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Gareth Hanrahan

@mytholder.bsky.social

4.7K followers 670 following 4K posts

He/Him. Novel THE SWORD TRIUMPHANT out May '25. Currently writing: Black Iron 4, A Different Unannounced Novel, Merryshire Detective Club, Terraforming Mars rpg, other stuff.

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · Jan 23

Gar's novels - a thread.
First, we've got the Black Iron Legacy series, starting with THE GUTTER PRAYER.

Three thieves - runaway Carillon Thay, slowly petrifying Spar, and corpse-eating ghoul-monster Rat - get embroiled in a web of intrigue and sorcery. Crazed gods, alchemy-punk, high weirdness.

Cover of the Gutter Prayer, showing three thieves in a spooky quasi-Victorian city

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Reposted by Gareth Hanrahan

John Jarrold @johnj.bsky.social · 5h

The second highly recommended epic fantasy series by an agency client, Lands of the Firstborn by @mytholder.bsky.social , which opens with THE SWORD DEFIANT:

www.orbit-books.co.uk/titles/garet...

The Sword Defiant

'Hanrahan's outstanding first outing in the Lands of the Firstborn series will thrill fantasy readers' Booklist, starred review THE SWORD CARES NOT WHO IT...

www.orbit-books.co.uk

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 7h

Ah, but how do you know you're not just a really, really, REALLY detailed painting on someone's stomach, a painting that SO detailed it thinks it's real? Dare you take the gamble that there isn't a giant belly button lurking just beyond the reach of your painted perception? *twilight zone music*

Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 1d

You can try OPTIONS->SETTINGS->LOAD PREVIOUS ITERATION and see if an older version of the Matrix works better for you

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 1d

OPTIONS->SETTINGS->DISPLAY and click the 'World Pulled Over Eyes' to 'off'

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Reposted by Gareth Hanrahan

cow tools daily @cowtoolsdaily.bsky.social · Dec 10

POV: you've committed the perfect crime, disposed of the weapon and and hidden the body, but now you arrive back at your pasture to find you are well and truly fucked.

Detective Columbo stands behind a wooden table with two irregular cow tools in it. He holds a 3rd cow tool and looks at it with his other hand scratching his head. He says, "Gee these tools are really something, aren't they? Y'know, my wife, she says they lack sophistication. But I just think that adds to the charm... Say... Don't they usually come in a set of four?"

Caption below the panel reads, "Cowlumbo tools."

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 2d

Or Tolkien going "this book is about death, and the fear of death".

Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 2d

Or the whole council of Elrond, where there's a very very long chapter discussing what the right thing to do is, because it isn't clear.

Or the fact that everyone from the leftmost hippies to a bunch of fascists lay claim to Tolkien, and both can cite textual support.

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 2d

Honestly, nothing beats my first game of Call of Cthulhu (1994) for an eye-opening “oh, this can be more than just dungeon crawling” moment.

Reposted by Gareth Hanrahan

noted bones haver @noted.bones.haver.maia.cash · 5d

become the Roko's Basilisk you would like to see in the world

Matthewせいじ @matthewseiji.com · Aug 14

It’s 2050 and a teen girl is torrenting a .tar.gz file of all the consciousnesses of all the tech bros who uploaded themselves into the cloud in a bid for immortality and modding them into The Sims 4

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Reposted by Gareth Hanrahan

Robin D. Laws @robindlaws.bsky.social · 2d

Did the lake’s mother write this

Public art at waterfront with text that reads
Cultivate a Practice of Unnumbing
To See and Feel the Invisible
Labour and Violence
Water Endures For Us

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Reposted by Gareth Hanrahan

Gareth Kavanagh @omegar24.bsky.social · 3d

In a big change for Octocon, in 2026 the event will be in cork.

I am looking forward to this, I think it is a nice venue.

2025.octocon.com/announcing-o...

Announcing - Octocon 2026 - Octocon 2025

Octocon is delighted to announce our 2026 venue and guests of honour! Clayton Hotel Cork City and Online Saturday 3rd October - Sunday 4th October, 2026

2025.octocon.com

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 3d

Hmm, I wonder what happened to my copy of that. It's not where I thought it was.

Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 3d

It's twenty years since I've run it, but listening to @itsquinns.bsky.social has got me thinking about it.

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 3d

Oh, man, it's so good. Have you at least read the Example of Play?

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 3d

It’s tempting. It’s very tempting.

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 4d

Yes Moffister.

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Reposted by Gareth Hanrahan

cow tools daily @cowtoolsdaily.bsky.social · 5d

it's not FOR us

edited comic panel. Batman is breaking a lump-with-handle cow tool over his knee and saying "this is the tool of the cow. we do not understand it. we will not use it."

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 5d

Possibilities - FISH, RAT, SQUIRREL.
More tenuous - BADGER.

Reposted by Gareth Hanrahan

The Author, Séamas O'Reilly @seamas.bsky.social · 6d

I write full time largely because of one thread about getting high with the Irish president. As cringe as it is to admit, my entire life has been massively enhanced by Twitter and ketamine over precisely the same time that those two things have proven less beneficial for Elon Musk.

Conrad Hackett @conradhackett.bsky.social · 7d

Has anything great happened in your life because of social media?

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Reposted by Gareth Hanrahan

sky @iamspacegirl.bsky.social · Jun 11

the Lord is my shepherd, He shaves my entire body to make sweaters

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 7d

So very good

Simon Spanton @simonguy.bsky.social · 7d

"You're a mythago. I made you. My dreams made you. Like the journal said..."

A photo of copies of the 1986 Grafton paperback of Mythago Wood, the 1990 Grafton paperback of Lavondyss and the 1994 Grafton paperback of The Hollowing, all by Robert Holdstock. The cover art of the first is by Peter Goodfellow and of the second and third by Geoff Taylor.

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 9d

Also using a random table for 'what's next' to keep myself surprised.

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 9d

Today, two of the to-do things are playtest feedback, so I'm just pomodoroing one of them and powering through the shorter one.

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 9d

At the moment (i.e. last week), I'm doing 1000 words on X, 1000 words on Y, trying to keep momentum up; the first 500 words of the day on a particular topic are usually easy enough. It helps that many of them are new projects, so there's less overhead in switching right now.

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Gareth Hanrahan @mytholder.bsky.social · 9d

Just fixing up some playtest feedback for a Thing.

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