kaylene

Hello people!
Wanted to ask if you have a book releasing from September 2025-August 2026 that you would like to be covered on Jamreads (SFF/Horror/Hist-Fic/Spec-Fic). (Trad/Indie equally)

Would you be so kind to put in the comments (so I can start working on my TBR with time?)

💙📚

Calls Open/Upcoming TRUNK: stories that took the long way   Concept: Stories that met with many rejections before being published. This can include both reprint or original stories. In either case, …

Feeling rejected? Send your story to us for TRUNK: stories that took the long way.
This anthology of SFF stories with 20+ rejections (10+ for novelettes) is open for submissions now.
books.metaphorosis.com/calls/

PBS DIDNT "BECOME WOKE" YOU GREW UP TO BE A BAD PERSON

We have failed Big Bird.

“The events of WWII are increasingly becoming a part of a distant past. It will be up to members of future generations to ensure this history and the stories of those who survived are not forgotten.”

For a split second I thought this was The Onion. But no, this was the inevitable outcome.

Oh no, that’s a whole big mood… 🙃

Claphams Clock Museum in Whangārei, NZ is probably my favorite weird museum I’ve been to. Absolutely obsessed.

What It’s Like to Be a Student Who Hates ChatGPT “Everyone is using it”—almost everyone.

you've heard about the college kids who can't do anything without ChatGPT's help—but what about the students who oppose generative A.I. for myriad reasons and refuse to rely on it as a shortcut? well, I found and spoke with a few of them here: slate.com/life/2025/07...

A Democratic Mayor arrested.

A Democratic Congresswoman indicted.

A Democratic Senator tackled and detained.

A Democratic State Representative killed.

A Democratic State Representative in critical condition.

We can all see where this is going.

I’m just saying whatever actually happened it’s republicans’ fault. Their hands are covered in blood and this was the inevitable result of decades of dehumanizing people and when they and the mainstream media insist it’s “both sides” they are full of shit.

also if you want a series of novellas with Chinese mythology and queer themes, you can't go wrong with the Singing Hills Cycle by @nghivo.bsky.social

start with THE EMPRESS OF SALT AND FORTUNE

BREAKING NEWS: This video will likely improve your day.

22-year-old Māori lawmaker Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke was just suspended for 7 days over the haka she initiated in New Zealand’s Parliament last year.

“The rules of Parliament don't really see or fit Māori people,” she told @teenvogue.com, in the profile we ran just last week.

A map from the Economist, of how dumplings spread from Italy to Japan by way of the Mongolian Empire

Maybe my favorite Food Map, ever.

Me: okay, I'll be productive after I finish this book.
Me, after finishing the book: ........ok, but what if I just *started* the next one.

(Future me is probably crying. I'm sorry, future me.)

None of us need help with ideas, we need our bills paid so we have time to write our ideas. We need security so we can play with ideas instead of spending mental energy on keeping the lights on and rationing groceries.

Like did these AI advocates never have an idea pre-2023? FFS

The PROP method for analyzing sources P -- Primary or secondary? Was this person an eyewitness to the event they are describing, or did they just hear about from someone else? R -- Reason to lie? Who is the author? Does this person have a reason to hide the truth or distort the facts? O -- Other evidence? Are there any other sources that can confirm what this person is saying? P -- Public or private? Was this source meant to be read by the public, or was it a private communication? People are more likely to be honest in their private diaries than they are in a public speech.

I used to use this strategy, the PROP method, to teach critical thinking skills in American history twenty years ago. It's as helpful and relevant as ever. How do you know something is true? How do you evaluate what you are hearing or reading? The kids always loved "reason to lie." Be skeptical!

This similarity also struck me as I read The World Turned Upside Down a few months ago…

The same applies to translation. If you don't enjoy the challenge of sitting with the words and crafting the perfect voice to match your source author's, why are you even here? The pay's not that great. And it can't be for the glory of it—we can't even get our names on the covers of our books.

In a discussion on The Tarriffs, a coworker said that the US govt MADE money for the first time this year, said she had read a report on it. What report is this??? I have heard nothing of this and would like confirmation that this is a real report?? (If anyone knows, please link me.)

How much will we risk in the name of AI? AI safety breaches are a very present danger. Evidence shows that leading chatbots are perpetuating Kremlin talking points, while many leaders tout optimism rather than concern.

Commentary: Russian propaganda is infecting AI chatbots all over the world — yes, including the ones many of us use. Yet too many leaders are burying their heads in the sand.

Gee, could it be that those professional reputations were built on having actual knowledge about a topic, but then tonguing the plagiarism machine shows blistering laziness as well as a total lack of critical thinking skills & the ability to understand consequences? Reputations aren’t forever.

That said, I’m sure that back in the early-00s, there were more people struggling more than I assumed. Just… not quite as much as these kiddos.

As someone working in k12, reading comp *has* dropped over the last decade. I can understand struggling with Shakespeare, Dickens, even Fitzgerald… but I have high schoolers struggling with To Kill A Mockingbird. It feels like a small slide backwards every year.

You love to see it. Keep that energy going.

Prismacolor pencils are very nice but have a very different feel than most others that I’ve used—they are waxy, so it takes a bit of adjusting to. My favorite pencils are actually Crayola and Faber Castell; as long as you understand how color works, most brands are decent.

A mosaic of 17 similar but non-identical graphics in black and white with simple graphics. Text on each varies from a basic "Be Alert For..." format, and each has art to go with the theme. The 17 are: Be Alert for Cats, featuring a cat silhouette; Be Alert for Dogs, featuring a dog silhouette; Be Alert for Hanahaki Disease, featuring a figure spitting out two flowers; Be Alert for Idiots in love, featuring two people with question marks over their head passing a heart between them; Be Alert for Knives featuring a knife; Be Alert for Little Goobers featuring a little alienish blob with big staring eyes and tendrils coming from it; Be Alert for New Blorbos featuring a figure emerging from a box; Be Alert For New Books featuring a stack of three books; Be Alert for Plot Bunnies featuring an open book with a bunny leaping across it; Be Alert for Plot Holes featuring a person sinking into a black hole with an exclamation point over their head; Be Alert for Poor Little Meow-Meows featuring a person with devil horns who is crying; Be Alert for Porn With Plot featuring two figures, one standing, one sitting crosslegged in a chair; Be Alert for Porn Without Plot, featuring two figures, one atop the other in a bed, mostly covered by a blanket; Be Alert for Redemption Arcs featuring a figuring holding a U Turn sign; Be Alert for Submission Deadlines, featuring a stack of papers with a timer over it; Be Alert for Transmigration Risks featuring a person falling into a book; and Be Alert for Unreliable Narrators, featuring a smirking figuring surrounded by text bubbles.

A mosaic of 16 similar but non-identical CAUTION stickers in yellow and black. Each design features the word CAUTION, text, and an image that matches the text. The sixteen designs are: Caution Angst, with a bandaged anatomical heart; Caution Dead Dover: Do Not Eat featuring a bird lying on its side, with an x for an eye, with a fork and knife on either side of it; Caution Enemies to Lovers with two swords crossed, a heart over them; Caution Fake Dating, showing two hands clasped in a handshake; Caution Fluff featuring a fluffy sheep; Caution Mutual Pining with a stand of three pine trees; Caution OMG They are Roommates featuring two figures sitting side by side on a couch; Caution One-Night Stand beside a nightstand with a lamp on it; Caution Shelf Nearing Capacity showing a full bookshelf; Caution Slippery When Wet with three tentacles emerging from waves; Caution Slow Burn beside a lit candle; Caution There's Only One Bed with a neatly made bed; Caution To-Be-Read Towers with three big stacks of books; Caution Whump, featuring a person with their arm in a sling, their leg bandaged, and a crutch; Caution WIP Longer than Expected featuring a document page so long it's folded back on itself three times; and Caution Work in Progress showing a stack of papers with a partially filled progress bar over it.

A mosaic of three blue and white signs that are similar but not identical. The first is a blue and white sign with a list of five items, each with a small illustration. The five are: color palette; reference materials; pen; ...pen; are you sure you have your pen?. Text at the bottom reads, "The required focus aids above must be prepared before a drawing session. The second is a blue and white sign with a list of five items, each with a small illustration. The five are: preferred website; suitable timeslot; cozy blanket; imminent schedule; and comfort blorbos. Text at the bottom reads: the required focus aids above must be prepared before a fanfic-reading session. The third is a sign with a list of five items, each with a small illustration. The five are: beverage; ergonomic support; background noise; suitable strategy; involuntary distraction. Text at the bottom reads "the required focus aids above must be prepared before a writing session."

A collection of caution tapes, each with different text: Angst Beyond This Point; Major Character Death Beyond This Point; Caution Dead Dove: Do Not Eat; and Warning Slow Burn.

Our Fannish Safety Sign Sticker Campaign is up on KS! Made with all of creator’s Xianyu Zhou’s fandom love, these 37 stickers offer warnings for fannish tropes, character archetypes, memes, and more. Get one sticker, get 'um all, mix and match, and customize your order! Learn more: shorturl.at/DBRI0

Now *this* is what AI is good for! This is an expert system developed by applying machine learning to a specialist, selected dataset, is designed for a specific, technical purpose, refined by human experts. And does not require the wholesale theft of creators' copyright intellectual property.

A rectangular gray gravestone, inscribed with Whitin Badger, 1906-1992, Dwight Cooke 1908-1992, and underneath the line "THE UNICORN WAITS IN A DARKENING WOOD"

Hey, who wants something nice?

So I was on tour this month, and when I was doing my event for the Princeton University Library and the Princeton Public Library, I ended up at the graveyard, where I found this gravestone: