Was in a meeting today with two backchannel chats going with other participants. My limited-track mind is not built for that kind of multitexting.

We're looking for a new managing editor! This full-time position
plays a central, collaborative role in the production & promotion of NER, including print & digital publications, events, & student experiences.

Applications are due 5/1.

Learn more & apply here: apply.workable.com/middleburyco...

Thanks so much for reading it!

Wow, another brilliant one by @graythebruce.bsky.social in @splitlipthemag.bsky.social

A ghost story that's breathless, breath-taking, &...

CAN STILL HEAR YOU BREATHING

Loved that panel.

Haven't done this in ages:

Everyone go get a free PDF of anything I've ever published, magazine issue or book. Use code FREEPDF to zero out your bill @ checkout. Choose any PDF at StanchionZine.com/shop (scroll waaaay down to see all the PDFs.

I'm so curious what you'll pick.

Excellent story. Timely and resonant.

"after all what is the difference between predictive text and a Ouija board" You're so gonna 💗I CAN STILL HEAR YOU BREATHING by @graythebruce.bsky.social in our APRIL ISSUE ✨ buff.ly/QRNp45B

Oh, wow. I didn't realize they'd addressed the book. I saw the 1986 West End version and while I'd loved the concept album (still have the cassettes), even at my age at the time I could sense the need for improvement.

Thank you for reading it (and for the boost), Liz!

This story is so much fun to read! I snickered like a co-conspirator at the line about her arm strength, and I laughed aloud at the repeated imagery of Hank being cared for, at all the playful ways the language infantilized him.

Thanks, Maura :-)

Thank you, Mari!

I Can Still Hear You Breathing — Split Lip Magazine when the barn in the moonlight shot them down as all around nowhere the twilight cried for clergymen so lethal was the road he spoke before your experiment was your experiment it was my joke you

Somehow I convinced the editors @ @splitlipthemag.bsky.social to publish a 1,300-word story that does not contain a single instance of sentence-level punctuation. Shhh. Don't tell them.

(For this ghost story, you may want to move any weapons out of arm's reach.)

splitlipthemag.com/fiction/0426...

Lightly-wrinkled textile portrait: color-blocked fabrics pieced together with zigzag-stitch line work. A dark green figure with red nails carefully threads the thick brows of a redhead with voluminous hair. A quilt-like pattern fills the background.

April showers bring: our fresh APRIL ISSUE. 🌼

WORDS by: @graythebruce.bsky.social, @kathystevens91.bsky.social, C. Zhang, & Quinn Franzen.

ART by: Ainaz Alipour.

PLUS: @iloveyoudaniel.bsky.social reviews an essay by @megpillow.bsky.social. buff.ly/cyFupU7

Spring Into Great Reads from the Short Mystery Fiction Society! About Shortmystery, genre insight from every perspective: reading, writing, revising, submitting, editing, publishing, and publicity.

The Short Mystery Fiction Society periodically shares updates about what (and where) members are publishing. I love that they're including descriptive blurbs and covers. Short thrillers are awesome.

shortmystery.blogspot.com/2026/04/spri...

don't care what you say about me, my LLM thinks every prompt I feed it is a work of genius, and I'm pretty sure it's objective

The cover for Uncanny Magazine Issue 69, "Kuolonuni" by Broci: A femme-looking figure with blue-green wavy hair and red eyes stands with one hand atop the other, open palmed up, a blue-pedaled flower with yellow stamens floats above centered to their chest. On their head is a pale blue snake with red eyes curled like a circlet. Their sleeves are pink, and their shoulders have wavy, yellow feathers or hair attached to a yellow and pink high collar. Behind them, green lily pads crowd each other out in a black background. The whole image has a hand-drawn look, with the colors textured like watercolors on paper. In white text is the "Uncanny" banner, "March/April 2026," Issue Sixty-Nine," and the artist, writer, essayist, poets, and Uncanny staff credits.

ICYMI, Uncanny Magazine Issue 69 Part 2 features new fiction by Theodora Goss, Sunwoo Jeong, and John Wiswell! buff.ly/DFoGFfz

Underrated ^

Earns the Shakespeare professor seal of approval.

Such a huge fan of Anubis Gates. That was my intro to Powers and I became so enthralled that I've been collecting signed copies of his stuff for decades. Like: I have the William Ashbless Memorial Cookbook.

Pushing English faculty to teach more grammar won't improve student writing--and will probably make it worse. (Sources: we now have at least three meta-analyses on this.)

I'll be there. First time.

excuse me while i take one from the bottom

that's where the stockers hide the best ones

Good thread. 100% agreement. Richard doesn't say it explicitly (though it's there), but those little clichés have been so heavily trained into LLMs that you'll look like one if you frequently use them.

❤️Submissions open until April 15: INCH --our little journal with a big heart-- is accepting manuscript submissions; read all about it: buff.ly/jGeTkNA

maybe an actuarial table

*jams knife into table 23 times*

IDES!!!!!!!!

<not an actual threat against tables>

A young adult I've met thinks the one weird trick for getting out of the draft is to say he'd frag an officer. Apparently, he and his gamer friends are all sure of this. Um, no, you're thinking like someone trying to get out of jury duty. With a draft, that's how you end up in prison.

Worth tracking. They're going to keep appropriating the face of human expertise and slapping it on AI impersonation-based services.

The traditional, middle-road, mainstream position on this usage is to oppose it.

*Before* AI, you'd have expected firms to pay you to use your likeness to sell stuff.

That's a heck of a team-up. Here for it.