You too! Hit me up if you're ever out in Seattle—it's been too long!

Yaaaaaaay! Congrats, Max!

The world's most adorable baby wearing a stolen hat.

To be fair, this baby could rob a 7-11 in broad daylight and no jury in the world would convict.

The bizarre flip side of the "men aren't nurturers" meme is that whenever I babysit my friends' kids in public, it's like being a Disney princess. People smile at me wherever we go. I'm suddenly assumed to be a safe and trustworthy member of the community.

The belief that men can't—and shouldn't—be nurturing is in the running for "most damaging tenet of American society."

🤘🤘

This reply literally sent from my shower as I attempt to repair it. 😂

Flier for an author event/book club discussion, showing the cover of DARKHEARTS (featuring two teenage boys about to kiss) plus James's face. James L. Sutter Author of Darkhearts April 24 5:30pm at Ashley's Pub in Bremerton, WA

BREMERTON! Come hang out this Friday with me and @ballastbookco.bsky.social's Reading the Rainbow book club! I'll be chatting and answering questions about DARKHEARTS, writing, gaming, or anything else. Meet at 5:30 at Ashley's Pub, right beneath the bookstore!

www.ballastbookco.com/events/20260...

WTF

Right?! And it turns out a lot of us who looked extremely artsy when we were out on the town in our 20s are currently 45 and wandering the plumbing aisle of Home Depot trying to match grout colors.

Lolllllllllll that's amazing. 😂

I also appreciate that so many of my favorite hardcore bands look like middle-aged dads—mostly because they're middle-aged dads.

This is the natural lifecycle of a band: start as kids touring in your parents' minivan, end up touring in the minivan you use for your own kids.

Don't get me wrong, I love me some artsy punks. But I also love when I read something totally mind-blowing and bizarre and then the author is a nondescript middle-aged parent in a minivan being like, "Oh, I just love that body horror, don'cha know! I wrote that during T-ball practice!"

A lot of wild, amazing art is made by extremely normal people.

Even as one of the more germ-avoidant people I know, I recognize that if I truly acknowledge how filthy my phone is and how often I touch it, I'll never feel good again.

I came here to post exactly this. Well played!

Capitalist art is supposed to reflect mass taste but turns out it just reflects the insecurities of the middle aged men who mostly comprise the managerial stratum.

I do find it ironic how we have to have all these delicate conversations about what to do about ICE when Trump and co. have executive fiated USAID, DOE, the Wilson Center, institute of peace, CFPB, and now the Forest service

To whoever in the military is playing Lucy from Peanuts and yanking the nuclear football away at the last second: thanks, please keep it up.

You have more in common with the people of Iran than you do with anyone in this administration, any member of the technocracy, anyone who is profiting from this war, or any billionaire. When you see Iranians forming human chains outside key infrastructure sites, you should feel a sense of kinship.

Teen who went to photograph L.A. 'No Kings' rally shot, blinded by Homeland Security agent, attorney says Tucker Collins, an 18-year-old freshman at USC, attended a 'No Kings' protest in Los Angeles on Mar. 28. He ended up getting shot in the eye with a less-lethal projectile by a Department of Homeland S...

"Tucker Collins, an 18-year-old freshman at USC, attended a 'No Kings' protest in Los Angeles on Mar. 28. He ended up getting shot in the eye with a less-lethal projectile by a Department of Homeland Security agent and is now blind."

Darkhearts: A Novel A Novel

DARKHEARTS is a queer YA romance and coming-of-age story about falling for the boy who stole your chance to be a rock star, set in my hometown of Seattle: bookshop.org/p/books/dark...

There's no great answer to consolidation in the arts, but there are lots of little ones: Shop at local bookstores. Get audiobooks from Libro.fm. Buy music. Subscribe to indie streaming services like Nebula. Use the library. Support artists on Patreon.

We need to create ecosystems, not monocultures.

Yes, Amazon has been a huge boon to self-publishing. But make no mistake: their goal is complete market control. And once they have it (which I would argue they already do), what's to stop them from changing the terms? They can take 99% of your revenue if they want. Where are you gonna go?

I know established creators who've been randomly and permanently banned from selling on Amazon for unspecified reasons, without ever being able to appeal to a human. And there's literally nothing they can do about it.

These companies *do not care* about individuals. We're just numbers to them.

We *must* decentralize the arts.

Right now, a creator's entire career can be shut down instantly because a bot logs a fraudulent copyright claim or uploads an unauthorized AI version of their art, and then a bot at Amazon/Youtube/etc. decides it's more efficient to ban the creator than adjudicate.

It's horrifying that all we can say in the face of an insane supervillain announcing his plans to nuke an entire civilization is "call your reps," but—call your reps. Jesus Christ.

I am once again reminding you that I'm at Norwescon this weekend. Come say hi!

I Work Very Hard, And I Would Like To Try Cake By A Horse Hello. I am a horse. I work very hard at my job of being a horse. When humans say move the heavy thing, I move the heavy thing. When humans sit on top of me and pull on my head, I carry them where they want to go. The main food the humans give me is hay and oats. But I am thinking it would be nice to have a different food. I am thinking I would like to try cake. Yes, yes. Cake. I know all about it. When humans eat cake, it is in glad times. It is the food for a celebration, such as when a woman becomes 47. I have seen cake on the Fourth of July. When humans have a cake, they stand around it and clap hands and smile and say happy birthday at each other. Sometimes there are beautiful markings on a cake, such as balloons or a pink shape. Sometimes the top of a cake is on fire and a boy must blow on the fire with mouth wind. This is the scariest cake. I do not want this kind. But I will eat any other cake. Any cake that is not the fire cake that tries to kill the boy. Please understand: I do not get money for doing work. I do not get to go inside the house. All I am either doing my horse job or standing in my pen or eating food off the floor. I always do these things. But I have never once gotten cake and I would like it very much. I have noticed that human children get to eat cake. But I am bigger than the children. I am more helpful to the farm. Children do not move the heavy things like me or let anyone ride on them. And yet they get cake. Maybe the humans will realize this. Maybe they will say, "You know who deserves cake? That horse. That horse whose back we are always on." Every day I dream about what it will be like if I get to eat cake. Here is what will happen. First, I will walk to the cake and putt my nose at it like hrrfff to make and stomping my hooves to make sure it is not a snake. Then I will trot in a circle to show that I am a horse and I am large. After that, I will nuzzle the cake to …

The horse op-ed is an instant classic. I can't tell you how much joy this piece gives me.

It should be taught in every introductory writing class in no small part because the horse arguments are so compelling. "I have noticed that human children get to eat cake. But I am bigger than the children."

James's Norwescon schedule: Friday Romantasy: YA or Nah? 11:00am - 12:00pm @ Cascade 13 Camden Rose (M), Kendare Blake, Marta Murvosh, Miranda Levi, James L. Sutter Signing (and selling) Books 12:00pm-1:00pm @ Dealer Hall From Campaigns to Contracts 3:00pm - 4:00pm @ Evergreen 1 & 2 Amanda Cherry (M), Rosemary Jones, James L. Sutter, Monte Lin, Sandra Rosner Freelancing 101 4:00pm - 5:00pm @ Cascade 11 Rue Dickey (M), John Godek, James L. Sutter, Luis Loza, Sean K. Reynolds Saturday Timeless or Nostalgic? 1:00pm - 2:00pm @ Cascade 6 Lish McBride (M), Lily Meade, Sonja Thomas, Gabrielle Harbowy, James L. Sutter Freelancing 201 4:00pm - 5:00pm @ Cascade 9 Jennifer Brozek (M), Luis Loza, John Godek, Erin Roberts, James L. Sutter Sunday Not Instagram Ready: YA Protagonists That Aren't Always Perfect 11:00am - 12:00pm @ Cascade 7 & 8 Lily Meade (M), Sonja Thomas, James L. Sutter, Margaret Owen, Gabrielle Harbowy Teen & Tween: Careers in Media 12:00pm - 1:00pm @ Cascade 5 Erica Angeline Solano (M), Bradley Englert / Orbit Books, Oz Norberg, James L. Sutter, Camille Meehan

Who will I see at Norwescon this weekend???