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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Sep 18

Privileged AF to get my grubby mitts on an ARC of this near-future fever dream. Avail yourselves of a copy - and a pair of knee-high railroad spike boots - the split second it drops!

@kkoja.bsky.social @meerkatpress.bsky.social

meerkatpress.com/books/dark-m...

J. Ashley-Smith holds up a copy of Kathe Koja's new novel Dark Matter.

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Reposted by J. Ashley-Smith

C.H. Pearce @chpearcewrites.bsky.social · Aug 18

Fantastic thread, thank you! 🙏🏻 I loved “The Beautiful Thing You One Were” by @spooktapes.bsky.social in Bourbon Penn. I also have a FUBF “Bird’s Eye View of the Old City” (magpies again) upcoming in Drabblecast in a few months 🖤

www.bourbonpenn.com/issue/33/the...

J. Ashley-Smith > The Beautiful Thing You Once Were > Bourbon Penn

Perhaps I should have been surprised when the magpie first spoke. Strange as it may seem, I had become quite used to the mimicries of those curious backyard birds, with their pristine black-and-white ...

www.bourbonpenn.com

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Aug 6

This David Lynch episode of Sesame Street is the worst.

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

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Jul 15

Separated at birth?

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

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Reposted by J. Ashley-Smith

C.H. Pearce @chpearcewrites.bsky.social · Jul 14

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:

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…

australasianhorror.com

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Jul 11

Meant every one of them.

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Jul 11

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.

Undertow Publications 🇨🇦 @undertow.bsky.social · Jul 10

Impossibly, I've made my selections for The Best Weird Fiction of the Year. Will announce the contents soon. Here, though, are 20 other stories I found quite notable, to be acknowledged in the book.

undertowpublications.com/shop/best-we...

Stories: The Sea, Like Glass
Caesura
Hair of the World
Their Wings as Powdery As Bones
The Beautiful Thing You Once Were
The Coalface
Way Up in De Middle of De Air
Plunged in the Years
Absent Below the Lip
Wayback
The Ferryman
The Dying Chorus
After We Kill Our Father and Before We Reach the Mainland
Brick City, Stick City, Straw City
Not All Your Bones Are Yours
Warmth
Shepherd Not Sheep
The Limner Wrings His Hands
Dissection of a Mermaid
Paraffin
Authors: Ainsley Hawthorn
Alice Hatcher
Aliya Whiteley
Avra Margariti
J. Ashley-Smith
Jack Klausner
Jamie Roballo
Jeffrey Ford
Charles Wilkinson
Leslie What
Lynda E. Rucker
Max D. Stanton
Max Franciscovich
Nika Murphy
Plangdi Neple
Sean Padraic Birnie
Simon Strantzas
Vajra Chandrasekera
Wailana Kalama
Will VanDenBerg

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · May 22

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

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · May 19

Life goals

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."

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Reposted by J. Ashley-Smith

C.H. Pearce @chpearcewrites.bsky.social · May 14

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

J. L. Westover @mrlovenstein.bsky.social · May 13

find your niche

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · May 15

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

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · May 6

Huge congrats!

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Apr 17

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

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Apr 16

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

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Apr 16

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

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

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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…

aurealisawards.org

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Apr 16

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

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Apr 16

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

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)

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Apr 14

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

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Apr 13

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.

J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Apr 2

So glad it arrived safe and sound!

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Reposted by J. Ashley-Smith

Meerkat Press @meerkatpress.bsky.social · Mar 19

#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

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J. Ashley-Smith @spooktapes.bsky.social · Mar 13

I can almost taste it.

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Reposted by J. Ashley-Smith

Kathe Koja @kkoja.bsky.social · Mar 12

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

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

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Reposted by J. Ashley-Smith

Kaaron Warren @kaaronwarren.bsky.social · Mar 12

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

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Reposted by J. Ashley-Smith

Meerkat Press @meerkatpress.bsky.social · Mar 10

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

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