, 5 and 1.

This David Lynch episode of Sesame Street is the worst.

A five thousand year old megalith poses beside author J. Ashley-Smith (who is almost as old).

Separated at birth?

Mentorship Program 2025 AHWA MENTORSHIP PROGRAM IS OPEN TO APPLICATIONS The AHWA Mentorship Program is open to applications for 2025. Applications will close at midnight on Thursday, July 17th. Offers will be sent to…

Spooky writer friends, if you have a project @australasianhorror.bsky.social mentorship program applications are open until the 17th! 👻

australasianhorror.com/mentorship-p...

I had a fantastic experience being mentored by @spooktapes.bsky.social in 2022 and blogged about it if you want more info:

Meant every one of them.

Undertow’s Best Weird Fiction of the Year is the gold standard anthology for strange stories - I’m so glad it’s back after what seemed a lifetime. Delighted and honoured The Beautiful Thing You Once Were made it into the list of notable stories, alongside some of my favourite authors of the genre.

A chapter, for sure. I stop noticing it after a para or two.

Mary Gaitskill quote: "I would sometimes get five rejection letters in my mailbox at once. The main thing editors would write was that the characters were too hapless, and it was all too depressing."

Life goals

Weird fiction people? Legends! 🖤

Thinking also about the writing advice I got from my amazing AHWA mentor @spooktapes.bsky.social back in 2022 to imagine your ideal reader (singular) when revising, and the effect you want the story to have on them, which I still find really helpful today

Ha ha, yup. Still writing for Cody. ❤️ (Thanks, Celia!)

Huge congrats!

It was pretty close for me. (Didn't recognise that I would always put Libs bottom on principle, but otherwise all good.)

It's now made of carcinogenic sugar alternatives, sawdust and my childhood tears.

2024 Aurealis Awards Shortlist Announcement Now in its 30th year, the 2024 Aurealis Awards, Australia’s premier speculative fiction award, attracted more than 830 entries across 15 categories, including 34 nominations in the tri-annual…

Check out the shortlist here: aurealisawards.org/2025/04/15/2...

And the story @bourbonpenn.bsky.social : www.bourbonpenn.com/issue/33/the...

3/3

It's the 30-year anniversary of the Awards, too, so doubly special to get a nod.

Congrats to all on the shortlist, especially the many good friends and colleagues! (I'll spare you all another round of multi-tagging – know that I love you all and think you're ace.) 2/3

Street mural of a magpie speaking with an old lady with green skin who may or may not be a witch (she has a pointy nose)

Delighted to learn my tragic, magic realist magpie love story – The Beautiful Thing You Once Were – has been shortlisted for an Aurealis Award. Some stories you just love irrationally, and this one broke my heart over and over as I wrote it... 1/3

Ping: @bourbonpenn.bsky.social

They’re fucking awful. What were we like as kids that that shit tasted like fucking ambrosia?

Editor: Love the book, Leo. It’s another masterpiece. But do you really need the 2nd epilogue?

Tolstoy: Stet. How else will my readers understand my book’s themes without an essay to explain them?

Editor: Ok. Let’s say we keep the 2nd epilogue… does it really need all 5 chapters?

Tolstoy: Stet.

So glad it arrived safe and sound!

#womeninhorrormonth CALVARIA FELL by @CatSparx & @KaaronWarren blurred so many genre lines. And horror was one of them. Salute to these two talented authors!

https://smpl.is/8sbjz

#CatSparks #KaaronWarren #CliFi #WeirdFiction #DarkFantasy #Horror @Kaaron Warren @Cat Sparks

I can almost taste it.

Woman in black with silver hair, laughing her head off while holding a book and two small paper prints and a sticker and wooden bookmark

SKIN is a very intense book about love, art, pain and letting it all go, and if @lostmirror.bsky.social didn't make me laugh so hard this would have been a very serious portrait 💀 And @meerkatpress.bsky.social has the presales now plus incredible swag #queerhorror #industrial #art

My stuff from last year in case you're voting for awards and need a reminder of stuff!

Congratulations to Joel Dane's THE RAGPICKER, a Foreword Indies Finalist | Science Fiction. An amazing book and we are so happy to see it on this list!

https://smpl.is/a3lmo

#forewordindiesaward #JoelDane #DarkSciFi #Dystopian @Joel Dane

I don't, in a million years, think my novella will garner enough votes for a Hugo nom. I'm not deluded. But I do know it is a damn good book, & worthy of your time. And to paraphrase Bilbo: why shouldn't I, have a crack at the prize?

(Ballot closes March 14).

Congrats! And omg that cover!

Huge congrats to Seb Doubinsky's THE SUM OF ALL THINGS, a Foreword Indies Finalist | Fantasy. We love this book & are excited to see it on this list.

https://smpl.is/a3lhw

@SebDoubinsky.bsky.social #SebDoubinsky #ScienceFiction #forewordindiesfinalist

Thank you so much, Em. Appreciate the shout out.

We simply went ahead and did certain things that we felt we ought to do, and that seemed to us decent to do, nothing more nor less."

Later, describing his role as a dissident, Havel wrote: "we never decided to become dissidents. We have been transformed into them, without quite knowing how, sometimes we have ended up in prison without precisely knowing how…

When he was at last imprisoned, the only writing he was allowed was a single two-page letter to his wife each fortnight, every word of which was closely scrutinised and censored by the prison guard.