Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Mae Tang 董美妍

@maetang.myatproto.social

60 followers 49 following 770 posts

She/her. Writer. Chinese Singaporean immigrant to the UK. This is where I talk about writing. Books: - My first book. Shortlisted for the Hachette Children’s Novel Awards 2025. - Book One and Book Two. The series I'm currently writing.

Posts Media Videos Starter Packs

Pinned

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · Jun 24

I'm happy that my first book made the shortlist for the Hachette Children's Novel Awards 2025, which is part of the #NorthernWritersAwards with @newwritingnorth.bsky.social. Many thanks to the judges for their encouraging feedback, and congrats to the winners!

1 1 3

Reposted by Mae Tang 董美妍

Bona Books 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️🤘🏼 @bonabooks.bsky.social · 19h

ANNOUNCEMENT🎺🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️

Introducing our bona new quarterly literary magazine:

FANTABULOSA!

Pushing the boundaries of bold, authentic, QUEER storytelling. Bringing you stories of the uncanny, the dangerous and the fantastical.

& thanks to our brilliant #WrathMonth backers, we're fully funded for 2026 🤘

Bona Books Presents

A new queer literary magazine

FANTABULOSA!

Tales of the uncanny, the dangerous and the fantastical, from radical and unapologetic queer voices.

Science fiction, fantasy and horror
Short fiction & poetry

Submissions open now

6 90 150

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 20m

The children's book: Roman legionnaires' wheat porridge

Book One: freshly steamed, meat-filled bao

Book Two: roasted duck & hoisin, OR chicken of the woods, fried up with wild garlic leaves

Novella: rice porridge with salted egg & bao with red bean

The WIP: a Sunday roast, cut into small cubes

L. D. Lewis, Peach Jolly Rancher 🍬 @ldlewiswrites.blacksky.app · 5h

What would *your* book smell like if you engaged in a mega weirdo scented pages promotional campaign?

Reposted by Mae Tang 董美妍

Christopher Caldwell @seraph76.bsky.social · 12h

Black queer surfers. Black queer bank-robbers. Black queer sea monsters. Black queer sorcerers. Black queer rootworkers. Black queer sailors. Black queer saints. Black queer sinners.

It’s Black!
It’s queer!
It’s Here!

Now available!
www.neonhemlock.com/books/call-a...

Call and Response by Christopher Caldwell (pre-order) — neon hemlock

A collection of short stories. Publication date: October 14th, 2025. An 8” x 5” paperback. 188 pages. This is a pre-order—any other books ordered with it will ship when the pre-order is ready to ship....

www.neonhemlock.com

1 41 53

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 10h

In his book, "Staring at the Sun", Existential Psychiatrist, Irvin D. Yalom, quotes a terminally ill patient on the value of connection in tempering the pain of transiency.

Reading a book is like seeing other lights bobbing about. Writing a book is like lighting a candle for others to see.

A screenshot of text from Irvin D. Yalom's "Staring at the Sun" reads:

But are there no limits to the value of connections?
After all, you might ask, if we are born alone and must
die alone, then what lasting fundamental value can con-
nection have? Whenever I consider that question, I
recall a comment a dying woman made in a therapy
group: “It’s a pitch black night. I’m alone in my boat
floating in a harbor. I see the lights of many other boats.
I know I can’t reach them, can’t join with them. But
how comforting it is to see all those other lights bobbing
in the harbor.”

1 4

Reposted by Mae Tang 董美妍

Murk @ginkgogoes.bsky.social · 15h

Tree sparrow 🪶

1 24 100

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 13h

Edited more of Book Two. Not far off finishing this pass.

New book is now at 31,000 words. All the main characters are finally in the same location.

Reposted by Mae Tang 董美妍

Erin Brown @babblewocky.bsky.social · 14h

We did it!!!

Android Press has picked up our upcoming anthology!

Click on link for details about the project, sub calls, who all gone be there, everything!

Coming soon: The Cookout: A Speculative Fiction Anthology

Sci-fi, fantasy, & horror stories by Black authors, centering traditions of “the cookout” — the joy, the drama, and the delicious food.

www.kickstarter.com

2 13 21

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 21h

... a perceived feminising of genres via "cosy".

Whereas they'll give "cosy romance" a pass that way, because they also see romance as being predominantly a feminine genre already.

Anyway, I'm unhinged to post any of these thoughts because it invites discourse. I should just go write instead. 😂

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 21h

When I think about it, if I say "cosy romance", it's not likely to get people moralising or reacting as much as if I say "cosy horror".

I think that's because both "cosy" and romance are often seen as feminine, and horror less so (lol!)

Which heighten my sense that perhaps some folks react to...

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 21h

And I write a lot of trauma because writing is a great container for me to do that.

But reading doesn't *always* have to be about activating in response to trauma, to what is broken in the world. Sometimes it can be about quiet, about comfort, about silliness, about slice of life, & even about cosy

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 21h

I don't always want to read for challenge, because I get a lot of that in my own life (dealing with bigotry), and from my work life (sitting with clients and their challenges.)

If your need is to see your trauma reflected in print, I understand that too. I also feel the same way at times.

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 21h

I've done work where I listen to people tell me about their traumas all day long. It's been satisfying work. And then I come home, and sometimes I want something soft, comforting, lower stakes, because my autonomic nervous system has been having a workout all day, vicariously following my clients.

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 21h

"I don't like this thing because it's soft & offers comfort & respite, when I want stuff that's powerfully reflective of my trauma & existential dread." Sure! You do you!

But there's a jump from that to arguing that other people's taste for cosy is a moral failing or a threat to the inflected genre

1 1

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 21h

... specific traumas, especially systemic ones. So again, they see it as existentially threatening to whichever genre it's appended to, as if it negates every other hard-hitting, gritty treatment in that genre.

But it doesn't. All those other books in the same genre still exist and are available.

1 1

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 21h

... threatens the existence of the genre itself.

I think some of it is low key phobia of things that may be coded feminine: soft vs gritty, comforting vs challenging. People sometimes complain "cosy" is somehow going to draw your teeth or negate or deny the existence of...

1 1

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 21h

People wouldn't apply that rationale to other inflectors. Eg: if I said it was "punk", there wouldn't be the same reaction. "Punk fantasy", "punk horror" - people wouldn't look to justify a lack of fit between their tastes and the punk version of the genre, by arguing that punking it up...

1 1

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 21h

... continued existence of romance or fantasy. Most readers understand they can go read fantasy or romance if romantasy isn't their cuppa tea. But some people see "cosy horror" or "cosy crime" or "cosy fantasy", & immediately begin to argue about how the cosiness dilutes & threatens the whole genre.

1 1

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 21h

"Cosy" versions of various genres are sometimes treated as if they existentially threaten the genre, by people who could simply go and read something else they prefer instead. It's a standard seldom applied to other inflectors of genre. Eg: few people insist that romantasy threatens the...

Rachel Feder @rachelfeder.bsky.social · 1d

Tell me your most unhinged literary opinion, as a little treat

1 2 5

Reposted by Mae Tang 董美妍

Dominique Ramsey 𓃥 @dominiqueramseyart.bsky.social · 1d

The greatest thing you'll ever learn, is just to love and be loved in return

Marker, colored pencil, and ink pen.
11 x 14in

Illustration of a green deer hugging a hare, with the hare is hugging a mouse. All three animals hugging form the silhouette outline of the deer.

18 440 1.5K

Reposted by Mae Tang 董美妍

Joshua W. Cotter @joshuawcotter.bsky.social · Nov 6

A drawing of an anthropomorphic goat and sheep, the goat is saying “THEY UNDERSTAND THAT THE FORCE OPPOSING HOPE IS DESPAIR. THE DESPAIR WE FEEL IS MANUFACTURED.
AND WHAT HAS BEEN MANUFACTURED CAN BE TAKEN APART.”

8 1.3K 2.9K

Reposted by Mae Tang 董美妍

🌈 Romie glows in the dark 📽 @romiesays.bsky.social · 1d

Props to Benjamin for sharing the details of his contract. Unfortunately no props to MRM because there's a lot of extremely outre stuff in here that I'd refuse to sign. Let's run it down. (Context: If you're negotiating a contract with Strange Horizons, I'm the person you're negotiating with.)

Benjamin C. Kinney @benjaminckinney.com · 1d

New neuroscience short story forthcoming in @analogsf.bsky.social! Which also means a story of - ultimately successful - negotiations with their new publisher.

Includes full final text of my contract for all to use while they finish rewriting their boilerplate.

benjaminckinney.com/analog-negot...

Analog Negotiations & Short Story Sale: Recognition, Memory » Benjamin C. Kinney - still pruning...

Successful negotiations with Must Read Magazines & Analog SF, who will publish my science fiction short story "Recognition, Memory."

benjaminckinney.com

1 14 23

Reposted by Mae Tang 董美妍

FIYAH Literary Magazine @fiyahlitmag.bsky.social · 13d

Submissions for our next unthemed issue are now OPEN 📣
Tell a friend! Everything you need to know is here: fiyahlitmag.com/submissions/

63 60

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 1d

Much longer would have been too painful.

Submitted the longer of the 2 pieces. The other one I need to sleep on and edit again.

Wrote more of the new book/WIP, to bring it to 29,000 words. The new character has shown up, with his ruined lungs, fingers with badly healed fractures, & his kind heart.

Mae Tang 董美妍 @maetang.myatproto.social · 1d

Edited more of Book Two.

Wrote 2 pieces of short fiction. The shorter of the two was difficult to write, because it's raw and personal. I wasn't sure if I could do it. But I've had the idea for some time now, and I wanted to get it on paper. It needed to be short though, because of the difficulty.

Reposted by Mae Tang 董美妍

Joanne Harris @joannechocolat.bsky.social · 1d

I'll be signing and dedicating a copy of VIANNE in aid of this year's Children In Read. Interested? Bid here. www.jumblebee.co.uk/auction/deta...

www.jumblebee.co.uk

10 41